You will not believe it, even if I tell you.
I had the biggest rollercoaster of a weekend and start of the week in my life! Saturday started out well, lazy day. Jonn just got his new van on Friday and was anxious to try it out. So he picked me up Saturday afternoon and we drove to Sapporo. Jack and Aki’s wedding party were at 8pm on Saturday night, so we had already arranged to stay over with a few friends in the city. I, was scheduled to write the Japanese proficiency exam the next day, so I didn’t want to stay out too late. Of course it had already been a long week and so the idea of letting loose and going crazy in the city had a definite lure. Regardless, the night went well, the party was fun (as the pictures may show). I only tripped once on the way to the restaurant…ahh boots. It was the first time, and probably the last time, I see the snowboard crew in “smart” clothes. Anyway, after drinking and eating from 8pm to 11pm, it was time to leave. Everyone was deciding if they should go to the second party or not, Naomi, Laura, and I, all had to write the exam the next day, so we went back. We took the subway, and walked through the rainy streets. Yes, rainy, wet, streets, in December. Unheard of really.
I slept well. The wine out of my system, with only a faint headache as a reminder, I welcomed Sunday. I heard Tim, Ben, and Jonn, at the door around 7am. They had just got home, and since it was almost time to get up to go to the test, I woke up to talk to them. It had been a wild night, 12 hours of drinking, and now they were back to sleep it off. During the course of the night Ben had lost his key, and Jonn was suppose to crash at his place, and so while I was talking to Tim and eventually returning to the living room to sleep more. I could hear Ben and Jonn talking very loudly. At the time, I thought about how thin the walls were, not knowing that they were actually outside on the balcony a floor up. Then I heard banging and crashing, something had fallen. Ben was yelling “No, no, no”, and my heart sunk. I ran to the balcony to look over at what they had dropped, and couldn’t really see anything. Regardless, I ran to the door, put on my shoes, and ran outside. The air was cold, the ground covered with snow, and as I got out of the stairwell and ran outside through to the other side of the building, there was Jonn. Lying on the ground, pool of blood by his head, face down. That is when I entered robot mode.
People were delegated to call ambulances, and Ben and I stayed with Jonn making sure he was still breathing. Jonn had fallen 6 stories, but somehow, through trying to grab on to things on his way down and from hitting his head on the bike roof before cartwheeling through the gap and onto the only pavement that didn’t have snow on it, he managed to survive the fall. The ambulance came, and so did the police. It was then I found out that what Ben and Jonn were doing, were trying to get into Ben’s apartment by Jonn trying to jump/climb/step from a neighbor’s balcony to Ben’s. The gap was small enough for him to have both his feet on either one. However, after 12 hours of drinking, dress shoes, and slippery metal from the freshly falling snow, he had slipped.
The rest well…Tim jumped into the ambulance with him, while I tried to answer the polices questions, and translate what the others were saying. 7am, in my pjs, outside, trying to keep my head straight, and answer questions while my friend is on his way to the hospital. Surreal.
Finally, after much confusion, and many tears, Laura and I were off to the hospital. We met with Ben, Myles, and Tim, already in the waiting room. After an hour, the doctors let Ben and I into the intensive care unit. We both washed up, and then headed in hand in hand. The doctors and nurses (not English speakers), wanted to know some questions about Jonn (not a Japanese speaker), like food allergies, medicine allergies, all those fun things. The first look at Jonn, and I thought I was going to be sick. I will spare you the details, mostly for my own sake of not having to think about them again. Jonn managed, between going in and out of consciousness, to answer my questions, which I relayed to the doctor, and even remembered and gave me his parent’s phone number. I gave the information to the doctors, and we were issued back out to the waiting room. But he was alive, we had spoken to him, and so far the news was a broken elbow and a broken cheek. We all rejoiced in life, in his life, and waited.
