Any Given Sunday – A Review

Editor's Note: Just to be clear. I received an email today letting me know that everyone involved is now safe and okay.

I decided that I’d take this long weekend to relax, but the weekend didn’t agree with me.

Friday, I came back to a messy house. Fruit was scattered about the kitchen, dishes littered the sink, and the entire counter top was flooded with soapy water. Bits of peanut butter were flecked across the stove top and I felt the dread that only comes from an uncontrollable need for order.

I’ve designed my life, in a lot of ways, to have no design. I am intentionally messy to keep myself from falling into old habits of meticulous cleanliness and to maintain the thought that order does not define me. I don’t, however, want to live in a place that’s infested with roaches. Which was the first thought that came into my mind as I shuffled around the three apples that, for whatever reason, sat on my kitchen’s floor.

I tidied half of the kitchen up, got frustrated and knocked on the door of who I suspected was the culprit. They seemed kind of surprised at the mess, but cleaned up what they knew was theirs and moved on.

Once the kitchen was clean, I cooked myself dinner, making sure to clean anything I touched to a degree of spotlessness that couldn’t result in me being called a hypocrite, and went into my room to hide.

I worked while eating, as to best utilize my time, so that way I could claim most of Saturday and Sunday to myself. This of course, only kind of worked, as soon thereafter I was playing video games with a friend. But! I did get around 1/3rd of my work done, which was a success enough in my eyes.

Saturday came around and the same thing happened. I got 1/3rd of my work done, got stressed at an overwhelming lack of cleanliness, and then hid in my room and played video games.

Despite doing my best to drown my unease in chip tune music and cartoon violence, I could not shake the tension. It was at this point that it had to be addressed. Why was I stressed? I boiled it down to work and issues rooted in my social life that I had decided to keep in, rather than express.

At some point, in all this stress I wound up in the bathroom with the intent to shave my face. I took my glasses off, and stared at my haggard eyes. The dark black rings reminded me that I hadn’t been sleeping. I was breaking out too. Especially on my neck, which has always been a sign that I was drowning.

“Great,” I said to myself, as I flipped the buzzer side of the electric razor open. I usually listen to music while I shave, and today was no different. I can normally finish shaving my face in around 3 songs. Which in my case is about 11 minutes. I stayed in the bathroom for the entire 23 song playlist.

I was not alright.

I vowed that Sunday would be different. I’d get my grocery shopping done (I even made a list), I’d finish my work, and I’d go for a run or something, weather permitting.

Well. It wouldn’t be much of a blog if it all went as planned, yeah?

Let’s start with groceries. My list was short, it mainly was just stuff to cook for dinner for the week and then a few amenities that were for me to snack on or that were just good to keep around, like peanut butter or popcorn. Well, I forgot to even check my list while I was there, so I completely whiffed on the snacks. I did, however, manage to buy enough food to cook dinner for the week, so that’s, at the very least, a plus.

While checking out with my less than complete stock of items, I get a call from my other roommate. I intended to ignore it and call them back, since you know, I was checking out at a grocery store. But I answered it anyway, feeling slightly rude to the clerk.

“What’s up?”

A voice, not belonging to my roommate, responded, “you need to get home, there’s blood on her face.” It was my roommate’s boyfriend on the phone. I could hear my actual roommate in the background crying.

“Whose?”

“The cleaning lady.”

Side note: my apartment has a cleaning crew that cleans the common space twice a month. But we never really know when they’re going to show up… today was one of those days.

“What happened?”

“We don’t know she just kept falling. Where are you?”

“I’m at the grocery store, just leaving.”

“Okay, we don’t know what to do.”

“Okay. I’m on my way.”

First and foremost, I made a mistake there. I should’ve said, “call 911!” or “did you call 911!?!?” But I didn’t ask.

I assumed I needed to.

So, half jogging, with a huge overflowing tote bag over my shoulder, I get emergency services on the phone and describe what I just heard.

The operator is confused and sarcastic, and it makes me extremely uncomfortable. I repeat my address to her 3 times and she confirms that 911 has already been called.

I breathe a sigh of relief.

I’m 5 blocks away at this point. Running to my house. An eggplant had fallen out of my bag, but I managed to catch it.

When I turn the corner, I see EMS waiting at my door… to be buzzed in.

Apparently, there’s no emergency access code. They’re let in as I come up and I follow them up the stairs.

When I enter behind them, they ask who is injured. My roommate and her boyfriend look stressed, on the verge of tears, “her,” they say, simultaneously.

They point to the kitchen. There’s a person standing there. They seem fine.

“Me?” they ask.

“Yes, you, you fell!” my roommate says.

