A Valentine's Day Surprise

On Valentine’s Day I wake up to tonsils the size of golf balls, aches and pains up and down my back, and a fever that takes over my entire body, making it so that the second my legs touch, sweat forms instantly.

I’m thinking great, it’s Valentine’s Day and I get to spend it feeling sick and miserable. Yay! Instead of letting my illness ruin my day, I decide to do something about it. At 8:30am I decide to haul my sick-self to Student Health in attempt find out what the hell is wrong with me. Of course, the night before it snowed a good 4 inches and D.C. ultimately just let it chill there for the day. So, I trek through the snow and finally make it to Student Health. I walk through the glass doors of the building at 9am and, assuming that Student Health opens at 8:30, I figure ok, not a lot of people should be here, so I should be able to see a doctor soon. I get there and the door is locked and the lights are off in the waiting room. I think to myself, this is bad, but I dragged myself all the way hear and I’m not going back until I find out what’s wrong with me.

Eventually someone shows up around 9:30 and says that due to the snow they are not opening until 10. After this nice woman lets me into the waiting room, she informs me that I will be able to see a doctor at 10. I then promptly pass out in my chair and hope to awoken by a doctor calling my name.

Unfortunately, my peaceful sleep is interrupted by a woman, with a long island accent, who is practically shouting, claiming that she is CONVINCED her daughter has bronchitis. I wake up and watch the mother-daughter duo. I also keep an eye on the clock as 10 o’clock approaches. To my surprise and utter disbelief, bronchitis girl, who has only been waiting 5 minutes is called in to see a doctor!! I wanted to scream, but oh wait I can’t because my throat kills and I physically don’t have the strength to.

At 10:17 my name is called by a kind, blonde haired doctor. Once in the room she looks at her charts and realizes that this is my third trip to student health within the past 2 months. Each time I visited they tested me for strep and gave me antibiotics, but each time I never had strep. After viewing my massive tonsils and checking my fever of 100.7, she says she’s going to have to test me for mono. In my head I freak out. The thought of having mono is devastating to me because right now is the WORST time to have mono especially because, not only is it Valentines day, but my birthday is 2 days away and I can’t be sick on my birthday! Oh yeah and it probably would be bad if I missed school too.

The doctor tells me I have an 80% chance of having mono. Awesome! She hands me a bottle of antibiotics and a sheet of paper which she then informs me that I need to take to a lab down the hall.

While I am paying for my visit, I overhear that bronchitis girl does not have bronchitis at all. Funny. The laughing stops here because the man at the desk tells me to take the sheet the doctor gave me to the lab, where they will take my blood. WHAT! I said. (I have an immense fear of needles). I ask him to repeat himself. He does and then I realize that there is nothing else I can do except go through with it.

I courageously walk down the hall to the lab and find that the door is locked. I trudge back into the office and tell the man at the desk that the door is locked and he says that they must be closed, but redirects me to another lab a few blocks away.

I walk down the windy, snow-filled streets searching for the building with this other lab. I eventually find the building, but when I get inside I can’t find the lab. After fifteen minutes of searching, I am sweating and on the verge of tears because all I want to do is be wrapped in my billowy comforter in my bed. Then, out of no where a man approaches me and says “you look lost.” I show him the piece of paper I am carrying and he directs me to the lab.

Once I am there the nurse sticks me in a chair, wraps a band around my arm, and then takes my blood. (While the nurse did this I 1. looked away the entire time and 2. listened to the new Justin Timberlake album in an attempt to distract myself from what was really happening)

I leave the lab and begin my journey back to Thurston. When I arrive back in my room, just as I am about to throw myself on to my bed, I see a dainty pink rose lying near my pillow from a special someone. I put the rose in a vase, lie down in my bed, forget everything I had just been through, forget that I was ever sick to begin with, and dream of my valentine.

My Autobiography

Star was born and raised in the thrilling and endlessly entertaining New York City. She spent her childhood days running through sprinklers at the playground with her older brother Ted, taking the subway to Yankees games with her dad and baking cupcakes dripping in frosting and sprinkles with her mom. With dreams to one day become a baker, little Star would spend hours preparing imaginary meals for her plush stuffed animals using her 3 foot tall plastic kitchen, equipped with a stove, microwave, cabinets and a plethora of plastic food. Despite her girlie traits, Star was also very sporty, due mainly in part to spending cool fall days in Central Park watching her brother play soccer. This prompted her to join a soccer team, which would eventually lead to a lengthy career as a soccer player, taking her places she never could have imagined.

Star attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart, a catholic all girls school, where she was from kindergarten to senior year. Here she could be seen laughing through the halls with friends, discussing the symbolism behind Hester Prynne’s scarlet letter in her English class, developing photos in the dark room, writing notes to her neighbor during statistics class and changing out of her school uniform into her soccer jersey and shin guards. Outside of school Star played on a travel soccer team, which traveled to places as close as New Jersey, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania and as far as Holland, Sweden, and Denmark.

At GW, Star is majoring in business and is yet to decide what field she would like to focus on, but hopes to find out what her true calling is soon. When she is not in class, Star can be seen at Kappa Kappa Gamma meetings and socials. One might also find her on the Vern practicing with the GW club soccer team. Star recently picked up a new hobby; running around the monuments while the sun sets on the glass like reflecting pool, it sounds cheesy, but is very therapeutic. One of Star’s favorite activities is jamming to her ipod while walking across campus, there is something about walking to a great song and escaping from the world for a brief moment. She also enjoys writing inside jokes on her friends’ facebook walls, catching up on episodes of Grey’s Anatomy, and leisurely eating a piece of dark chocolate.