Day 40 Question 40:

What are some of the craziest things you have ever encountered/have ever had happen to you?

We all have those days where we see/encounter something or something happens to us and we stop and think to ourselves, “Is this for real?  or Is this really happening?”  There have been times in my life that I swear I was waiting for a camera crew to pop out from the closets or behind the couch and tell me I am on candid camera.  I thought I would share some of these little stories with my readers in hopes that you all share some stories with me.  My stories vary from funny/OMG really moments to somewhat sad and wishing this wasn’t real life.  I thought I would give everyone a variety.  Although some of the stories don’t always have the happiest endings, I love sharing them because it gives me the opportunity to re-live pieces of my life that I had kind of put on the back burner.  It makes me see where I have come from and how far I have come.  Anyhoooooooo, here we go:

1)      This first incident happened just yesterday 2/24/2012.  I had been working at the restaurant and my manager asked me if I could go over to the liquor store to pick up an order.  This was something I did quite often so I didn’t mind at all.  I got to the store and told the cashier I was there to pick up an order.  She was just finishing packing everything up.  While standing there these two young men (I would guess about mid 20’s) came into the store and said, “Do you know that there is a dead raccoon in a plastic bag outside of your door?”  I immediately whipped my head in their direction and said, “No way!”  He waved me over and told me to come look.  I was apprehensive at first then thought, “Yea I totally have to see this.  Who in the hell would leave a raccoon in a plastic bag.”  The girl behind the counter, the two guys and myself walked out of the store and one of the guys looks down and looks up and said, “It’s gone.  It was right here a second ago.”  At that moment we all look up to watch this raggedy looking man walking into the woods behind the liquor store with the bag in hand.  One of the guys pointed and said, “He totally took the bag.”  We all looked up and sure enough one of the dead raccoon paws was sticking out the side of the bag.  We all stood there in disbelief thinking to ourselves what the man was potentially going to do with the raccoon and thinking that this man had to have picked up this piece of road kill with his bare hands.  We were all taking a pretty good guess that the raccoon was going to be the man’s dinner.  We walked back into the store and literally all stood there with our mouths gaped open and our jaws gathering dust on the floor.  I said to the girl, “Well, I guess if someone is desparate.”  She said, “He just came in and bought a 6-pack.  He is a regular customer.”  Well, I can definitely see where some people’s priorities are.  Ha Ha.

