Monday, May 23, 2011

Thanatos, St. Jude and Machine Gun Kelly

This guy has my back. Be jealous.
I'm not sure if I believe in fate, or that Thanatos has my back, but it almost seems like I should. The day I got hit, October 28th my whole ride I was cursing HC and basically coming up with an escape plan that included getting in my car and driving home. Spending 9 hours in the hospital that day derailed that plan pretty quickly. I also found out something odd during study break when I probably should have been studying Russian, but after my tutor informed me that even if I was one credit short I could still walk (real confidence booster there), so the pressure was off. Anyways I found out that October 28th is also St. Jude's feast day. Now for those of who didn't have a grandmother who made you read about the saints every time you wanted a cookie let me fill you in. St. Jude is the patron saint of desperate causes and lost causes. Let me tell you, I have a couple of those. It's a bit of an odd coincidence. Not only that but on April 28th I finally ordered my new bike without realizing it was the 6 month mark. On May 28th I'll be leaving HC for good, and on June 28th I'll be back out to testify. Maybe I'm just reading too much into it, like people do with the Mayan calendar (Mary Clair). But it does seem odd that for 3 months in a row, the date lines up with the original date that started so many changes. 

As for biking I don't plan on actually getting back on the road out here. There's no real point and I've been enjoying doing more mountain biking. So much so that I basically look like Jason Kidd's wife, allegedly. But I'm excited to actually get on my bike at home where I know the streets and area better and I only really have to be worried about buffalo and snakes and not crazy Woo-Rats (that's what they call Worcester natives, enduring right?) who fail to yield. And mountain biking basically makes me feel like a badass so that's a plus. 

The last court day went okay, he is still maintaining his innocence, so now it goes to jury trial. Let me tell you, Law and Order is deceiving when they wrap everything up within an hour. The last time I wasn't able to see him because they thought I would get called to do a line up and that seeing him would tamper with it, so they were constantly shuffling me around to avoid him. Which had it been SVU, I would have walked out of the interview room at the same time he had, so I was a little disappointed by the real court proceedings, much less drama. I'll let you know if anyone gets shot this next time, but don't hold your breath. 

I realized a couple of weeks ago that I was going to be okay, because I had been here before. My parents got divorced when I was in 5th grade. I was completely blindsided (luckily no car was involved). While at the time I thought my life was over, I mean who has divorced parents?!??? It's a pretty sweet situation now. My dad lives 6 houses down; I get to make 2 phone calls when I have exciting news; I have 2 bedrooms; 2 summer cabins; 2 birthday presents; and any time my mom is out of grapes I can just go to my dads. Jealous, right? Part of it is that right from the beginning my parents never let me be defined by it. I couldn't blame anything on the fact I was from a dysfunctional family, because we're the most functional-dysfunctional family I know. My dad still comes over for supper pretty regularly when I'm home, he's was there in the morning before I would go to school, and they are still together for holidays, birthday, and even late night jail breaks (kidding about the last one). They even punish me together, which usually means a lot longer than just one being the bad cop (7 weeks of being grounded is my record). With the crash and the leg incidents there too is a light showing at the end of the tunnel. While they are a part of me, I will define them not the other way around. Like Frankl says, it's not the event that defines who you are, it's how you react. 

Clearly not who I was writing about
So I finally wrapped everything up with DF, I turned in about 40 pages of random thoughts, okay not so much random, well he might think so. I ended up calling my paper "Machine Gun Kelly: The ride of my life and other athletic comebacks." It was only after I turned it in that I realized he has no idea that Machine Gun Kelly is the name of my bike. . .whoops. While some days that class felt like it was putting salt in an already bleeding open wound, addressing everything and putting to all together before I leave this place is what needed to be done. I can finally close the chapter on it all and walk away with almost a fresh start. Which is exactly what I plan on doing. I probably won't stop blogging though, as it's a way to still compile my thoughts even if they are random. And really I'm not fully back on the bike yet so I wouldn't want to let my loyal readers (mom and heidi) down. Ha.