As promised last month, here is the story I referred to as The Time I Fell Right Outside of Foreign Affairs and Landed in the Bushes and Nobody Cared.

I was in a rush to meet M at a restaurant before heading off to Montreal, and so I was dressed comfortably and casually in black bell-bottoms and runners. Carrying my gorgeous and rather large red overnight bag (which had no cover), I flew out of the front doors of headquarters, ran down the stairs and across the pavement and started to step back on to the sidewalk. Am a girl on the move, with French boutiques to find and fashionable cities to conquer. I should just move to Montreal considering how often I am there.

Do understand that in front of the entrance one can find all of the smokers, the Ministers’ cars, the diplomats and the taxi cabs. I was not alone; I couldn’t even pretend to be alone.

I started to step back on to the sidewalk when I felt that my right foot was caught in my left bell-bottom. Since I am a mover and a shaker and getting ready for Montreal, rushed and in bell-bottoms and runners, it is only natural that the bell-bottoms were flapping and the runners going at an extra fast pace. Unfortunately, there was a collision between these two, and I the worse for it.

I had no right foot to land on and so I kept flying forward at an alarmingly rapid rate, right over the step of the sidewalk, the entire sidewalk and nearly half the bushes. Most bizarre was my sense of fear, for it was not about my body, but rather that all of my precious items, those so carefully placed in my overnight bag, were to be damaged as soon as they hit the pavement. Do rest assured that nothing was damaged, for as I went propelling forward towards the bushes, so too did all of my precious items (remember: the gorgeous red overnight had no cover).

It must have looked rather poetic actually, as though I had practiced doing just this at that precise moment in front of HQ, in an effort to provide both food for thought and humor to all those puffing away on cigarettes.

My knees and stomach hurt and my face was itchy; because my glasses were a little askew, I couldn’t see much, and so it took me a moment to realize I was in the bushes, stomach down, ass in the air and with gorgeous red overnight bag still over my shoulder, though practically empty.

As I lay in the bushes, a gentleman getting into a cab (& carrying a suitcase) was kind enough to yell out – at the top of his voice: “ARE YOU OKAY?” to which I offered the honest response of: “Erm. I don’t think so.”
And to this he yelled back: “WELL. OK”, then jumped in the cab and left. But not before he waved goodbye.

Isn’t that nice of him? To wave goodbye as I lay in the bushes? Sunshine was flowing out of his every orifice.

In his defence, he is a fellow employee and considering he was carrying a suitcase, he was probably rushed to get to some other part of the world…as most of us who work here are usually in this state of rushed affairs.

I gathered all of my items, made certain that my gorgeous red bag was without rip or tear, rolled up my pants and headed off toward the restaurant without even one look over my shoulder.

Jim Morrison said it best when he said “Walk tall, act fine and never look back,” but maybe he wasn’t talking about “Roll out of the bushes, walk tall, act fine and never look back”…but who knows?

Wait. Maybe that was Bowie?

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