Um…Grace, you dropped your rock…

Early this morning, one of my employees sent me a text message asking me if I was able to pick him up on my way in to work as he was dropping his car off at a dealer for some work (this is NOT psycho-boundary-breaking-f-head-co-worker).

The extra stop put me behind about 20 minutes, so by the time we got to work, the parking lot was full, and we had to park on the back of the building…what I call: the “Scooby Doo 4” section of the parking lot because it’s so far away from the building, but unlike amusement parks, there is no shuttle to take you to the door.

Now, let me provide a prologue to this morning: I am not now, nor have I ever been, a morning person. I believe this has something to do with the fact that I can never get to sleep before 2am and on more nights than not, I’m plagued with iniquitous and fear-provoking dreams and nightmares. Last night was one of those nights. Due to the above, I find my head cloudy and my body clumsy before about 9 am.

Now, on a “normal” morning, I can handle to walk from my car to the building where my office is housed without too much difficulty. This is because I typically get to work before the rest of the characters and I’m able to park within a ½ mile radius of the building…in an area I like to call, “SpongeBob 1”, an area where you can walk right up to the turnstile with ease.

After parking in the Scooby Doo 4 section of the parking lot, my co-worker and I begin the arduous walk into the office. I was juggling my purse, a cup of coffee, a cup of ice, and a bag filled with files, and my laptop when my heel suddenly got caught in a crack on the pavement and I stumbled and tripped (in slow motion, of course), spilling my ice & coffee, and dropping my purse and bag. I was off of the ground in less than 2 seconds, my employee didn’t even have time to ask, “Are you okay?”

The first thing I did was of course look around to see if anyone else was around, you know, filming my clumsiness to put on YouTube (because I am just that important and interesting). Luckily I saw no one, with the exception of one young lady at the “smoke-table” but she was “in the zone” smoking and texting so surely she didn’t catch the mad lady fall in the parking lot.
I didn’t see anything fall out of my bag so I picked myself up and continued my trek into the building, pretending nothing out of the ordinary just happened. My employee says, “Um, you dropped your rock.” My brain made no connection to what he said. And I thought to myself, “My rock?” He bends down, picks up *my rock* and hands it to me. It was the heart rock that DT loaned me…and of course I carry it around with me, “in case of an emergency” ( I know – FREAK)! I also carry lots of other things in my bag, computer glasses, gum, altoids, a book or two, even dental floss. Did any of that fall out of my bag? NO! Just DT’s rock.
He said nothing else…but I’m sure he walked away wondering why in the world his boss is walking around with a rock in her bag.
Oh, well, I need the rock, so I carry the rock…I’m not embarrassed about it. Okay, maybe I’m a little embarrassed about carrying a rock. But, hey – at least it wasn’t a teddy bear.