it must be all that jumping around i've been doing
October 22, 2003, 1:39 pm

This morning, I awoke at 5:21am and was all kinds of pleased with myself that I was being responsible and trying to get my stuff together for another day, and then I realized something was terribly, terribly wrong.

I couldn't move.

This was not a dream-like state of "Oh, I'm groggy and I can't move" this was more along the lines of "HOLY FUCKING SHIT! I CAN'T MOVE!" Never in my life have I identified with Ash from Army of Darkness better.

You know how I've been going to my super-cool chiropractor, Dr. Ray, and he deigned me better and I felt all kinds of better after some major therapy? Yeah, well, lifting a ton of heavy shit to set up a stage and running around the auditorium for the benefit of a bunch of 9th graders does not a happy neck make. Add these exploits to my drunken debauchery and my hungover plane rides, and there you have it: a seriously fucked up neck.

So I weighed my options. I could a) decide to never leave my bed and watch Sportscenter for the rest of my days or b)jump in the shower and see if it got better or c)stay in bed without the tv on and feel my will to live slowly slip away. I got up and hurled my legs over my bed, and I realized that not only could I NOT turn my head, but my back was spasming as well. "Patience, grasshopper," I thought to myself, "The pain will subside. You MUST go to school today, idiot."

So I took a shower: a comedy of errors since I couldn't really see the soap I was bending down to pick up or lift my head to grab the right shampoo and conditioner. I felt WORSE. I had to call the sub line.

I HATE getting a sub. It inevitably creates FAR more work than necessary or than if I had showed up to school. I also had to put some stress on E___, my fantastic department chair and Christian's mommy, which was the last thing that I wanted to do.

Then I called Dr. Ray's office and left a message:

"Hi! It's Jessica Biensoul and it's, uh, 5:53 in the morning. I'm, uh, laying in my bed because that's pretty much all I can do right now. I mean, LYING, LYING in my bed, staring at the ceiling. So, uh, I have to come into the office today and get myself fixed. ANYTIME. Seriously. I'm not going to school, and uh, I can't move from my bed. At all. It hurts to talk on the phone. So uh, I'll be waiting by it for your call. I'm not going anywhere, really. So uh, could you call me back? Thanks!"

When Deb, the receptionist and Dr. Ray's wife called me, she said, "That was the best message anyone has ever left on the machine. We'll see you at 10:30."

Yaya drove me over to the office because I couldn't turn my head to see if on-coming traffic was headed right for me or if I was backing into a mailbox. I walked into office stoic and still, and Deb said, "Boy, I know you're in pain if you're not blabbering away the instant you hit that door." Mmmmhmmmm.

So Dr. Ray hooks me up to the machine, gets me all soft and squishy, and then cracks my neck so loud that in the distance I can hear a million seagulls fly off the beach in Ocean City in alarm. Now I can tilt my head, but the pain is excruciating, and I had to cancel my play practice. Gah.

But enough about me, I have to give some mad shout-outs to my JournalCon peeps that continue to hook me up link wise and make my day better by seeing my name in print and for leaving love in my gbook. Thanks, guys.

Not only that, but KatSlater is headed state-side in a scant few weeks, and I'm tickled and nervous and deliriously happy that I'm going to see her.