His bosses from work arrived an hour or two later, and I got to accompany them in their meeting with the doctor. I tried to focus, and listen to the Japanese the best I could. Somehow it all made sense, and since the doctor and his bosses didn’t speak Japanese, I was delegated to call his parents. Illness kicking in again. I thought of what I could possibly say to make it easy on them. Worst yet, when I called I only got their answering machine. I left a message saying Jonn had broken bones, but that he was fine, and gave my information. Nothing more, nothing less. Hours later I called again, and my call met a frantic mom on the other line, and then the answers began. Jonn was still in intensive care, and they were monitoring him and still doing tests to see what could be wrong. So far, it was only a broken elbow and cheek.
After getting special permission by the doctors and at Jonn’s bosses demands, Laura and I got to stay in the intensive care unit with him until 9pm. Visiting hours are usually 2pm to 2:30pm. But this was a special case, specially since we had to translate things between the nurses and Jonn, Jonn and the doctor, the doctor and Jonn.
Finally Laura and I returned back to her apartment after trudging through a record snowfall of slush. My feet soaked, tired, and worn out, we managed to shovel off and out, Jonn’s van. Jonn’s bosses had already asked me during our meeting, if I could drive his van back to his hometown because it is the neighbouring town, and because we couldn’t leave it parked there. Luckily, my supervisor had given me Monday off, so I didn’t have to return that night. Specially since most of the roads had been closed down anyway.
However, the next morning, everyone went to work. I woke up, got ready, packed up my stuff, and got into Jonn’s van. The plan was, to drive to the hospital, visit and help out as much as I could, before having to leave to go back home. So I started the big diesel van, shoveled the area off, made sure the vehicle was warm, that the mirrors were in the right position, and off I went. The roads were icy, and they had just been cleared, so some of half of one lane was still packed with snow. Regardless, I managed to get about 20 blocks from Laura and Tim’s apartment. On one of the icy bridges that I had to cross, I heard a bang, the van started skidding and sliding all over the place. Car horns honking, me trying to keep myself on the bridge, and not injure or take out anyone in the process. My foot, stomping repeatedly on the brake. Finally, managed to slow it down, and get it off the bridge to the nearest gas station. At the gas station, I got out, thanked God that I was still in one piece and looked at what has just happened. All that was left was a hubcap. But that hubcap was still in good shape because the bridge was less than block away. So all they needed to do was put on a tire, and I could be off to the hospital. Which would be a lot easier, if I had the money to pay for a new tire. So next, it was a 45 minute walk (cause this place was in the middle of nowhere in regards to actual banks and shops) to withdraw cash to pay for the tire. Still in the slush, feet soaked again, I got back, exhausted from the past 24 hours, but also from what just happened. I paid the gas station attendants, and got back into the van. Did a little prayer, and off I went.
I finally got to the hospital, and found out that not only did Jonn have a broken elbow and cheek, but also a broken shoulder blade, broken collar bones, bruised lungs, and a damaged liver. The hidden injuries were now coming out. Jonn’s bosses returned and details needed to be sorted out, business stuff, travel stuff, work stuff. Finally, after I had got his bosses to talk to the nurses, we had convinced them to transfer Jonn onto a stretcher and bring him out into the hall, outside the ICU, and to where the phone was so that he could talk to his mom. That relieved some stress for a lot of parties.
