As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I am the full package: the schlemiel and the schlimazel. Yes, those are actual words and if you’ve never heard of them, read my post I’m A Schlemiel first.
The schlimazel is the one in the scenario whom the soup gets spilled on. The one with the chronically bad luck. Soup is the least of it. I was the kid at day camp who always got stung by bees. I’m the adult at dinner whose meal is the only one forgotten. If the waiter passes by the table, I’m the one he spills salad dressing all down the back of. It’s me, the grandchild who amongst the other ten, opens their holiday card to find it is missing the crisp $20 bill from grandma that everyone else has.
One memory I have from being a young schlimazel is that of a day that was meant to be magical. I was to see my first waterfall. I freaking loved waterfalls. Some kids had pictures of JTT and Devon Sawa on their bedroom walls. I had a giant mural of a waterfall. As we approached our final hill before we reached that sweet, sweet heavenly fall, I slid my tiny butt over a giant wasp nest. The agony I felt as tons of wasps stung me all over my body, could only be magnified by one thing–the water.
I also had an experience in 5th grade involving the meanest teacher on the hall-block and a giant bucket of water. Why she had this bucket? I don’t remember. But Ms. McJerk (her real name was McGurk… get it?) was probably making us mop the floors or something, but somehow she ended up dropping the bucket of water all over my bod, making me the only participate in Ms. McGurk’s 5th Grade Wet T-Shirt Contest.
If you’ve stuck with me as a reader, you may remember the paint incident of 2009. You can read about that fiasco involving a dropped bucket of paint and my living room becoming a canvas for splatter art on my post RIP my carpet.
It’s not easy being (covered in) green. Or brown. Or any other substance that I’ve found myself in. The worst situation I have had though, was on a sunny day in Puerto Rico that turned out be a very dark one for me. I had the unfortunate timing to step out of the elevator, into the hotel lobby, moments after the scene was set. I can still hear the yells of the staff “nooooo….”
But it was too late. My legs kicked out from under me, I slid across the floor, before I lost my balance and went down. Shrieking like Carrie at prom, I was covered. Down on the floor I lay in a pile of fresh, baby vomit.
.