True Life: People Like to Hit Me...With Their Cars

It's my favorite time, story time!

Sometimes, weird things happen to me.

For example, twice in my life, I've somehow managed to accidently stab myself with a pencil bad enough to cause some pretty good bleeding. I have a permanent gray spot inbedded in the tips of one of my fingers because of one of these incidents. It was 9th grade, it was English class, we had free time to chat and I was talking rather animatedly to my friends, my right hand holding a pencil, and I somehow managed with my gesturing to shove the pencil so far in my ring fingertip in my left hand, I'm pretty sure it stood up on its own. I pulled it out, held the injured finger in my opposite hand, and as a pool of blood filled up in it in a matter of seconds, I calmly walked to the front of the class, lifted my hands to my teacher and nonchalantly said "I need to go the nurse." I actually went to the bathroom first, and squeezed my finger SO HARD the entire way there that by the time I got there, the bleeding had almost stopped completely. Washed the blood off, went to the nurse, got a band-aid, went back to class within 5 minutes. No big deal. The other time was even grosser, so I'll refrain from telling you.

Another example, a few summers ago, I was at home alone and it was late at night. My neighborhood doesn't have streetlights and who knows why but no one ever EVER uses their lampposts so it's always uber dark. I'm in my room with the light on, and someone walks up to my window from the outside and knocks on it. And for whatever reason, my brain doesn't register fast enough and I stupidly walk to my front door, open it, and look out to see who was trying to get my attention. No one is there but there's a shady car parked across the street. That's when my brain starts working and I realize any normal person would ring the door bell or call me, I FREAK OUT, close the door and lock it, run into the bathroom, and sit there curled up in a ball crying for half an hour until my dad got home.

So weird things happen to me.

Sometimes, they especially happen while I'm running at nite.

And btw everybody I'm totally scared of the dark. Probably due to the story I just told you and the one I'm about to tell you, as well as the trend in my neighborhood to never use your outside lights.

Once, maybe about 5 years ago, I was home from Millersville for a break and decided I was gonna go out and run. I'm pretty sure this was the last time since currently starting this 5k training that I've run, and you'll soon figure out why. It was pretty late at nite, 11-11:30, and I decided to just do one little block around, about half a mile. On the other main road in my neighborhood, almost directly across from my house on the other street, I'm running, it's pitch black, and I notice there is an even darker shadowy person-shaped figure just standing silently in the middle of the road. Just standing there. Not walking by. Not holding a flashlight, a phone, nada. Not the neighbor who lived at that house. Not making a sound.

Just. Standing. There. Who does that?

I think somehow my brain protected me (or like in the previous story just didn't think), because the fear of WHO/WHAT THE HECK WAS THAT???? didn't register until after I casually ran by like I see creepy shadowy figures standing in the middle of the street silently in the dead of night everyday. But after I got by? That's when I realized the danger/creepiness factor. I sprinted the rest of the way home for my life, with the fear that all that person had to do was cut thru my neighbors yard to get to my house and beat me there anyway. But they didn't and I made it there, so out of shape I almost killed myself with exertion, and had no desire to ever run outside at nite again. Or just ever run again...how am I supposed to protect myself and get away from an attacker when I'm already hacking up a lung, out of breath and dying from running?

I run with mace now. Go ahead creepers, make my day. In all honesty I'm really curious about seeing the effects of this stuff, and have decided not to try it on one of my friends, even when they're curious enough to be willing to get sprayed haha. I also have been running in the morning as the sun's rising. Birds tweet, the air is cool, and it's a much happier, safer-feeling time than 11:30 at nite. But last weekend we had daylight savings and so when I was getting up at 6:15 before to run, it's now dark. And honestly, I'm not the morning-est of people and getting me up when the sun isn't yet is basically the impossible. The past few days I've been finding other times to run. Tonite, I ran after dark.

First lap around my neighborhood? Nothing exciting.

Second lap? I get to the same location, the SAME EXACT LOCATION as the shadowy figure in the middle of the road incident, and this car that's been driving down the road coming in my direction, instead of slowing or going in the other lane to give me space decides to SWERVE TOWARDS ME AND INTO THE GRASS TO TRY TO HIT ME. Yep, that really happened. I was a teensy bit freaked and considered finishing that lap and calling it quits for about 2 seconds. But I told myself earlier I would do 4 and kept going.

3rd lap around, I discover the location and identity of the car parked on a side street, and run right by the driver (a teenage/20-something girl) standing next to it talking to a friend. Jerks, I think. Don't really have the balls to say anything out loud tho, cuz lets face it. They're crazy and have a car, and I have a small canister of pepper spray. Not much good in this situation. End of 3rd lap, the car is on it's way out of the development, rounds a corner near my house, sees me, speeds up, at the last second jerks the car to swerve out of the way like something jumped out at them, and then maybe just my imagination but directs the car towards me again. I ran a good 6 feet into someone's yard that time the second I saw them coming and the driver ended up straightening the car out, staying on the road, and driving by. I kind of felt like flipping them the bird, or doing SOMETHING again, but refrained, for the same reasons I didn't call out to them earlier. And because I'm probably a lot tougher in my head than in real life haha. Instead I ignored and played it off like it was nothing, but I still can't shake the feeling of pure terror that shot through my heart the moment they turned that corner the second time and I recognized the car. Ok, so there's a chance that maybe she was just a terrible driver and when she saw me got distracted and started driving towards me? And then the second time decided to overexaggerate and sharply swerve out of my way? Even though I was clearly in the middle of a yard and her headlights should have picked me up and given her fair warning long in advance?

