Sometimes you need a second chance to make a good first impression.

This story takes an eternity to set-up...then the way things fall apart happens very quickly.   Readers may need a flowchart to follow exactly how the stage was set and who  the characters were and how, pretty much in a matter of a few hours,  I no doubt left a near-permanent impression not only on lot of folks but also quite a few material objects!

In 1986, I was working at a public high school and my daughter was a senior at another public high school.   Denise's boyfriend, Scott, had graduated the previous year and was attending an out-of-state college.   Schools here get what is called "Spring Break" early in the spring and "Easter Break" later. 

My story is, believe it or not, all going to transpire in less than  24 hours...on the first Saturday of our "Spring Break".   My husband got up early that morning to drive to Houston to see about a car he was interested in, leaving me to take Denise to an  early emergency appointment with an ophthalmologist.  The night before she had gone out with friends and did not realize when she took her contact lenses out when she got home  that she had scratched one cornea.  Saturday morning the eye was painful and light sensitive so we located a doctor who examined her eye and then put a patch on it.

We didn't realize it that morning but our day was just then beginning to come unraveled!  Scott was on his way home for a weekend visit and Denise had a patch on one eye!  Determined to look as pretty as possible under the circumstances, my daughter would later in the day simply put extra eye makeup on the other eye.  Heavy eye makeup on one eye - no makeup and a patch on the other! 

Denise and Scott - two of the cast of characters!

We had, for a week or so, had a building contractor working at our house enclosing a covered patio with a wall of glass that looks out on the backyard.  The contractor had also installed a new tile floor, a new ceiling and new crown molding which he planned to paint the following week.  I've always loved to paint.  I felt so good that day - I was looking forward to seeing Scott, I had a pretty new chambray workshirt with two big front pockets, I had a new haircut,  my makeup looked good and I had on my favorite earrings but, ghee, I didn't have anything at all to do...so...I decided I would paint the new crown molding in the sunroom myself! 

I'm no dummy when it comes to painting.  I got my new Electrolux vacuum cleaner out and carefully vacuumed every inch of the new crown molding and the new tile floor but I  did not  bother to put away the vacuum cleaner.

The contractor had opted to use a sort of makeshift scaffolding when he put up the crown molding - instead of a ladder, he brought in two redwood picnic table benches out of our backyard and stood on them.  Seemed like a good idea to me, the height  was perfect!  I carefully opened  and stirred  a brand new quart of oilbase paint and found a perfect paintbrush.  Michelangelo  himself could not have felt more inspired to paint a ceiling!

Now you know the whereabouts of four of the characters...Denise is looking prettier than ever with one eye heavily lined, shadowed and mascara-ed  and the other eye covered with a patch, Scott's plane has landed and he is on his way to our house, I'm the picture of DIY interior house painting and my husband is in Houston!

Let's see, who is missing?  Oh, yes, my dad!  My late father always had a huge vegetable garden in his backyard.   Like all good gardeners, springtime meant preparing the soil...which Daddy did that Saturday with a gas powered  tiller even though the ground was still a little damp from a recent rain.   Daddy's plan that Saturday was to get his garden ready to be planted - what was a little mud?

I think that's all the family and friends characters but there were more people involved.   A couple of miles away two EMS personel  had finished their shift then showered, dressed in suits, and were waiting for another EMS co-worker  to return to the fire station,  shower and get dressed, then they were all going to a special occasion together. 

I don't know what the people in the ER were doing but they were in for a big surprise!   Denise, Scott and I were at home, my husband was in Houston, my late father was tilling his muddy garden, two EMS responders were all dressed-up in their suits  waiting for their friend at the fire station and the folks at the Emergency Room were no doubt busy working in their orderly, surgical suite clean environment!

When the action started, things happened very quickly!  I was standing on one of the redwood picnic table benches, a full quart of oilbase paint in my left hand, a paintbrush in the other hand.  I was concentrating so hard on painting the crown molding...so hard.  Nik Wallenda wouldn't have done this but I was so engrossed in my painting that I forgot what I was standing on.  As I methodically inched along painting the molding, it never crossed my mind that when I stepped on the end of the redwood bench it would drop me like the last person left  on a seesaw. 

Wham!   I hit the brand new tile floor like a ton of bricks!   It has always seemed like I went down in slow motion.  The air was filled with flying oilbase paint.  The walls of the sunroom got splattered, the beautiful new floor was ruined, the new Electrolux would never look new again, but the redwood benches and I caught the worst of it...when I fell, I literally covered myself with the can of oilbase paint I was holding.  It even filled both  breast pockets on my new chambray workshirt.

I don't think I have ever felt such pain!  I had fallen hard on the tile floor and was further injured when the redwood bench flipped over and fell on top of me.    It was not a pretty picture!

Denise and Scott naturally tried to help and somehow I managed to stumble outside where I collapsed on the grass as Denise hurridly dialed 9-1-1 for help.  I was slipping in and out of shock, I knew my leg or ankle  was injured but had no idea what was wrong.    Denise, probably in shock herself, reported that I'd fallen and hurt my ankle.

At the fire station, the "dressed-up"  EMS crew heard that a woman in the subdivision a couple of miles away had fallen and assuming I perhaps had a sprained ankle, they decided to take the quick call while their co-worker was finishing-up getting ready for the formal event they were planning to attend. 

I cannot imagine what these two kind young men thought when they drove up in our driveway and saw me, shaking with muscle spasms, drifting in and out of shock from the intense pain, covered from head to toe with sticky, smelly, oilbase paint!

They first put an air splint on my ankle and the pain totally stopped.  I thought they'd fixed whatever was wrong and really wondered if I needed to go to the ER?  They somehow managed to get me in the EMS van but told Denise to follow them to the hospital in her car.   Unable to see to drive wearing  the eye patch, she removed it.   Think about it! 

I'll always remember how unwelcome I felt arriving at the ER!  Nobody wanted to touch me.  Every person who did ended-up with oilbase paint on themselves.  Everything that touched me got  sticky with paint.  Somebody located some kind of solvent and tried to clean the paint off my body.  They cut my paint soaked clothes off and managed to get me in a clean hospital gown and eventually things were reasonably under control although the new paint smell lingered heavily like a cloud over half the hospital!

Other than dying a slow death from embarrassment, I wasn't in too much pain  until someone removed the air splint to X-ray my ankle.  Oh, lordy!!  The only comfort I could hold onto was expecting my longtime orthopedic specialist to show up any minute...only to learn that he was not on staff at this hospital.   Another doctor eventually set my ankle and I was in a cast up to my knee for several months.

There's nothing funny about setting a broken ankle but there is about a beautiful teenage girl in the ER trying to comfort  her distraught, paint-covered mother with one eye heavily made-up and absolutely no makeup on the other eye!  And, the whole family wasn't even there until Denise called my dad to tell him I'd been rushed to the Emergency Room.  Naturally he laid down his tiller and rushed to the hospital with no thought whatsoever about his  muddy overalls and shoes.

At some point,  I was told Denise could drive me home...wearing nothing but a paint smeared cotton hospital gown.  As we pulled into the driveway, my husband was right behind us.  As he and Denise got out of their cars, Paul started to say something about his trip being disappointing at which time Denise told him that no matter how bad his trip had been, it was infinitely better than her day had gone!