Junior year high school. I was running laps on the football field. We were in the middle of lacrosse practice. Oh, did I mention I used to play lacrosse? Yeah…about that… Anyway, lacrosse season just so happened to coincide with track-and-field season, which meant sharing the football field with the track team (I like to call them t&f-ers). There was a corner of the field that the t&f-ers did their field events, one of which involved hurling a 5-lb discus as far as possible. You could imagine the holes in the grass these things would make where they landed.

So anyway, we were running laps at lacrosse practice and the t&f-ers weren’t far away practicing their discus throws. All of a sudden, I heard someone yelling at me to duck. And not wanting to end up with a ginormous dent in my head from being clocked by a large metal flying object, I ducked. Boy, did I duck. I ducked so well, I ended up with my foot in one of the aforementioned discus holes, fell sideways, and twisted my ankle. Smooth.

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Freshman year of college. It had been snowing for a few days, so there was quite a bit of it laying around. Also, Pittsburgh never seemed to have a notion of salting sidewalks/streets, so there was snow literally everywhere. Some friends and I were walking back to our dorms from another friend’s apartment after dinner, and we caught sight of a bus. We took off running to catch it. As we were running across the street, my brain failed to process the fact that all of the snowfall had essentially made the street appear to be sidewalk-level. I reached the sidewalk and attempted to step onto it. But I miscalculated and only half of my foot ended up on the sidewalk. Factor in the speed I had picked up from running and my reflexes kicking in to negotiate this unforeseen surprise, and I literally ended up flying across the sidewalk.

To add insult to injury, because of the ice, I also slid a few feet on my back before coming to a stop. To add more insult to injury, MOW and K basically stood over me and pointed and laughed as I died of embarrassment. Only when I got up to recompose myself did I realize that my ankle wasn’t doing its job and that I couldn’t walk anymore.

When we were back at the dorms, MOW took compromising pictures of me in pain because she was a considerate and kind roommate who clearly valued making sure her good friend was okay over her own amusement. *eyeroll* The next day I headed to the University Center to grab lunch after visiting the doctor. The guy behind the counter saw me limping as I walked in and asked, “What happened to you?” I told him about the sprain. “Were you drinking?” he asked. “No,” I replied. “That’s kind of pathetic, you know,” he said to me only half jokingly. I wanted to disappear.

Months later, I walked into my dorm room to find MOW giggling at her desk. She had developed those photos. “For blackmail.” The beginnings of a beautiful friendship, I tell you.

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Two nights ago. LK is in town. I haven’t seen her in, what, two years? We grab F and E and head out to drinks. And LK orders the punch bowl. The alcoholic punch bowl. As in, the punch bowl filled with juice and alcohol, but mostly alcohol.

Hello? Asian? Glow? One beer limit? Zero alcohol tolerance?

After drinks, we want to head out to check out another location. I’m not paying attention to what’s in front of me and basically fall into a crack in the sidewalk. When I do, I hear that unmistakably familiar cracking noise in my ankle. The one that tells me the next step I take will be excruciating. Suddenly I’m seeing stars and I think I’m going to pass out. But I’m also in heavy denial and trying to convince myself I can still walk (reminder: alcoholic punch bowl).

We give up pretending I’m ok and climb in a cab. I wake up the next morning to see a baseball where my ankle should be.

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I was going to end by saying my ankle just can’t catch a break. But that pun just made my head explode.