- April 17, 2024
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I am clumsy and I have bad luck. It has been the story of my life for as long as I can remember. So when one thing goes wrong, it’s almost inevitable that something else will follow.
I recently moved and that is when the bad luck swung into a full-fledged flair up.
After several months of going back and forth between the possibilities of buying a house and then finally deciding I just wanted to rent at the beach, I found a place that met my expectations, for the most part.
Being the perfectionist that I am, nothing met all of my standards, but the view from the balcony of my new residence was calming enough to overlook the flaws.
In fact, as I sit in my hammock chair looking out at the Intracoastal while I write this, there is a group of dolphins hanging out in my so-called backyard.
But as with every new place, things aren’t always as put together as they seem at the walk-through. Some things are not discovered to be broken until you actually move in and start living. This was the case with my new beachside residence. In addition to the usually cleaning, within a couple days of my move in I also discovered there was no hot water in my shower. But these were all things I could handle.
After two weeks, the boxes that housed my kitchen utensils were finally unpacked and stacked in the hallway inching their way closer to the front door. My knife block had found its way next to the stove and my wine rack was full thanks to my trip to the World Market red wine sale.
It was finally time to cook dinner in my new kitchen.
I started chopping the fresh vegetables I bought at the farmers market and threw a couple pieces of Greek-rub-seasoned boneless chicken breast on my cast iron griddle. Like normal, I tossed the vegetable ends into the garbage disposal and flipped the switch. While it sounded like the disposal was doing its job, looks were deceiving. The water flowing from the faucet was being spat back up in a circular motion, mixing with the coffee grounds that had been thrown down the hatch earlier that day.
Suspicious, I opened the under-the-sink cabinet to investigate with confidence, like I knew what I was doing. But I didn’t have to be a plumber to figure out that the disposal, for sure, did not work. The abundance of water spilling onto the cabinet floor made it clear. But to fix it was another ball game: A plumber was needed.
That was when I decided it was prime time for a bike ride.
I furiously rode my garage-sale-purchased beach cruiser along A1A. With my headphones in, I proceeded to pedaled faster and faster. On my ride home, after stopping for a gloriously creamy twist cone at my favorite A1A soft serve stand, I felt the pedals make a slight clicking sound.
I ignored it. After the garbage disposal, nothing else was allowed to go wrong today.
The sun sank down below the horizon, and I continued to rock out, singing out loud and riding faster and faster until all of a sudden the pedals were going too fast. I looked down only to discover that the chain had fallen off. Panicked, I tried to stop. But with footbrakes and no chain, that simple task proved to be a little difficult.
The bike swerved into the grass, and I lowered my feet in an attempt to walk myself to a rest.
For the next five minutes, I sat in the dark squeezing my fingers in between the rails trying to re-attach the oh-so-essential part of my bike. Finally, I walked it over a nearby restaurant to benefit from their outside light.
I continued for another five minutes to work the chain around the spokes until finally the group of men standing in front the eatery looked back at me, my grease-stained hands and grease-smeared face, noticing the distressed look in my eyes.
They fixed my chain, and I was on my way.
Feeling defeated, I thought about how bad the day was. I couldn’t even blow off steam without something going wrong. Someday though, my luck is bound to change. Right?