Ok, enough trying to explain it away, she wanted to hit me. That's fine, no big deal. ;)

No more running at nite for me. Dark shadowy figures, psycho young girls in ugly orange sports cars who can't drive and/or think it's funny to try to drive off the road and hit me...crazy things happen.




On the bright side, I just ran 3 miles nonstop, no sweat (ok there was a little sweat...but ya know what I mean ;) ) in pretty good time for the first time in....oh wait, I've never done that before ever! YAY!

Running, jury duty, and who let the dogs out?

With week 1 of training for a 5k under my belt (guys, that's a weird expression...I've just decided) I wanted to report on how I'm doing.

I actually ran every single morning this week and didn't quit after the first day...go me. And oddly enough I kinda like it.

With the exception of that morning when I went out a little later than normal and had to run past at least 4-5 high school kids waiting for the bus, followed by the bus (filled with more high school kids) passing me on the way to picking them up, then a 2nd random bus passing me right after the first one, and THEN when it went around the neighborhood, the first one passed me. AGAIN. As if the first go around weren't enough. So much for no one seeing me. It would only be right that of anyone who could've seen me, it had to be an entire busload of the generally most judgmental and mean group of people in society. Who probably have a bus-wide nickname or 2 for me by now...woooohoo.

And with the exception of the fact that my former cross country coach also lives in my development and I'm paranoid one of these days he's gonna come out of his house and just start running with me. It hasn't happened yet, so I guess I can't really count this as a con.

Also, now I have to pee uh thousand times a day, and I'm also even hungrier and have started eating like a teenage boy. Ok, it's not that bad.


But I digress/make lame excuses. It's going pretty well, REALLY well actually and the good far outweighs the bad. Today I ran a mile and a half in 18. Some women run the entire 5k in that amount of time haha. But it's progress! And I'm happy with it. And heck, it's only been a week. I'm not going for speed at this point.

The very best thing about running so far? My lungs feel AMAZING. My lung capacity has grown immensely and when I breathe in I feel like I can just keep breathing in forever. It's delicious. The other day on my drive to work, I took in a really awesome breath of fresh air and out loud said to myself "I'm ALIVE!!!" haha I was so happy about it. Other good things: it's helped me get up earlier, have more time to get ready in the morning, more time for introspection, feel happier, and in general feel more awake throughout my day.

Still can't believe I'm doing it.



On a different topic of discussion, I love my job, because I love the kids, and the people I work with. Today, as a bunch of us were in the classroom at the end of the day doing chores and clean-up and other end of the day activities, one of the kiddos, (who happens to be all legs and is VERY spontaneous, impulsive and not exactly in his right mind, so you need to watch him at all times) out of no where started jumping around singing "WHO LET THE DOGS OUT". Immediately after yelling/singing that, he bolted to the door, through the baby gate (that's to keep my client in there), and sprinted out of the classroom and down the hall. His staff chased him down while the rest of us just stood there wondering if that really just happened, and when he was caught he says to the guy "Good catch Mr. Derrick!" HAHAHA. It was a fantastic moment in my life.

Monday I have jury duty. Totally NOT excited about it, I hope I don't get picked. My work even pays me for a full week of not being there. And I still would just rather be at work. I suppose it'll be a cool experience and all. And I should just have fun with it...well, not literally you need to take it seriously, but you know what I mean!

As long as it's not a gross murder trial that lasts a month. Or something controversial that makes the news like the George Huguely trial that causes thousands of uninformed people who THINK they know everything to make a huge deal that our government is ruined, horribly corrupt, etc, that the judge was paid and let him off easy and this guy clearly murdered someone and he's a rich snobby little priviledged brat who's walking away without the death penalty and what is the world coming to yadayadayada. UGH. People. Were you on the jury? No? Then shut it. Where did you come up with all that information? One unflattering picture of the guy and you instantly knew his life story? Oh, you read a little blurb from the media and inferred the rest from it? IT MUST BE TRUE. And for the love of pancakes, the government isn't corrupt and the judge didn't make the decision, there is a jury. Which is made up of a bunch of carefully chosen, unbiased, unpaid, everyday people like you and me who do everything they can to make the right decision and see that justice is served.

Wooo sorry for the unexpected rant. It's a newly discovered peeve of mine. If you couldn't tell. ;)

Honestly, being on a jury for a murder trial would be pretty epic, as long as it doesn't take more than a week! I'll just hafta wait and see what goes down. I'm all hyped up and it'll prolly be a "we got a divorce and he's keeping money from me" kinda ordeal and I'll feel like Judge Judy having to listen to a bunch of idiots.

Words from an inanimate object

To the person who ripped me in half:

Congratulations, you're a jerk. I hope you get pregnant/get someone pregnant and the child has autism and you have to experience what it's like to deal with that every day of your life. Who'll be laughing then? You thought you were such a funny little vandal, ripping off the word autism so no one knows what the awareness is for. Karma my friend, karma.

Sincerely,
Sheridan's Austism Awareness car magnet

P.S. I noticed you left my friend the Phillies P magnet alone. Thank you. I guess that means that at least you're not a Yankees fan.