Breaking Bones, Hating Jobs and Chillin' With The Easter Bunny!

Six years ago-- almost to the day-- I broke my right ankle.  I was on my lunch break while I was working for a "well to do" day trading company and I was simply going to pay my rent.  The office wasn't open, so I had drop the check off in the mail slot.  As I was leaving the place, I stepped off their lovely deck, located right next to a VERY busy freeway, missed one of the stepping stones, turned my ankle and it was all over with.

I spent the next 30 minutes rolling around in the grass.  This was the first time I had EVER broken a major bone.  I mean, I danced for 14 years, so I had broken all of my toes at one time.. but those you simply tape to the next toe and move on.  But this was MAJOR pain!

Of course, expecting it to be a routine trip, I left my phone in my car, so I had no form of communication and the landlord's office was closed for lunch.  I rolled around on the ground like a damn june bug stuck on it's back.  I finally go to the point where I could pull myself up to the deck of the office.  I could see a doorbell, so if I could just get to it--  I could hopefully get someone's attention inside.  But as I'm crawling up to it, a maintenance man walks out the door.

I am in tears and probably looked like I had just been assaulted because when he walked out I was begging him, "Please sir!! Please help me!!!! I am pretty sure I broke my ankle!!!"  He looks at me, without skipping a beat and says, "Oh.. I just thought you were out here enjoying the day on the deck!" Haha! Really?  Just chillin' on my landlord's deck-- next the the feeder road-- while cars are zooming down the freeway on a very busy lunch hour...

Well-- needless to say, he called an ambulance, we got a hold of my boss and off to the hospital I went.

So, while I was working for this lovely day trading company, they were working hard shoving the idea of being "zen and at peace" down our throats.  I was a highly miserable, newly single mom with a 2 and a 6 year old.  It was not going to be easy for me to reach the status they wanted me to over night and not sure how ANYONE could force it upon themselves, but they somehow thought it was going to happen.  We had to write weekly essays on assignments they gave us that would sort of push us in their idea of the right direction.  Aaaand when they found out about my predicament, I had to write 1000 words on "how I could have avoided the break"

Now-- I wrote things about how I could have been more careful about my steps.  How had I been looking down instead of forward I would have stepped correctly and possibly not miss the pole two feet in front of my face.  I wrote all kinds of things-- but that was NOT what he wanted.  He made me rewrite it not once, not twice, but 3 times because I refused to write that I was fat and I could have avoided the break had I lost weight.

Just me, my cart and The Easter Bunny on MY lap!

Yeah-- I just said that-- he wanted me to write about how I could have avoided the break by losing weight.  First off, the break happened and there was NO avoiding it at this time. It happened, there was no looking back and what was done, was done. Second, WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE telling me that MY perception of the incident was wrong?  Third, the man telling me to write this was about 150 pounds over weight and I thought he could have used a GOOD look in the mirror.  Fourth, I quit that job in a matter of weeks with my middle finger in the air and a smile on my face after getting bitched out, through a group Skype convo, for not doing one of our writing exercises correctly.  He was talking, talking, talking and I was packing my bags. This one called for you to "go on a walk and just be..."  I was NOT going on a walk with crutches so I drove it.  Driving it was not acceptable SOOO... I made the whole thing up.  I lied and lied and LIED through my teeth and I was totally fine with that because they made me rewrite that one as well.  I stopped him and told him in a choice amount of words that he could save his breath because I was OUT OF THERE!  It was the first, but not the last of jobs I quit because I knew I was worth so much more.

Needless to say, the job was one of the worst experiences of my life that had just been tacked on top of the other worst experience of my life at the time-- being that newly separated, single mom who was not able to get along with the father of her children at the time.  BUT I learned a lot.  I didn't learn what they wanted me to learn-- but it was exactly what I needed at the time.

I learned that I wouldn't take shit from someone who thought I would take it forever-- just to make a few bucks.  I learned that I could have fun with this, rode the cart at Walmart with pride and even submitted some of the pictures to People of Walmart.  I learned that I had thicker skin than I thought because WHEW were some of the POW comments on my picture were cruel.

The actual picture I submitted to POW

And I learned that I knew what I was doing.  I knew there were going to be comments that were hard to swallow.  I knew there would be a rough patch for quitting my job with nothing new in mind.  I knew there was something to this meditation, put your mind at ease stuff  but I also knew there was a better way to do it.  My way, on my terms and with true willingness to change in my heart.  I learned to love me, that I would break bones, that life didn't come with a redo, that I could take better care of myself, that my decisions were my own and no one would force me to say, think or feel any different.

And P.S.-- I have never seen happier women then when I came to pick up the free pictures that Walmart provided with the Easter Bunny... They literally said-- "IT IS YOU!!!! WE HAVE BEEN WAITING TO MEET YOU!!!" Yeah-- I know-- I'm a celebrity n' stuff!

A Motivated Mama, The Easter Bunny and Carpe the Hell Out of This Diem!