“I didn’t fall.”

EMS looks confused, and I’m guessing I do too. What did I just walk into?

My roommate turns to the two EMS personnel now, and says “she fell and couldn’t get up, she grabbed my leg. She just kept falling.”

“Ma’am,” began one of the paramedics, “are you diabetic?”

“No,” they said.

“Hm,” the other hummed, “where are you right now?”

“Working.”

It’s then that I notice how they're standing. Leaning hard on the faux granite countertop behind them. They have one leg twisted to the side for support. Their hands are wrapped hard around the counter’s lip, knuckles white, arms shaking.

The two EMS people must have noticed it too, as they began to walk up to her.

“Ma’am, what day is it?”

No answer.

“Ma’am, what city are we in?”

No answer.

The paramedics walk them to a chair and sit them down. They ask "if she feels funny, or different."

They say “my tongue kind of hurts,” and then they stuck it out. On the tip there are four deep cuts. The two in the middle are long and shallow, the two on the outside are deep, but are shaped more like pinpricks.

“She bit her tongue,” I whisper.

“Do you have a history of seizures?” the paramedic asked.

The cleaning person began to shake their head no, but stopped themself and nodded. They started to cry.

“What’s going on?” my roommate said under her breath.

I’m wondering the same thing. They're clearly scared. But is it because they're confused or something else?

EMS checks their blood pressure and probably does other stuff that I’m not even paying attention too.

They're shaking, and I don’t know if its physical or mental. And I just want them to be alright.

EMS takes them to the ambulance, I finally put the eggplant down, and we bring their supplies down and put them in their boyfriend’s car. He seems mad, not at them, but at the situation. We figure out that they're scared we’re going to tell on them. That we’re going to get them fired. We repeatedly tell them that they're fine.

From the back seat of the car, I hear someone say “is mommy OK?”

There’s a little girl in the back. No older than one of my students. And my heart breaks.

I go upstairs and the apartment is half clean. I tell my roommates I’ll handle wiping the floors and surfaces down. But they insist on helping. Before they see it, I wash the blood out of the sink.

They’re both shaken up, rightfully so. “I can’t believe her daughter had to see that,” my roommate says, referring to the broken woman and the angry man.

We’re all cleaning the place and we get to chatting about the mess of fruits on the floor, they were hers, we discuss cleanliness, routines, and work. We talk for fifteen minutes before we split and go our separate ways.

I put my groceries away. And go sit with my knees to my chest on my bed.

After an hour, I get up and get most of my work done. Everything I need for Tuesday is finished. I was meant to get Wednesday and Thursday’s work done today, but I can’t focus.

When I’m finished with my work. I cook. I’m working with tofu for the first time, and it goes decently. I decided to make a riff on baba ghanoush too. That also goes alright.

When I’m finished, I’m back in my room and I hear a knock on the door.

When I open it, it’s the police.

I’ve never been afraid of law enforcement. But when they talk to me, I get a little nervous. Maybe even defensive. It’s usually the way they rest their hands on their belt, inches from a gun, that makes me uncomfortable.

I figure we’d need to file some report or something for the incident. But instead they ask me why I keep calling 311 on the second floor. Their tone is accusatory.

I knock on all my roommates doors and ask them if they called 311, they haven’t. I tell the police officer as much and they believe us. I don’t know if I would be so trusting.

They said the department received four 311 reports today and yesterday. And I tell them that it makes sense, as the 2nd floor is extremely loud, but that I know for a fact its not me. In the past, I’d just go talk to the kids that lived there. The officer tells me that if this happens in the future, I should address my landlord, something I cannot do thanks to living with Bedly.

The officer leaves, and my roommate (the one who was there with EMS) says “no more cops. No more emergencies. No more!”

And I chuckle, “you’re telling me.”

I go back to my room. Close the door. And just stare at the ceiling. At this point, I’m in an unreasonable headspace. I’m going over all my failures as a friend, as a teacher, as a human being. I’m consumed by the thought that I’m pushing the people I love away. I’m eaten by the words of a student who told me that I failed him. I’m wrapped up in the idea that I will never be enough for anything or anybody.

I take out a sketchbook, some pens, and a set of watercolor markers. And I let them take me to midnight.

I chat with an old friend about our love lives, their ranking on vegetables, and our very different philosophies.

And eventually, I go to sleep.

I still have black circles under my eyes.

I still am feeling trapped.

But, at least its Monday. And at least, I’m finding time to relax.

Thanks for reading. I know this is a long one. Proud of you for sticking through it. Have a nice week.

And as I told my kids, people have today off, take some time to remember why.