Heather Toshiko

Well, it’s taken me 10 years to write this, but I’m fairly certain that I’m finally emotionally stable enough to share the story of a night I will never forget.

When I was 25, I was still fairly oblivious to the warning signs that my body sent me when I was sick. I attributed most discomfort to allergies and never really bothered to consider that sometimes I might be ill.

For some reason, I always got the flu during Christmas or New Years. Before I started getting the vaccine religiously, one or the other of the two holidays was spent in bed feeling like ass. In 1999 however, it hit me around Easter. I remember sitting on the couch in my parent’s living room, and feeling cold. I had been sniffling for a few days, but I assumed that my springtime allergies were kicking in. I decided to take a shower, so I left the warm blanket I was wrapped in, and headed down the hall.

When I got in the shower, I still felt cold and the hot water felt wonderful. It felt so good in fact, that I kept pumping the heat higher and higher until the room was quite steamy. Halfway through the shower, I tilted my head back and closed my eyes to rinse the conditioner out of my hair. That’s when my ears started ringing and I lost my vision for a second. I stood up, and felt fine, so again, I tipped my head back and tried to rinse my hair. Again, I started to pass out. Not good.

I turned off the water, hair dripping conditioner, legs half shaved, and sat on the edge of the tub. My stomach started to feel sick, but I really wanted to finish my shower, so I stood up, bent down to turn the water back on, and started to black out as liquid shit shot out of my ass and into the tub. Awesome. That’s when I realized that something was really, really wrong.

Barely conscious, I heaved myself onto the edge of the tub, feet on the ground, head on my knees. That’s when I lost it. Completely. What I can recall is waking to hear my little brother knocking on the door asking if I was ok. I mumbled that I was, then realized that I was lying naked, half in the tub, legs hanging over the edge, hair resting in a puddle of shit water. I had fainted and fallen backwards into the tub and landed in my own crap.

My brother, sensing that something wasn’t right, called my Mother who came in to find me naked in a room that reeked of poop and humiliation and struggling to get out of the bathtub. To her credit, she didn’t laugh until much later.

After helping me out of the tub and wrapping me and my hair in towels, she got me across the hall and onto a bigger towel on my bed. I wasn’t taking any chances getting skid marks on the sheets. Then, she took my temperature. 104 degrees. Oops.

By that time, Dad was involved, and after he checked on me, he went across to the bathroom where I heard him exclaim “Oh, Heather,” followed by laughter. To his credit, he got paper towels and Lysol and cleaned out the tub for me.

After resting, my Mother still had to help me shower and wash the excrement off of my arms and out of my hair. I was still too unsteady on my feet and very weak.

Turns out I had the worst case of the flu I’d ever experienced. I was cold before my shower because I had a high fever that caused the chills. By taking a scalding hot shower, which felt good to my chilled body, I had sent my temperature soaring thus causing me to pass out. Dumping a liquid grumpy on the shower floor was just a bonus.

To this day, when I get particularly mouthy, my family is kind enough to remind me of the time my ass vomited in the shower and I passed out naked in the puddle.

I hate people.  Well, maybe that’s a little strong.  No, nevermind, I hate people. 

See, about twice a year, I go to Costco and stock up.  I try to avoid weekends and Costcos in cities with high illegal immigrant populations, but I was in need of some essentials today so we went to the one on Sepulveda in The Valley.

For starters, it probably didn’t help my mood that it was 92 degrees outside.  I’m not a fan of the heat, so I was already feeling pissy when we entered the store.  That’s when the stench of a thousand sweaty bargain hunters from countries spanning the globe hit me.  It seems they were all embroiled in a vicious battle for cart spaces closest to the free sample tables, and failing to wrangle their tards.  In a word: hell.

Within minutes we were stuck in a 5-cart pileup near a sausage sample table in the deli section.  Some stay-puft marshmallow minority was blocking an entire aisle while greedily shoving mini-dicks in her mouth.  Really?  The joke writes itself.  I had to clap my hands and loudly say  “Traffic jam, c’mon people move it along.  You’re blocking the aisle.”  Stay-Puft looked up in a grease addled daze and then lumbered out of everyone’s way.  Fatass.

