Stress Stinks

The following essay was written by my younger brother Dave, a junior at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, majoring in Broadcast Journalism. Hopefully you'll feel better about your last 10 days after reading this. I know I did.

April 3rd, 2008

These last 10 days have been stressful, stressfully funny, and even slightly traumatic. I managed to lose my cell phone last Monday, as in 10 days ago Monday, and I still do not have one. This experience has tested me in the depths of my patience and sanity with friends and family.
“Where did you put it last?” “How did you lose it?” “Have you retraced your steps?” All questions that a concerned friend would ask.
“Well Billy, if I knew where I put it last, I would have my phone, now wouldn’t I?” “If I knew how I lost it, I would tell you, and I would also have my phone.” “And no, I haven’t retraced my steps. I’ve actually sat on my butt searching for my phone while watching Seinfeld… Yes, of course I’ve retraced my steps.”

Now I appreciate those questions, because that’s obviously what we need to ask when we are concerned about one’s prized possession. And I did, however, pinpoint that my phone must be in a four-block radius of my house, and could have possibly fallen down the sewer drain. I really don’t know how it wasn’t in my friend’s car, or on my retraced steps of where I was, because it was a 10 minute process when I had it and when I didn’t. From that moment, I was dreading having to tell my dad, and so, I didn’t; at least for a few days. I knew that we didn’t have insurance on it, so it would have been a hefty price, if any of you have experienced the same thing. I heard through a couple of friends that Verizon could locate a phone through their computers and GPS. I got very excited, and this news enabled me to tell Rod, my dad. I wrote him a long sympathetic e-mail, saying that I couldn’t believe I lost it, yadda, yadda. All of which was true, but a little overdone. I explained that Verizon could find out where it was via GPS. Well, that was a complete lie. Whoever told me that was full of it. So now I have an angry, disappointed dad, right? Wrong. Apparently he had got insurance a couple months ago that I was unaware about. That was probably the best news that happened this week, although I’m still extremely curious as to where my other one went. I can’t wait to see where God conveniently put it for me when I’m up there with Him.

Ever since that incident, I have felt like I have been in middle school and that I am out of the social circle. It is amazing how much we rely on those little guys once we have one. And it is nice; however, not feeling obliged to talk to anyone is kind of nice and things are more peaceful without one sometimes. But since then, I have had a few things happen to me that have added to those stressful 10 days.

Last Thursday, before our testimony night, I had left a couple important pieces of equipment back at my house, thus having to use Rachel’s car to go back and get it. Thank you, Rachel. She has also not heard this story yet. Anyways, I took her car keys out to the parking lot out and I could honestly not remember which one was her car. I obviously couldn’t call her because I didn’t have my cell phone, and I didn’t want to walk all the way back here, so I paced the lot, acting like I was looking for something I had lost. Or maybe I was subconsciously looking for my phone, who knows. I eventually saw the car that I thought was hers, unlocked it, and tried starting it up. Nothing. I tried wiggling the wheel and getting the key in there. Nothing. I tried this for about 3 minutes when I decided to look at my surroundings inside the car. I couldn’t exactly remember what I saw in there, but I remember thinking, “These things do not remind me of Rachel.” So I opened the glove compartment, looked at the insurance, and saw the car was under the name of ‘Amy Shmockenberry.’ This may not be the exact name, but that’s what I specifically remember. I’m just thankful Ms. Shmockenberry didn’t come to her car and see what was transpiring. Anyways, I did end up finding Rachel’s car shortly afterwords about three spots over.

As this last weekend came up, I started wearing my black Columbia jacket instead of my brown Irish one. I did this because on one of the nights, some friends and I went on a mission where we didn’t want to be seen. Looking back, I really wish I would have stuck with my brown Irish one. “Why?” you ask? Well when I had put it on, I noticed a slightly weird funk on it, but thought it was bearable, so I kept wearing it. As I kept putting it on for a couple of days, it started to get worse. I thought it smelled like sulfur, but one of my friends thought otherwise. He thought it smelled like cat pee. I thought, “That’s ridiculous!” But then shortly afterwards, I got confirmation from another friend, Ben John, who also said the same thing. I came to the conclusion that Barry, our housecat, had peed on it.

That Monday ended up being incredibly brutal because the heat of my body was intensifying the pee smell on my jacket, and almost made me vomit by the time I got home that night. Needless to say, there were no smiles or rubbings-of-the belly for Mr. Housecat Barry. And did I say that I forgot my brown Irish jacket in my buddy’s van that came up for the weekend from Minneapolis? Well, I did. And did I say that he doesn’t have facebook or an e-mail address that I know about, so I can’t tell him to send it back to me? Well that happened too. I also heard rumors around our house that night that Barry was being deported. I didn’t know how to take in that information, but I then found out later that one of my roommates, Justin, strongly vetoed the Barry deportation, so there will be no deportation anytime soon. I’m not sure how that makes me feel.

Now that Monday seems horrific enough, am I right? Wrong. One of my buddies, Bryce and I, were supposed to go the Twins opener that night because we had free tickets, but that little snow storm thought otherwise. So if you noticed, we didn’t go. This meant I had to go to class because I no longer had a legitimate excuse not to go, besides the weather. It’s very rare that I miss the Twins opener, so this made me sad and depressed, as it still does. This jersey also had to be sent to me yesterday by my mom because of my inability to get home and to the game. Thanks Mom.

On Tuesday, the day after these incidents, I decided to go ahead and take care of business by washing my jacket to get the smell off of it. I put it in the wash and within 15 minutes, I realized that the washer had broken mid-way through the wash process. My jacket was sitting in a pool of laundry detergent water and watered down cat pee smell. I put it in the dryer for a while, took it out, Febreezed it like mad, cologned it like mad, and it actually made the smell even worse. To this day, I have not worn a jacket outside, thus you probably see me wearing the same hooded Nike black sweatshirt every day. The upside of Tuesday was that I literally found 5 dollars.

Anyways, I don’t know what I’m going to do with my laundry, I don’t know how to stay warm unless spring decides to warm up, I don’t know where my lost phone went to, I don’t know how to meet with people without my phone, I don’t know why DHL decided to stop by my house 15 minutes before I got home today so I couldn’t get my new phone, I don’t know how to get a hold of my buddy from back home, and I don’t know where my sanity level is right now. I do know, however, that I am still living, I am hanging in there, and I am laughing with God through all of this. Amen.