Read Online Suitable Precautions by Laura Boudreau - Free Book Online
Authors: Laura Boudreau
Ads: Link
or even Javex will ever get that mouth clean. Which is the point, obviously.
Alice said, Doesnât your mom get mad about these?
I thought about that. I tried to imagine my dad taking the old Leica off the shelf in the bedroom closet and saying, Okay, Karen. Sit on the edge of the bed. Spread your legs. Yep, be more pinchy with your fingernails. Now, look at the corner of the ceiling like youâre trying to decide which of the kidsâ Halloween costumes to sew next. And my mom, purple spider veins on her thighs, holding the pose like she was sitting for one of those oldie timey photographs you can get at Pioneer Village, saying through her closed teeth, Are you almost done, Eric? I think the dishwasherâs finished and I donât want spots.
No, I said to Alice. I bet she probably doesnât mind. And Alice said, Well, I would. Whoâd want her husband looking at pictures of other girlsâ you-knows. And I was like, What, hoo-has? Snatches? Twats? But Alice gave me this look and said, God, Lauren. Sometimes you donât know when to quit.
I get that a lot.
Sorry, my arm is tired. Okay, Iâm good.
Yeah, Mrs. Ogilvy said those exact words to me, except for the part about God, because I donât think youâre allowed to talk about God at school anymore. Not like when my mom went to school and they made her pray before every math test and spelling bee, and do creepy stuff like kiss her crucifix before trying to jump over the pommel horse in gym. But then again, what do you expect when you go to Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrow and all your teachers are named Sister Mary Jehosephat, or whatever? So Mrs. Ogilvy didnât say God, because I donât go to a Catholic school, and because if anyoneâs got a pickle up her bum about what youâre allowed and not allowed to do itâs Mrs. Ogilvy, but she definitely said, Lauren, sometimes you donât know when to quit.
She said it because I did this thing that I do sometimes, this thing where I fall over. Iâve perfected my technique so it looks really painful, but it isnât. I roll my eyes back in my head so people can only see the white parts, and then I twist my lips up into this weird kind of face. Iâve learned to keep my mouth closed and my teeth clenched so I donât bite my tongue. Then I click my shoulder blade out of placeâIâm double-jointedâand jerk my shoulder up to my ear. After about a half-second I let one side of my body, Iâm better at the left side, go limp and I just kind of crumple in on myself. Blam. I jerk my left arm up at the elbow in kind of a spastic way when I do it, so it looks like maybe Iâm having a seizure or a stroke, or something, but really itâs for balance. Itâs a controlled fall.
I got the idea from reading this book by a girl with epilepsy. The girl had to go to this special school for epileptics that was run by nuns, and one of the things the nuns taught them to do was fall. That way if the girls felt a seizure
coming on, they could fall on their own time and be on the ground when it came, and they wouldnât seize standing up and crack their heads open. I donât know how the nuns knew what they were talking about. I mean, they were nuns, not physiotherapists, right? But their training methods made sense. First they got the girlsâthey were all girlsâto fall into a swimming pool, so they could get used to the feeling of falling, the loss of gravity, and stuff. Then they made them practice the same sort of thing but on these cushy gym mats. The girl in the story described the process in very poetic terms. She wrote that the girls in the water were like spreading lilies and that the girls on the mats were like drifting snowflakes, and all of that. It was cool to read but not all that helpful when it came to learning how to fall, especially because I donât have a pool or a cushy gym mat and so I had to start with my bed, which was
Alice said, Doesnât your mom get mad about these?
I thought about that. I tried to imagine my dad taking the old Leica off the shelf in the bedroom closet and saying, Okay, Karen. Sit on the edge of the bed. Spread your legs. Yep, be more pinchy with your fingernails. Now, look at the corner of the ceiling like youâre trying to decide which of the kidsâ Halloween costumes to sew next. And my mom, purple spider veins on her thighs, holding the pose like she was sitting for one of those oldie timey photographs you can get at Pioneer Village, saying through her closed teeth, Are you almost done, Eric? I think the dishwasherâs finished and I donât want spots.
No, I said to Alice. I bet she probably doesnât mind. And Alice said, Well, I would. Whoâd want her husband looking at pictures of other girlsâ you-knows. And I was like, What, hoo-has? Snatches? Twats? But Alice gave me this look and said, God, Lauren. Sometimes you donât know when to quit.
I get that a lot.
Sorry, my arm is tired. Okay, Iâm good.
Yeah, Mrs. Ogilvy said those exact words to me, except for the part about God, because I donât think youâre allowed to talk about God at school anymore. Not like when my mom went to school and they made her pray before every math test and spelling bee, and do creepy stuff like kiss her crucifix before trying to jump over the pommel horse in gym. But then again, what do you expect when you go to Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrow and all your teachers are named Sister Mary Jehosephat, or whatever? So Mrs. Ogilvy didnât say God, because I donât go to a Catholic school, and because if anyoneâs got a pickle up her bum about what youâre allowed and not allowed to do itâs Mrs. Ogilvy, but she definitely said, Lauren, sometimes you donât know when to quit.
She said it because I did this thing that I do sometimes, this thing where I fall over. Iâve perfected my technique so it looks really painful, but it isnât. I roll my eyes back in my head so people can only see the white parts, and then I twist my lips up into this weird kind of face. Iâve learned to keep my mouth closed and my teeth clenched so I donât bite my tongue. Then I click my shoulder blade out of placeâIâm double-jointedâand jerk my shoulder up to my ear. After about a half-second I let one side of my body, Iâm better at the left side, go limp and I just kind of crumple in on myself. Blam. I jerk my left arm up at the elbow in kind of a spastic way when I do it, so it looks like maybe Iâm having a seizure or a stroke, or something, but really itâs for balance. Itâs a controlled fall.
I got the idea from reading this book by a girl with epilepsy. The girl had to go to this special school for epileptics that was run by nuns, and one of the things the nuns taught them to do was fall. That way if the girls felt a seizure
coming on, they could fall on their own time and be on the ground when it came, and they wouldnât seize standing up and crack their heads open. I donât know how the nuns knew what they were talking about. I mean, they were nuns, not physiotherapists, right? But their training methods made sense. First they got the girlsâthey were all girlsâto fall into a swimming pool, so they could get used to the feeling of falling, the loss of gravity, and stuff. Then they made them practice the same sort of thing but on these cushy gym mats. The girl in the story described the process in very poetic terms. She wrote that the girls in the water were like spreading lilies and that the girls on the mats were like drifting snowflakes, and all of that. It was cool to read but not all that helpful when it came to learning how to fall, especially because I donât have a pool or a cushy gym mat and so I had to start with my bed, which was
Similar Books
