| I never thought it could be May 14, 2004 Sooooo... I have another death defying story, and it involves both Teresa and I. We had just finished eating a delightful lunch at McAlister's and were driving back to my house. We were on College Street heading towards Watkins, having a pleasant conversation about tickling, when we heard the strangest of sounds, sort of like a crackling explosion. I saw light reflecting in the dashboard and when I looked in the rearview mirror, lo and behold there was a tree falling down onto power lines and into the road right where my station wagon had just been not two seconds earlier, meer feet from us. Teresa and I were rather stunned and we drove around the block to see what exactly had happened. Teresa observed that the tree's roots were rather "spindley". It looked to me as if someone had simply pushed the tree over. Hmmm... Anyway! It was way weird. I've been sitting here trying to think of an adjective to describe it. It was almost like a sitcom or something, where characters are driving around and they're causing mayhem behind them and not knowing it. Except Teresa and I didn't make the tree fall. I never thought it could be May 10, 2004 I've been debating for a couple of days on whether or not to write about something that happened to me on Saturday. And, obviously, I've come to the decision that I will. I didn't really want to make a big deal out of it or over-dramatize it, and I was also afraid of what kind of reaction I would get. But I think I decided to write mainly because I wanted to thank the two people, Andrew and Teresa, who were there for me. And it already sounds dramatic. Anyway, here I go. On Saturday, Andrew, Teresa and I went swimming at Greers Ferry Lake. When we got to the swimming hole, there was no beach because the water was so high. Which was weird. The water was also freezing. F-ree-zing. But we decided to brave it since we had come all this way, and hey, there were a bunch of children in the water and if they could do it, we could to. All three of us started to ease into the water, proclaiming the coldness each time the water touched a new part of our bodies. We decided that we would swim all the way out to the "don't-swim-anymore-or-you'll-get-hit-by-a-boat-yellow-caution-floating-thingy". Well, we started swimming and everything was going fine until I noticed that I was getting tired earlier than usual. At first I attributed it to the fact that I hadn't swam in some time. But as I kept swimming my muscles began to feel as though they were going to give out, almost as if I couldn't feel them. I decided that if I didn't get to shore or to the "yellow-caution-thingy" in a minute or two I would be in trouble. I looked behind me, the shore was too far; I looked in front of me, the "caution-line" was closer but still too far away it seemed. My mind started to panic, and began not to be able to hold myself up in the water. Teresa was about seven feet away from me, so I decided that life was more important than pride and called out to her. At first I told her I was having trouble, and as I did I noticed I could barely breath. She told me to float, I said I couldn't breath, she said she was coming. I began to panic more. As she swam towards me, she continually stated that I should float, but I couldn't get any air in my lungs to do so. My mind was thinking I needed something to hang on to, but I didn't want to take her down with me. I kept trying to float, but every time I got on my back my head would go under. I can't remember who called to Andrew, but he was soon there telling me to grab onto his shoulder and I remember Teresa saying something about swimming towards the "caution-line" because it was closer. With my hand on Andrew's shoulder, and Teresa's arm under mine, we swam towards safety. At one point, Andrew said I was holding on too hard, and I noticed later I couldn't have felt that if I wanted to because I was so cold. The closer we got, the calmer I became, and it became easier. But even when we got to safety, which seemed like forever, my lungs still felt as if something was pushing on them and I could barely feel anything. We talked about what happened and decided that I had had a panic attack. Which, of course, the water is the best place to have one of those. Even though it seems like this could have been prevented, most accidents and trauma are like that; you don't expect them to happen. I decided later that I was never really in any danger of dying; I had two awesome friends there to help me out, and I have an experience that I will never forget. That being said, I would like to thank Andrew and Teresa for all the help they provided and for being there for me. Consider this my eternal gratitude. You both mean a great deal to me and I love you very much. I never thought it could be May 6, 2004 So, I've got some wonderful news. On Friday, my father and mother are coming up because my dad needs something from the house for his new business, but I have no idea what it is so don't ask. After that my father is going back down to New Orleans and leaving my mother here to take care of some business and to spend time with family. So I got a guestbook entry that asked me to put a link up on my Merritt Butrick page that leads to a Yahoo! group. I think I'll have to think about that one. The page was meant more to create an awareness of a disease than to be a fan page. I like Merritt Butrick but I don't really know a lot about him, and I honestly used him as an outlet because I felt bad for him and I thought he was a good example of how AIDS can stop someone short of a better life. But I think I will put the link up eventually, I'll have to think about it first. |
| May 2004 |