2)      The second incident I am going to tell you about happened in I believe it was 2008…maybe 2007.  I tend to get my years jumbled up the more time passes.  I was living in a townhouse with 2 of my girl friends.  Well, only one of them is a friend now.  The other was a completely crazy person…but I won’t get into all of that now ;0)  I had a guy friend from back home (northern NY-I currently live in Murrells Inlet, SC) and ask if he could come down and stay with us for a few days.  He was going to bring 2 of our college friends as well.  I was completed stoked and of course said yes.  I admit though that I was a little apprehensive.  These three guys were good friends of mine in college but they were also rugby players.  I knew them at a time that they lived in a church that was converted into a house.  It was pretty routine for them to hold keg parties with masses of people that would get pretty rowdy.  Holes being made in the walls was not uncommon.  I told my friend that we were all grown-ups now so we could not have any damage being done to my townhouse.  He just laughed and said that would not be a problem.  The boys arrived on a sunny afternoon and we immediately went to lunch.  The beers started flowing.  It was so fun to be back with these guys.  My new friends were meeting my old friends.  My boyfriend at the time was able to meet people from my past.  It was so much fun.  We stayed at the restaurant for a while just catching up and drinking.  We decided to go back to the townhouse and set up a beer pong table in the back yard.  The boys actually had a friend that lived in the area (about 45 minutes away) so he came down to hang with us as well.  There was about 10 of us there I would guess-the more games of beer pong that were played the hazier it got.  Well after an unknown number of games we decided that it was time to retreat inside and get set-up for some much needed sleep…or should I say it was time for everyone to pass out.  I walked into the living room and decided I was going to move the coffee table so we could set up the air mattress.  This was a glass top coffee table I must mention.  So, I picked up the piece of glass and was getting ready to lean it up against the wall.  Well my plans became botched instantly.  As soon as I picked up the glass off of the base (and we are talking about a 50-60lb thick piece of glass) it immediately buckled and the glass broke in two.  Due to how heavy it was I immediately fell to my knees and the glass hit the base of the table and broke again.  I wasn’t freaking out.  All that was going through my head was how much it sucked because I loved that table..UNTIL I suddenly saw blood squirting out of my arm.  I am not exaggerating when I say that the blood shot across the room and it kept spewing out of my arm.  After that the night becomes a little bit cloudy because of the loss of blood and insane amount of beer I had drank.  My roommate (she was in nursing school at the time) ran out of her room and immediately put a rag around my wrist and held it tight.  I lived about a mile from the hospital but there was a debate on how to get me there because everyone had been drinking.  Luckily, one of my friends arrived late and hadn’t been drinking at all.  All I remember is sitting in the driving saying that I did not want to die.  I forgot to mention that the cut was on my wrist…in the same spot where most people attempt suicide.  We arrived at the hospital, my roommate with no shoes and they admitted me in the Emergency Room immediately.  I was covered in blood from head to toe.  I had calmed down by this point because I knew I was in good hands.  The doctor came in and ask what happened.  I told him the whole story.  He numbed my arm and gave me five stitches.  Meanwhile the nurses must have asked me about 10 times if this was intentional (I did understand why they were asking) and finally I raised my voice and said, “YOU CAN SMELL THE BEER COMING OUT OF MY PORES-NO IT WAS NOT INTENTIONAL!”  She backed off pretty quick after that.  Luckily, I did not have to be admitted to the hospital.  I hate hate hate hospitals.  I arrived back home and pretty much everyone was passed out.  I went upstairs to my room and my boyfriend at the time was in the bed.  He rubbed my back a little and asked if I was ok—he wouldn’t recall doing that to this day because he was so hammered.  I pulled off my jeans and ended up having to scrub my legs because the blood had soaked through onto my skin.  The next day I woke up and asked my boyfriend what they did with the glass and he told me they dragged it out onto the backyard.  The same backyard that kids run through everyday.  I just shook my head.  I went downstairs and peeked out the back window.  The glass was covered in dry blood in 4 big shattered pieces.  By some magical force I got all of the blood on the glass and only 3 small droplets on the carpet.  Even my accidents I do in a neat manner :0)  I went outside and pulled the glass onto the porch and hosed it off so no one needed to be subjected to it.  For the entire day my arm throbbed all the way up to my shoulder but I was still in good spirits.  My friends and I went to the beach and had lunch at an ocean-front restaurant.  Everywhere we went they would tell the waitress that I tried to kill myself so I deserved a free meal.  I just sat there rolling my eyes and shaking my head so let’s just say that no free meals came to me that day.  While sitting there one of my guys friends from home said to me, “Hey Diane, remember when you told us not to f**k up your townhouse?  We weren’t expecting YOU to f**k it up instead.”  This is a story of karma biting me straight in the ass.  Although it was traumatic and blurry and insane all at once it is one of the best stories I have to tell.  If you were to ask my guy friends that were there they would tell myself that I threw myself into the table because I lost at beer pong.  :0)