After fighting through the rest of the aisles and getting reprimanded by Chris every time I wanted to buy something that tastes good, we headed to the front of the store.  There, we stopped briefly to look at socks.  Seriously, why do men think it’s ok to wear socks riddled with holes?  I mean, it’s like $5 for 50 pairs at Costco so you really don’t need to wear socks that are grayish in color, threadbare and crunchy.  I digress. 

So, we park the cart in a respectable slot on the side of the aisle so as not to block traffic.  Also, there were a ton of illegals as I mentioned before, and you just know their carts weren’t insured.  Anyway, we’re looking for sox in size ginormous and this little Armenian woman asks us to move our cart so she can get by, rather than burning 5 extra calories and going around it.  Chris, nice guy that he is, happily obliged.  I fought to silence my inner demons, but I did not win.  I politely suggested she just go the fuck around and stop being lazy.  I’m pretty sure she didn’t understand a damn word I said.  Fatass.

We finally managed to get to the checkout without further altercation, and after spending $300, I nestled into the herd headed for the door.  There, some minimum wage monkey barely glanced at my receipt then marked it with her highliter-of-self-esteem.  Seriously, does this really help prevent theft?  Unless they’re checking every item against the receipt, which there is no time to do, it’s a pointless exercise.  All it does is cause a huge clusterfuck at the door.  Arrrgh!

By the time we were in the lot, I was sweaty, agro and looking for a fight.  I’m still not sure how we made it out of the lot.

I hate Costco.

I’m pretty sure that I don’t really like change. Sure, there’s good change, like when you lose 20 pounds, or when you buy a nicer car, but generally, I’m not a fan.

For most of my life, I’ve lived in a home with several people. Growing up, it was my parents and my brother. When I moved out, I lived with my friend Jackie and our roommate Cindy. From there, I moved to a house with my brother and his best friend. When his best friend got engaged, my brother and I got our own place. Only in the last year and a half have I lived alone in a place that has been solely mine. I have to tell you, I kind of like it. At first, I was uneasy about the idea. I liked living in a place full of noise and laughter. I thrive on chaos. Now, I love coming home to a house that is just how I left it. I love my freedom and my sovereignty.

In exactly two weeks, the short-lived era of my residential freedom will come to an end. My guest room will no longer be the dumping ground for my forgotten clothing, old shoes, boxes of detritus and general crap. On April 30, it will become the domain of my beloved boyfriend and his computers, cameras, printers, books and nerd supplies. My guest room will become his office. In other words, change.

My boyfriend, Chris, is a great guy and one whom I still can’t believe I managed to snare. He’s my first and only “nice guy,” and I have to say that I’m pretty hooked on the breed. He’s making a huge sacrifice by moving to Orange County from his digs in Studio City, but for some reason, he seems to think I’m worth it. Sucker! I’m thrilled to have him here, and seeing him daily instead of weekly will be awesome. I just feel like there’s this looming cloud of change coming and I’m not sure what to do to prepare myself.

The change seems to already be happening in increments. Suddenly, there are healthy snacks in the fridge, surely not mine, and I’m sleeping on the wrong side of the bed because of Chris’ shoulder injury. My beautiful 42” plasma will be coming off of the living room wall and move to it’s new home in the master bedroom. Why? Chris has a big mama jama entertainment megaplex that will be taking up residence in the living room. My tv wasn’t good enough. Sigh. Then there’s the car situation. My garage is full of crap, so only one car fits inside. Will my 2004 Infiniti get to continue living there? Nope. Chris’ new BMW 5 series is moving in and kicking my Infiniti to the curb, literally.

I suppose these are truly first-world problems, and I really shouldn’t be complaining. The kids in Darfur would love to have any of these issues. Actually, I’m not even complaining. I’m getting a big entertainment center with a badass tv, a king sized bed, and DirecTV. Oh, and most importantly, I’m getting Chris. I suppose that’s all that really matters, right? If I’m willing to sacrifice my sovereignty, and he’s willing to sacrifice his LA lifestyle, then I suppose it’s meant to be. I just hope that once we adjust to the change, and we get comfortable calling things “ours” instead of “mine,” we can focus on what’s really important in our lives, “us.”