After that, and many hours later. I was driving back from the hospital to Kyogoku (Jonn’s home town) to drop the van off, and get a ride home from Jack. The roads were bad, I was exhausted, but I managed to get there. Jack and I got from Jonn’s place the stuff he requested just as his supervisor showed up. We cleared out the stuff in his fridge that would go bad while he was gone, emptied the garbage, turned the water off so his pipes wouldn’t freeze, and finally about 45 minutes later, Jack was driving me home. Fishtailing on the icy roads. I did get home though. I trudged through the snow, dumped my stuff, jumped into the shower, got out. Got a phone call from a few people making sure I made it, and then I tried to call my supervisor to get the day off on Tuesday to sleep because I was so exhausted from it all. To this question I got the words bad, and you have classes to teach at the junior high, the elementary, and Christmas parties to plan. Yep, nothing like a little break for my sanity. I hung up the phone and lost it. The shock, stress, everything hit me. I called my parents, crying, and breaking down. Just then my house started swaying, the light swinging to and fro, and earthquake. Can this story get any worse? So there I was, on the phone crying, explaining how I couldn’t just switch mentally from robot hospital mode, to fun Christmas party planning, finalizing fundraiser details, preparing a speech, getting the ECC information packages complete and collating all 250 of them, on top of administering an oral interview test for my junior high school. All this, while my house rocked back and forth, along with my sanity. But I cried myself to sleep, and woke up to my mom calling to see if I was okay. I managed to get through my day. Exhausted, strung out, crying, I was given a 2 hour break from school, I came home, cleaned and had a drink. I very rarely drink, and never alone, but this was a special case. So I made myself a kahlua and milk, finished getting my house in order cause it was really trashed, went back to school and gave the test. The rest of the day went by in a surreal haze. My supervisor, after seeing me in my zombie like state, handed me the phone to speak more Japanese and sort stuff out with Jonn’s office. I yanked the phone from her, thinking how she hadn’t even let me sit down before calling them back. After sorting that out, she thanked me for my hard work and that was that. My dad ended with Megan coming over, and her helping me off the floor and putting me to bed. Now, it is 1am, and I am awake. Still exhausted, my body aches all over, so does my mind. Although I am slowly pulling things together. Out of necessity really. In reality I want to take a baseball bat to my house and just start swinging, not to mention having a few choice words with my supervisor. But instead I am going to try to breathe and get back to bed. Raw from the memories, haunted by the sights and sounds, my body aching and knotted. One day at a time. So many lessons have been learned, but that is for another time. Right now I need to try to sleep.
Take care of each other and self. Blessings.
I had the biggest rollercoaster of a weekend and start of the week in my life! Saturday started out well, lazy day. Jonn just got his new van on Friday and was anxious to try it out. So he picked me up Saturday afternoon and we drove to Sapporo. Jack and Aki’s wedding party were at 8pm on Saturday night, so we had already arranged to stay over with a few friends in the city. I, was scheduled to write the Japanese proficiency exam the next day, so I didn’t want to stay out too late. Of course it had already been a long week and so the idea of letting loose and going crazy in the city had a definite lure. Regardless, the night went well, the party was fun (as the pictures may show). I only tripped once on the way to the restaurant…ahh boots. It was the first time, and probably the last time, I see the snowboard crew in “smart” clothes. Anyway, after drinking and eating from 8pm to 11pm, it was time to leave. Everyone was deciding if they should go to the second party or not, Naomi, Laura, and I, all had to write the exam the next day, so we went back. We took the subway, and walked through the rainy streets. Yes, rainy, wet, streets, in December. Unheard of really.
I slept well. The wine out of my system, with only a faint headache as a reminder, I welcomed Sunday. I heard Tim, Ben, and Jonn, at the door around 7am. They had just got home, and since it was almost time to get up to go to the test, I woke up to talk to them. It had been a wild night, 12 hours of drinking, and now they were back to sleep it off. During the course of the night Ben had lost his key, and Jonn was suppose to crash at his place, and so while I was talking to Tim and eventually returning to the living room to sleep more. I could hear Ben and Jonn talking very loudly. At the time, I thought about how thin the walls were, not knowing that they were actually outside on the balcony a floor up. Then I heard banging and crashing, something had fallen. Ben was yelling “No, no, no”, and my heart sunk. I ran to the balcony to look over at what they had dropped, and couldn’t really see anything. Regardless, I ran to the door, put on my shoes, and ran outside. The air was cold, the ground covered with snow, and as I got out of the stairwell and ran outside through to the other side of the building, there was Jonn. Lying on the ground, pool of blood by his head, face down. That is when I entered robot mode.