3)      The last story I will share is one in which I wish I didn’t have to experience but in a way I am glad I did because it gave me a bigger glimpse into real life.  I will try to condense it some so I don’t go too overboard in this entry.  In 2008 I was a Parent Educator for a local nonprofit agency.  I would do home visits with parents (primarily single mothers that were low income/”at-risk”) and I would teach them various behavior models and developmental skills they could work on with their children.  I went into a lot of homes and some of these homes were extremely scary and it was hard to believe that people could actually live there.  I got a call from Department of Social Services asking if I could go visit this one girl who lived close to my office.  She was 14 years old with a 2 month old baby.  The reason I was called is because the baby had been in the hospital the week before with the flu and the doctor stated his concerns saying that the mother did not know how to take care of the child.  The day of the visit arrived and I decided to bring a coworker with me.  We pulled up to the house and in the driveway was a big truck with spinners and two big thug guys standing outside of it.  We went to the front door and when the door opened there was a waft of smoke and mold smell that hit my nose and never left.  The young girl came to the door and she couldn’t have handed me the baby fast enough.  It was almost like she wanted to give me the baby to take home.  While sitting there (which was frightening because the couch was so stained and absolutely reeked) it became very clear that this mother (remember she is 14 years old) was very slow developmentally.  I would guess her to be functioning on the level of a 7 or 8 year old.  She had no idea how to handle this baby let alone herself.  I came to find out that the baby was a product of rape (the story was unclear though).  The house she was staying at was her boyfriends (well his grandmothers-and they both lived there).  Her mom was in prison and her dad lived just down the road but his girlfriend that lived with him had 2 sons and said that the house did not have enough room for her.  My coworker and I tried talking to this girl about her social activities and what she would do with her baby and it was like pulling teeth trying to get anything out of her of any substance.  While sitting there I glanced to my right and saw a young girl (I think it was the baby’s aunt) sitting on the bed and spit into a Pampers box.  This girl looked extremely rough.  I found out when we were getting ready to leave that the girl’s boyfriend was there the whole time but he was asleep and decided to not come out.  The number of people that came in and out of this house during the time of the visit was unbelievable.  The grandmother came from the back, which I am assuming was the kitchen, with a broom in her hand (which at that point seemed pretty pointless) and this woman was absolutely frightening.  This might sound cruel but this woman looked like she had already died.  She looked like the crypt keeper with most of her teeth missing and all she did was grunt.  If she was saying actual words I have no idea what they were.  In one of the corners of the living room on an old, junky table there were approximately 15 stuffed bears all piled on top of each other.  The wallpaper was yellowing and peeling off the walls and there were pictures and statues of Jesus everywhere.  If Jesus is real then these people needed him more than ever.  A little boy (about 3 years old) ran in from outside.  I have no idea whose child this was.  He started yelling, “Look Look the Po Po is outside.”  He then ran into the back of the house.  I tried not to show the shock and disbelief on my face but I am pretty sure it was there for all to witness.  I felt like this was a scene in a movie.  There was no way this could be real.  After about an hour my coworker and I finally left.  We drove back over to our office and talked to each other about all of the horrors we just witnessed.  By the end of the day I left the building and went to my car.  I got in the driver’s seat  and just started to cry.  I felt absolutely helpless because I had no idea what I could do in this situation.  The next day I called DSS and told them about my home visit.  I told them that part of my job was as a mandated reporter and if I ever felt anyone was in harm I needed to report it.  I had come to find out that a social worker had been to this household several times before I had.  I strongly voiced my concerns and told the woman I spoke with that I felt as if they pawned this family off on me because they did not want to deal with it and a case of this size was far beyond my job.  I ended the conversation by telling the woman on the other end of the phone that if someone did not get into that home and try to do something about that situation that there was going to be a dead baby or a dead teenager very soon.  They were harsh words but this was the case of a child raising a child.  They were 2 helpless people that were in a situation that was so unhealthy and so dangerous.  To this day I have no idea what has come of this case.  I always want to help when I can but I knew that due to legalities and the harmful issues at hand that this was way above me.  It is stories like these that make me look at my own life that make me so thankful and appreciative of all that I have and for who I am.  These situations are what push me to help others and to open their eyes to better themselves and better their situations.  Not everyone can be helped because they refuse to be but I want to do what I can.  It absolutely broke my heart to see people living in a world like that.