It Can Always Get Worse

A few years ago, my good friend, KG, had had an exceptionally trying year. As the new year began, she said, “It has to be better, because it can’t get any worse.” I had a sinking feeling when she said that. It seemed that she was tempting fate. I kept my mouth shut because, well, it was an opportunity not to be missed.

KG had indeed tempted fate. That year was worse than the year before. As yet another new year rolled around, she said, “I will never again say that it can’t get any worse.”

* * *

Summer 2001 was a huge suckfest.

In the weeks after my crash, friends came to see me from near and far. (I think everyone thought I was on my way out.) I had lots of flowers and cards and visitors. I was overwhelmed with the outpouring. I felt blessed to have so many people who cared about me and remember feeling somewhat surprised at how many people had reached out to me and my circle. Thanks, guys!!

I was finally released from the hospital on July 10. I was scared to leave. I was still so sick and I didn’t know how I would make it out in the world. Earlier, E had asked me where I wanted to stay; with her or my mother. Without hesitation, I said, "You." I did not want to stay with my mother because she lived in a very small two-bedroom apartment with my adult brother. (Thanks, but no thanks.) I didn’t want to be a burden to E, but I didn’t have anywhere else to go and I wasn’t in any position to actually do anything about it.

So, to E’s house I went.

I was still very, very sick. I had a feeding tube hanging out of my nose and a drainage tube coming out of my abdomen. My mom came and stayed with me a lot and took me to my weekly hospital visits. For once, my mom was a blessing. She didn’t leave my side for the last two weeks of my hospital stay and I was happy to have her there. I never thought I would have been happy to have my mother with me for two solid weeks, but I was.

On Saturday, July 28, E’s son was playing in a soccer tournament. They were going to be gone all day so E recruited my friend R to stay with me. R and I were just hanging out, doing nothing because, well, I couldn’t do a fucking thing. The phone rang and R answered it. She handed it to me. It was my dear friend and neighbor from San Francisco, BD.

BD: It’s DD.

Me: What happened?

BD: She passed away last night.

DD was my best friend in the whole wide world. And now she was dead.

It can always get worse.

June 15, 2001

In May 2001, I began a drastic change in my life. I had lived in San Francisco for 10 years, but had wanted to move to New York for the past few years. Even though I loved SF I was, for the most part, miserably depressed and needed a change. After much thought and lots of therapy, I began planning my move.

Using craigslist, I arranged to swap apartments with a law student who lived in Brooklyn Heights. She was interning in SF for the summer, and I wanted to keep my rent-controlled apartment for a few months—just in case I wanted to come back. I got rid of most of my crap, left a few boxes of stuff with my best friend, DD, and packed my car full. I left SF on May 31 with no set timeline for my cross-country adventure.

First, I went to LA. I had only been to LA a couple of times and I had never done the tourist thing. I spent a couple days there taking tours, going to Graumin’s, the Hollywood Bowl and Sunset Strip. From there I traveled to Las Vegas and stayed with a friend from college for a night. From there it was up to Vail to see a high-school friend. Then, I made a push to the Midwest, my home turf.

On June 15, while traveling from one friend’s house to another, I crossed the center line of a 90-degree curve on an old country road and hit an SUV head on. The SUV driver was fine, thank God. I, on the other hand, was near death. (That curve, by the way, has been straightened out and no longer exists. I guess too many folks bit it there.)

My head crashed into the windshield and bounced back. There was a bunch of long dark hair hanging from the windshield. There was blood all over my clothes. I couldn’t see out of my left eye. I couldn’t breath. Two things came to me almost immediately: 1) this wasn’t going to kill me (much to my chagrin) and 2) I would walk again, eventually. Isn’t that strange; that I would have those two thoughts immediately after realizing what had just happened and that it was my hair hanging from my cracked windshield?

A man came up to the window. He told me “They're coming,” or something to that effect and I told him I couldn’t breath. Thankfully, he popped the clasp on my seat belt. That first breath was like mother’s milk to a baby. After that, I could breath a little better, but not much.

The first car on the scene was my friend’s girlfriend, K. I had just left their house and she was on her way home from work. As she was standing by the side of the car I said, “I really fucked up, K.” While I was sitting there dying, I realized I was not going to make it to my killer apartment in Brooklyn Heights and I was not going to spend my summer working in Manhattan.

Within minutes one of my oldest friends, E, whose house I had just left, was there. She and K were standing there with looks of horror and worry on their faces. I really didn’t want to die in front of them so I held it together and stayed conscious, just like the paramedic was begging me to.

It took quite a while for them to get me out of the car. When I finally got into the ambulance I tried to fight the medics off, told them to let me die, and then I passed out.

I spent 25 days in the hospital. I could not eat nor drink for six weeks. I would not be able to walk on my own until September.

Now, like my mind, my body was wrecked, but not totaled.