People were delegated to call ambulances, and Ben and I stayed with Jonn making sure he was still breathing. Jonn had fallen 6 stories, but somehow, through trying to grab on to things on his way down and from hitting his head on the bike roof before cartwheeling through the gap and onto the only pavement that didn’t have snow on it, he managed to survive the fall. The ambulance came, and so did the police. It was then I found out that what Ben and Jonn were doing, were trying to get into Ben’s apartment by Jonn trying to jump/climb/step from a neighbor’s balcony to Ben’s. The gap was small enough for him to have both his feet on either one. However, after 12 hours of drinking, dress shoes, and slippery metal from the freshly falling snow, he had slipped.
The rest well…Tim jumped into the ambulance with him, while I tried to answer the polices questions, and translate what the others were saying. 7am, in my pjs, outside, trying to keep my head straight, and answer questions while my friend is on his way to the hospital. Surreal.
Finally, after much confusion, and many tears, Laura and I were off to the hospital. We met with Ben, Myles, and Tim, already in the waiting room. After an hour, the doctors let Ben and I into the intensive care unit. We both washed up, and then headed in hand in hand. The doctors and nurses (not English speakers), wanted to know some questions about Jonn (not a Japanese speaker), like food allergies, medicine allergies, all those fun things. The first look at Jonn, and I thought I was going to be sick. I will spare you the details, mostly for my own sake of not having to think about them again. Jonn managed, between going in and out of consciousness, to answer my questions, which I relayed to the doctor, and even remembered and gave me his parent’s phone number. I gave the information to the doctors, and we were issued back out to the waiting room. But he was alive, we had spoken to him, and so far the news was a broken elbow and a broken cheek. We all rejoiced in life, in his life, and waited.
His bosses from work arrived an hour or two later, and I got to accompany them in their meeting with the doctor. I tried to focus, and listen to the Japanese the best I could. Somehow it all made sense, and since the doctor and his bosses didn’t speak Japanese, I was delegated to call his parents. Illness kicking in again. I thought of what I could possibly say to make it easy on them. Worst yet, when I called I only got their answering machine. I left a message saying Jonn had broken bones, but that he was fine, and gave my information. Nothing more, nothing less. Hours later I called again, and my call met a frantic mom on the other line, and then the answers began. Jonn was still in intensive care, and they were monitoring him and still doing tests to see what could be wrong. So far, it was only a broken elbow and cheek.
After getting special permission by the doctors and at Jonn’s bosses demands, Laura and I got to stay in the intensive care unit with him until 9pm. Visiting hours are usually 2pm to 2:30pm. But this was a special case, specially since we had to translate things between the nurses and Jonn, Jonn and the doctor, the doctor and Jonn.
Finally Laura and I returned back to her apartment after trudging through a record snowfall of slush. My feet soaked, tired, and worn out, we managed to shovel off and out, Jonn’s van. Jonn’s bosses had already asked me during our meeting, if I could drive his van back to his hometown because it is the neighbouring town, and because we couldn’t leave it parked there. Luckily, my supervisor had given me Monday off, so I didn’t have to return that night. Specially since most of the roads had been closed down anyway.
