Have you ever had an experience that happen to you that made you put something off to the side? Or told yourself that won’t ever happen to me? Maybe even laugh at someone else because they experienced something you wouldn’t think it could happen? When something unpleasant happens to you in life you must stay strong and be persistent to find a way to overcome it. I been through many experiences in my life when I had to keep moving forward. This one experience that I am going through in my life has brought everything downhill for me.
It all began on December 27,2013 after the holidays going into the New Year. It was an average Friday, I went to the gym with my father like every other morning it was are routine to start the day off. After a good gym session, I went home to freshen up for the day. I then drove to get my scheduled haircut appointment I had at Shear Genius for my Friday night out with some friends. Later on after my haircut I picked up my girlfriend from her first job at the YMCA and drove her to Burlington for her second job because she didn’t have a car at that time. While driving, we had a conversation in the car I had asked about how her day was at her first job. She then told me about her day with the children in her group and how she had fun playing soccer with them. After talking we then arrived at Burlington and she said “you’re lucky, I have to work both jobs and one being late while you go and have fun. Make sure you pick me up tonight at ten o’clock” as she was getting out of the car. I replied “don’t worry I will be there at ten o’clock, have a good shift”.
Afterward, I went home and call my buddy Khoury up to ask about tonight’s plans. I asked him if I should drive up to his place in Westport or he would come to my house in Fall River to pick me up. Khoury told me to drive up to Westport at his place because he wasn’t out of work yet. His job is a family owned company with his father, it’s a Limousine company – Salon Salon Limousine. He had to wait to make sure all the limos were ready for tonight and all customers were taken care of before going out. Its like a 15 minute drive up to Khoury’s place, when I got there I parked my car in the parking lot. Then I went to look for him and double check that everything is done before we left for the night. He said “yeah, bro everything’s all set just give me a minute while I lock the doors and meet me in the Chevy Suburban”. He then came to the SUV and told me that we are going to pick up are other friends that we went to highschool with plus some new friends we met. Once we picked up everyone, we were all hungry because it was already seven o’clock and none of us had eaten. So we all agreed to McDonalds. We then arrived to Mcdonalds, parked the SUV and we all went inside to order. Me and my friends love McDonalds, it was our favorite place to go to after school for a quick bite. We loved Mcdouble’s ordered like ten of them for all of us. You can’t have burgers without fries and drinks we ordered some large fries and go some drinks. After getting our food we sat down, and began to devour our food. Once we were all done with eating, we got back in the SUV and starting talking. My friend Randy said “Guys, I need to go home because I got work in the morning”. Khoury then said “Alright bro, ill bring you home. Anybody else needs to go home?”. Everyone had work in the morning so he dropped everyone home after Randy.
Khoury started driving to Randy’s house in Somerset , its like a 20 minute drive from the Mcdonald’s we were at. I was sitting at the end, near the door behind the driver side and Randy was in the middle. Once we got to his house, I had to get out of the SUV to let him out. When I opened the door and got out of the SUV, I didn’t step on the hitch step up which is if a vehicle is too high off the ground the hitch step is used get up from the ground to the inside of the SUV or high lifted trucks. Instead, I jumped right out of the SUV on to the cement not knowing that it was icey out. I immediately fell on black ice, I fell so hard it hurt really bad. When I fell I got right back up and starting running around saying “Ouch,ouch, ouch” and used some vulgar language. I sat back in the SUV, telling all my friends I think I broke my ankle as I am rolling up my jeans to look at it. My friend Gary and Cameron both skateboard and had sprained their ankles many times, telling me “Coti, it’s not broken it might be sprained , it don’t look that bad”. Khoury then drove me back to his place where my car was parked so I could go home. Before leaving, I immediately called my mom and told her everything that happen. She told me to drive home because it wasn’t my driving foot but I felt dizzy so I asked Gary if he could drive my car for me. We were going to go straight to the hospital to check it out. But it was already 9:45 and I still had to pick up my girlfriend in 15 minutes. As we were driving to Fall River, my girlfriend called me asking where are you? I told her just to walk home because I have to go to the hospital for my ankle but she wanted to come with me so Gary drove to her work to pick her up before going to the hospital.
My mom then called me telling me to get home first so my sister will drive me to the hospital. Gary drove me home with my girlfriend then we got in my sister’s car and drove to Charlton Memorial Hospital. After checking in at the hospital, they took me in immediately and did x-rays on my foot. They gave me ice after the x-rays were taken of my ankle. A few minutes went by and the doctor came back with the results. She said “Coti, it’s severely sprained. I am going to give you brace and some crutches. Please stay off of it and ice it.” I asked what about work? She said “You’re not going to work for the next four days.” After getting all this bad news, my sister brought me home and my girlfriend slept over that night.
The next day, I was just thinking about how stupid I am because I didn’t get out of my friend’s SUV the correct way. A few hours later, around noon – the doctor from the hospital called me and said she read the x-ray wrong and it’s broken. She also say that Monday morning I must go to Dr. Rock and check it again. Monday came and I went to him he gave me a air boot for my ankle. Ever since then I been having this air boot on my foot, I haven’t been at work and I had to do physical therapy so my ankle could heal.
This being the worst event in my life because I wouldn’t think something like this would happen to me. I would always laugh at people if they fell on ice but it now happened to me and its been terrible experience. Persistence helped me through this event because since I ain’t working and can’t leave the house. I still have bills like my car insurance and cell phone. Before breaking my ankle, I would save money every week from my paycheck just to save in case of an emergency. My persistent of saving money helped me alot because I am not bringing in a income, my saved money helped me for the past two months to help me get through the challenges of paying bills and get by without working. Also, my family and girlfriend has helped with things like food, gas and other needs.
I think we all did something that we put off more than once with regreats Many times I’ve done the same myself also I like the way you put the details in a certian mouments i think you bounced around with the story a little bit on some things just like me ,but very great story overall.
Coti this is a really good memoir. I’ve always been scared of breaking or spraining something. You provided a vivid description and you should be proud of yourself for putting aside emergency money. That’s a good idea, it teaches you about responsibility and it seems like it really helped you out.
You tell this clearly, with a lot of detail. The main issue I have, though, is how well this fits the assignment. You bring persistence in at the very end, but most of the rest of the essay is all set-up to the event that requires you to show persistence, so that you never really get to much that explains your persistence itself. Much of the detail doesn’t really connect to persistence (all the driivng around and the McDonald’s info).
If you stick with this experience (and it is a rather recent one to write about–there are advantages and disadvantages to that), you wold need to focus much mor eon what happened *after* your accident, rather than the build-up to it. Or you may want to scrap this and start fresh with another topic (I know that’s a hard thing to hear and do!) If you do decide to start fresh, you can turn in/post a second rough draft by the final draft due date, and then I’ll give you comments on it and a few more days to get final in. Email if you have questions or want to run an idea past me.