My life is a comedy of errors. A few years ago I would have said that I was unlucky or that the old saying, “If something bad is going to happen ,it’s going to happen to me” was an accurate description of my daily life… but recently I have decided to change my mindset.

A “comedy of errors” is a much better fit because I have learned to laugh at myself. I actually think it is God’s way of giving me some humor in the midst of dealing with something difficult.

For instance, at the end of my junior year at Auburn I had to move apartments because my roommates were graduating.

To say I was not happy about this move would be an understatement. I was sad about leaving my apartment that I loved to move to a smaller one that I did not love and where I would have to share a bathroom. I was nervous about my new living situation with different roommates. I was depressed that my two best friends were graduating and leaving me. I could go on, but I won’t.

I had until July to completely move out, but my parents wanted me to bring as much stuff home as I could in May. So I had to pack my car. Let me set the scene for you as I saw it in my mind …

It was at least 1,000 degrees with 100 percent humidity. I had to move sooooooooo much stuff to my car, which was three flights of stairs down with no elevator. I was never going to see my best friends again because they were leaving me here and I was wasting our last few hours together packing.

In reality the temperature probably was in the 80s. I have a Honda Civic, meaning only so much stuff can fit in my car. My best friends are from the same town I am and we live about 10 minutes apart from each other, so the likelihood that I’d see them again was relatively good. The walking down three flights of stairs, however, was completely accurate.

Trouble struck at about my third trip down to my car. I was carrying this plastic case of shoes that was very bulky and awkward. It was a clear tub so in my mind, walking down the stairs wouldn’t be a problem. In reality it was only see-through when nothing was in it, not when it held 10 pairs of shoes.

I get to the second to last step on the third story landing and I think I am on the last stair, so I misjudge the step. Naturally my foot hits the edge of the stair and I begin to fall.

Here’s what I was thinking:

Ahhhh I missed the step!!! Where did that extra step come from?? I’m going to land on the concrete! This is gonna hurt, there’s definitely gonna be blood. I am not OK with blood. Why did I decide to walk down these stairs in my Rainbow flip flops instead of tennis shoes? Because it’s 1,000 degrees and tennis shoes are hot — that’s why! Now my flip-flop is caught under the step so I can’t catch myself! Good life decision. Way to make use of that college education. How should I land? On my knees … that seems like the best option. Well, I can’t land on my right knee because it has that big scar from my surgery and it doesn’t seem safe to land on it. My parents will be so mad if I mess up my knee again! They won’t pay for another surgery. Left knee it is!!

Notice “drop the box of shoes” never even crossed my mind.

So I landed on my left knee and the force of the landing caused me to skid a little bit so that it scraped all up and down my knee, leg and ankle. At this point I still had the shoes in my hands so I decided to go ahead and limp to the car to finish packing.

I walked to my car with blood running down my leg and then walked back up to my apartment, opened the door and yelled for my roommate who had graduated from nursing school two days before.

She walked out of her room and screamed. Then we had a discussion about how screaming at patients was not the best plan of action. I hate blood and hadn’t looked at my leg so I made her fix it.

This involved her telling me the peroxide wouldn’t hurt, me yelling that she was a liar after she poured it on my leg, me crying when the stinging started and her trying very hard not to laugh as I sat on the bathroom counter (which I had just cleaned) with my leg in the sink and my eyes closed because I hate blood.

The best part of the story is her telling me that we didn’t have a Band-Aid big enough to cover the scrapes on my leg and all the gauze she had came from the hospital, which I was not OK with because she had just spent the last two years telling me how disease-ridden the hospital was. So I made another oh-so-wise decision and just drove home with my knee still bleeding, meaning I had to stop several times to wipe the blood off so my car didn’t look like a horror movie when I got home. It is hard work driving, trying to keep your leg from touching anything and then occasionally wiping away the blood without looking at how much blood there still is.

I look back on this story now and laugh. Instead of remembering the day I had to leave my friends and my apartment as a bad one, I remember it as the time I was balanced enough to fall down the stairs, smart enough to believe the peroxide wouldn’t hurt and brave enough to try not to cry when said peroxide tried to burn my skin off. That might not sound like a good day, but it gave us one last hilarious bonding experience that still keeps us laughing to this day.

By Caitlin