However, the next morning, everyone went to work. I woke up, got ready, packed up my stuff, and got into Jonn’s van. The plan was, to drive to the hospital, visit and help out as much as I could, before having to leave to go back home. So I started the big diesel van, shoveled the area off, made sure the vehicle was warm, that the mirrors were in the right position, and off I went. The roads were icy, and they had just been cleared, so some of half of one lane was still packed with snow. Regardless, I managed to get about 20 blocks from Laura and Tim’s apartment. On one of the icy bridges that I had to cross, I heard a bang, the van started skidding and sliding all over the place. Car horns honking, me trying to keep myself on the bridge, and not injure or take out anyone in the process. My foot, stomping repeatedly on the brake. Finally, managed to slow it down, and get it off the bridge to the nearest gas station. At the gas station, I got out, thanked God that I was still in one piece and looked at what has just happened. All that was left was a hubcap. But that hubcap was still in good shape because the bridge was less than block away. So all they needed to do was put on a tire, and I could be off to the hospital. Which would be a lot easier, if I had the money to pay for a new tire. So next, it was a 45 minute walk (cause this place was in the middle of nowhere in regards to actual banks and shops) to withdraw cash to pay for the tire. Still in the slush, feet soaked again, I got back, exhausted from the past 24 hours, but also from what just happened. I paid the gas station attendants, and got back into the van. Did a little prayer, and off I went.
I finally got to the hospital, and found out that not only did Jonn have a broken elbow and cheek, but also a broken shoulder blade, broken collar bones, bruised lungs, and a damaged liver. The hidden injuries were now coming out. Jonn’s bosses returned and details needed to be sorted out, business stuff, travel stuff, work stuff. Finally, after I had got his bosses to talk to the nurses, we had convinced them to transfer Jonn onto a stretcher and bring him out into the hall, outside the ICU, and to where the phone was so that he could talk to his mom. That relieved some stress for a lot of parties.
After that, and many hours later. I was driving back from the hospital to Kyogoku (Jonn’s home town) to drop the van off, and get a ride home from Jack. The roads were bad, I was exhausted, but I managed to get there. Jack and I got from Jonn’s place the stuff he requested just as his supervisor showed up. We cleared out the stuff in his fridge that would go bad while he was gone, emptied the garbage, turned the water off so his pipes wouldn’t freeze, and finally about 45 minutes later, Jack was driving me home. Fishtailing on the icy roads. I did get home though. I trudged through the snow, dumped my stuff, jumped into the shower, got out. Got a phone call from a few people making sure I made it, and then I tried to call my supervisor to get the day off on Tuesday to sleep because I was so exhausted from it all. To this question I got the words bad, and you have classes to teach at the junior high, the elementary, and Christmas parties to plan. Yep, nothing like a little break for my sanity. I hung up the phone and lost it. The shock, stress, everything hit me. I called my parents, crying, and breaking down. Just then my house started swaying, the light swinging to and fro, and earthquake. Can this story get any worse? So there I was, on the phone crying, explaining how I couldn’t just switch mentally from robot hospital mode, to fun Christmas party planning, finalizing fundraiser details, preparing a speech, getting the ECC information packages complete and collating all 250 of them, on top of administering an oral interview test for my junior high school. All this, while my house rocked back and forth, along with my sanity. But I cried myself to sleep, and woke up to my mom calling to see if I was okay. I managed to get through my day. Exhausted, strung out, crying, I was given a 2 hour break from school, I came home, cleaned and had a drink. I very rarely drink, and never alone, but this was a special case. So I made myself a kahlua and milk, finished getting my house in order cause it was really trashed, went back to school and gave the test. The rest of the day went by in a surreal haze. My supervisor, after seeing me in my zombie like state, handed me the phone to speak more Japanese and sort stuff out with Jonn’s office. I yanked the phone from her, thinking how she hadn’t even let me sit down before calling them back. After sorting that out, she thanked me for my hard work and that was that. My dad ended with Megan coming over, and her helping me off the floor and putting me to bed. Now, it is 1am, and I am awake. Still exhausted, my body aches all over, so does my mind. Although I am slowly pulling things together. Out of necessity really. In reality I want to take a baseball bat to my house and just start swinging, not to mention having a few choice words with my supervisor. But instead I am going to try to breathe and get back to bed. Raw from the memories, haunted by the sights and sounds, my body aching and knotted. One day at a time. So many lessons have been learned, but that is for another time. Right now I need to try to sleep.
Take care of each other and self. Blessings.
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