Chapter Two

Bouncing – Crawling – Falling – Battered and Bruised

On my butt I bounced down the stairs hanging on to the railing and sliding my other hand on the opposite wall, the only lifelines I could find.  I left the phone downstairs the night before and I all I could think was getting to it to call for help –   bouncing down the stairs on my butt seemed the only option I had, one by one.   With each bounce my eyes were filled with a blur of color and motion.  Even so, somehow I reached the bottom of the stairs. 

The phone was just around the corner tucked nicely in its cradle.  I pulled the cords and everything crashed to the floor.  Kind of like me…  There I was on the floor, phone in hand and I didn’t know who to call.  I just laid there.  “Oh shit, the address book is in the kitchen”…  I thought, “Who the hell puts their address book in the kitchen?”  What the hell was I thinking?  Why didn’t I call 911?  There’s a question without an answer…

Another kick of survival set in … From there, in a zigzag pattern, I crawled on the hardwood floor of my dining room, falling over, crashing into things that had morphed to obstacles.  Just the day before, those things were neatly and pleasingly in place.  I made my way through the dining room to the kitchen constantly falling over on to my sides, left or right, it wasn’t my choice.  I had absolutely no connection to my movements; my movements couldn’t make a connection to me.  Each time I fell thoughts reemerged convicted to… “The address book, it’s in the kitchen – on the counter… I have to get it… oh, God, please help me….”  I made it to the kitchen.  There I was, on my hands and knees, half of my body leaned up against the cabinets, battered from the journey.  Using my arm that wasn’t smashed against the wood I attempted to reach up and grab the counter-top thinking I could pull myself up to reach the book.  “I’m almost there….”  I was half way up when bash, I fell completely backwards to the floor.  I laid there – a choir of desperate thoughts rushing through my head, like mores code, dashdash dot dot dash slash dash dotdotdotdot dot dotdashdot dot.  I deciphered that I needed that address book.  Still, no real panic and believe it or not, it still never occurred to me to call 911… 

“Okay, I have to try again; I need to get that book”.  Once more, leaned against the cabinet, I reached above my head gripped the counter-top as hard as I could and pulled myself halfway up.  I grabbed the counter-top with my other hand and with tears streaming down my face I pulled myself all the way up.  “Finally, I can get the book… oh shit!  The phone – I left it in the living room!”  There went my grip and I crashed to the floor and sobbed.  I don’t how long I laid there before I gained the mind and strength to work my way back to my living room, to the phone.  But the address book, was still on the counter.

I worked myself back up to my knees, grabbed the counter top and pulled as hard as I could to get myself up onto my feet.  I grabbed the address book and started to fall sideways.  I tightened my grip on the counter to the point of thinking I was going to pull the cupboards off the wall.  Then I folded my upper half of my body on top of the counter, still with an iron clad grip, thinking of a way to get myself to the phone.  I mapped it out in my head.  I tucked the address book into my pajama bottoms, managed to slide myself alongside the counter until I reached the end to the doorway leading into the dining room.  Gripping each side, I leaned myself against the frame of the doorway, I reached for the back of a dining room chair hoping my hand would land on the backrest so I could pull myself to it.  I caught it but the chair slid and I fell onto the hardwood floor.   The rush of thought reappeared, dashdash dot dot dash slash dash dotdotdotdot dot dotdashdot dot.  I lay on the floor in tears and pain but I knew I had to get there.  Suddenly, I began to feel a foreboding that for some reason I had disappeared from myself, from my sense, my awareness, of where I was in space.  It felt surreal, I felt unreal.  Battered and bruised I pulled myself back up to my knees found strength to zigzag my way to the phone.