Basically, I'm Job

As in the Almighty is testing me, not the thing that society unjustly expects me to find/hold/not show up drunk to.

When I was 13, I dislocated my knee playing soccer. It was the worst pain ever ever ever in all the land. One minute I was running and the next thing I knew I heard a horrific cracking sound and I was on the ground screaming. I was on crutches with the entire left leg imobilized for months and months, during which the muscle atrophied (shrunk) and I developed a nasty allergic reaction to the third knee brace I had to wear. After 8 years of playing, I refused to even step on a soccer field again (seriously, it makes me hyperventilate a little to even kick a ball around with my dog).

This all happened one week before 8th grade started, and the indignities that I had to suffer were endless. My friends became my personal bell-hops, carrying around my backpack and books for me. I couldn't fit my jeans over the imobilizer, so in a panic I went out and bought a ton of (short) skirts. Which seemed like the perfect idea (in my defense, Clueless was a big movie at the time, so at least I didn't resort to the ill-fated skirt/knee-sock/Doc Martens combo that was totally the look du jour) until my first class, when I went to sit down and realized that while short skirts were good in theory, when you have to lift your leg up and elevate it while wearing said skirt things turn a little indecent awfully quick.

In addition, this little faux pas took place two months before my bat-mitzvah. I shopped for cute little (ok, not quite so little but there's my drift, so try and catch it) patent-leather heels while in a wheelchair.At first they thought I tore my ACL or cracked my bone, so on my first trip to the orthopedist, when I explained the situation, the jackass actually said to me "well, you might be in a cast for a very fun party". Obviously he had never met a 13 year old girl before, because if he had he would know that such a callous comment would catapult me into a state of depression so intense that it would make the characters in The Grapes of Wrath think "huh, things might be a little dusty, but overall we don't have it so bad!" I cried for 48 straight hours.

Anyway, the point is this was not a great time in my life. Anything that has to do with my knee, particularly my left one, FREAKS ME THE EFF OUT. I seriously spend about 70% of my energy every day just avoiding any possible knee injury.

So when I was rushing around on Sunday and the monsoon outside mixed with old motor oil on our garage floor caused me to slip and bash my bad knee on the slick concrete, I wasn't sure whether to laugh at the fact that I was an idiot/God hates me or let out a string of expletives that would ensure that my parents never let me around my younger siblings again.

I'm really starting to miss my brother.