Anything did happen

As we sat at our enormous dinner table - it was a reservation for 14 after all - my friend made a joke referencing the trailer for that awful yet timely movie, New Year’s Eve. On the night before 2012, he said, “According to the New Year’s Eve trailer, anything can happen.” We all laughed out loud at the joke. We thought we knew exactly what was going to happen. We’d finish our meals, drink, drink some more, then head across town to a party which indubitably had more alcohol. We’d dance, laugh at inane things and call it a year.

The thing about New Year’s Eve is that no matter how hard you try to curb your expectations, they will always be higher than the actual outcome. In year’s past, I had never spent a new year drunk, surrounded by friends. Plans would fall apart - like last year, when a snow storm made it impossible for me to go see my friend in Virginia - or I wouldn’t even try. More often than not, I would simply opt for sitting in my home with my parents, watching them doze off while waiting for Dick Clark and/or Ryan Seacrest to announce the new year.

But this year? This year was going to be my year. Because the only expectation I had was seemingly already met. Plans with friends. Lovely dinner. Grey goose vodka. Champagne. The hospital.

Yeah. The hospital. And that, my friends, would be the part I didn’t plan for. The part I was not expecting. At the cross-town party, while talking with a group of people, somehow wine ended up on top of my foot. Well, not so much my foot as my little toes. And not so much wine as a full bottle of wine. And not so much ended up as violently fell on. That’s where the hospital comes in. But only after the pain and the pools of tears.

Luckily my toes weren’t broken. It was diagnosed as a “crushing toe injury,” the fancy way of explaining exactly what happened. When I woke up later on the first day of 2012, they were red, black and purple and swollen. They hurt a lot - but maybe not more than my pride as I tried to walk with the ugly supportive shoe they gave me.

I told someone what happened the next day, and their response was “I feel like that would only happen to you.” And I very much agree with that. The majority of my stories end with the sentiment “and then it got weird.” Part of my New Year’s Resolution was to try and change that. Until the wine bottle beat those thoughts out of my mind.

I think it’s time I realize that I am probably just an awkward person. I attract strange situations. But maybe that isn’t a bad thing. It does give me some pretty good writing material.