Why am I sitting on the ground?

One year ago today, my day DID NOT start out well.

One year ago today, my week DID NOT start out well.

One year ago today, the last week of Fall 2009 DID NOT start out well.


One year ago today, I got another reason to want to return home after returning from Thanksgiving Break.

One year ago today, I left my apartment as usual. It was nippy outside, but snow had yet to make an appearance. Black ice, however, had arrived.

I had never really known the difference between black ice and regular ice. I knew that black ice was harder to see but to be honest, if the ground was shiny and it was cold outside, I trekked with caution.

Leaving my apartment to go to class, I didn't trek carefully. I couldn't really tell that there was black ice on the pavement of the parking lot. Until I was sitting on it. All I was doing was turning the corner to leave the parking lot and head to campus. But in the blink of an eye (literally!) I was on the ground, my legs sprawled out in front of me. Despite being in shock, one question ran through my mind: how the hell did I end up on the ground? (not even: did anyone see that?)

Right from the start, I was in pain. My legs were sore but got over that quickly. But when I finally reached my class and sat down, it was painful! I winced every time I sat down that day and the rest of the week. I called my mom and told her what happened. She thought that I hurt my tailbone and advised me to ice it. I didn't want to wrap an ice cube in a paper towel because, well, ice melts. Which meant that after a while the paper towel would be wet. Instead, I grabbed my butterfly ice pack that I put in my lunchbox and stuck it down the back of my jeans so I could sit on it. I did this off and on until I got home.

When I finally got home for Winter Break, my mom took a look at my rear end and sure enough: I had bruised my tailbone. Which made me laugh because once I realized where I really hurt, I thought of a scene from the TV show Reba when Van fractures his coccyx but as Cheyenne says "Let's face it: he broke his butt." It's the only thing that got me through the pain.

Needless to say, I've trekked over shiny concrete even more cautiously than before. I'm just glad this is my last winter around it (I hope!)

Trek Carefully!