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| This is how I imagined I would look |
I was a woman in heat this past weekend. No, not that kinda heat but literally heated or immensely hot rather. New York was experiencing her first heat wave of the season and my room was without any cooling system. I had put off buying an air conditioner for the Summer but waking up to migraines and heat rashes lead me to realize that my cheap ass could no longer postpone the purchase.
It dawned on me that buying an AC would be the easy part. However, getting it home, up the stairs, and into the window was something I had never done before. Why though? I have never lived in an apartment with an elevator before. And my six years in New York had seen previous AC installations so why did all this feel so friggin' new?
And then it hit me.
In the past, I always had boyfriends that would take care of the installations.Ick.
Previous to this epiphany, I'd always considered myself an independent lady even when in a coupledom where certain chores are allocated to boyfriends. I set myself apart from those women who assumed a man should pay for every meal, be the only one to take out the trash, fix plumbing problems, kill rodents/bugs, etc. I mean I thought I was "good" about those things. But apparently, when it came to physical labor i.e. putting together Ikea furniture, hanging up shelves, and dealing with AC units, I outsourced out the yin-yang. The realization made me thoroughly disappointed in myself. Weakling! I thought. You don't need a man to do x, y, z around the apartment. You got able hands and legs!
And then the third day of the heat wave fiercely hijacked New York and my desire to be independent was eclipsed by my desire for comfort and coolness (yes, I am aware of my first world woes so no emails pointing out the obvious, Lone Reader of my blog.)
Luckily Crab Curry was in town and we'd made plans to hang. When in town, he always has access to a car. And he has very, VERY strong arms SO, it only made sense that I request that perhaps my dear, strong friend help me out a weeeee bit.
And because Crab Curry is Crab Curry (always down for helping out), we made our way to Target and I bought my unit. He lugged it to the car. Then he hauled it to the apartment building. And then he schlepped it up four flights of stairs. And he did all this although he was leaving the country in 12 hours and still had a bevvy of things to take care of. It dawned on my that my weak, over-heated butt was being selfish so, though he offered, I told him he need not waste him time putting the unit in the window and that I'm not that useless. Surely we should spend our limited time more efficiently--why waste time doing something I'm confident I can do by myself?
Shit. Was I wrong.
After Crab Curry left, I quickly scrambled to put in my unit, excited by the prospect of a cooler
No, no, I can do this by myself I thought. Women have babies and raise human beings all by themselves. Surely I can put a goddamn AC unit in the window by my lonesome! I am woman dammit. HEAR ME ROAR!
So I screwed everything. Sure, I did it incorrectly the first, umm, 2 times. But I figured it out. Eventually. Now it was time to just raise the unit into the window, and boom! I'd be one chill woman.
What followed was not a pretty sight, Loves. That ish was heavy. Steadily keeping the window up with one hand while keeping the unit pivoted on the ledge was quickly turning into something damn near impossible. I looked outside to the courtyard under my window where small children were playing. Shit, I'm gonna squash a child. The children looked up at me, eyes filled with amusement mixed with a twinge of fear. "Guys, move over, this may fall!" I yelled from my window above. The children scrambled to safety, laughing but screaming something along the lines of the crazy lady at the window who was about to drop her AC. Luckily, luckily, I caught the unit at the last moment.
And then, like another ton of bricks, it hit me.
I couldn't do it, Loves. I couldn't friggin' tilt the AC at the perfect angle with one hand and push the window pane down over the unit with the other hand because, well, must I state the obvious?
Luckily, my roommate helped me install the unit the next day and what took me an hour to not do, we did together in 5 minutes. Problem solved. Sure, someone could potentially always help me with this but was I OK with that? Surely I wasn't that weak?
I needed to be strong. I quickly You Tube'd a Jillian Michael's full body workout video. I could do this. I WILL DO THIS DAMMIT! The next time I have to carry or install anything, I WOULD DO IT, sans boyfriend, roommate, or whomever! I will be stronger and more independent. This wasn't only about an AC!
I was motivated. Hell, why stop at Jillian's videos. I was gonna give myself a make-over from the inside out. I'd tried to be better about eating and working out but perhaps I could kick it up a notch. A stronger, leaner, meaner, AC unit installing Soni was so close I could taste it!
Find out in my next blog post how I've progressed.
Did I finish Jillian's 55 minute video or did I hurl half-way through? Did the AC unhinge from the window because I never used all the screws (where the hell do all those lock brackets go?!)? Do I have an impending law suit against me because the unit fell on the children below? Do I have a new boyfriend with out of this world upper body strength? Though unintentional, did you, too, notice how many times there was an opportunity to say "that's what she said" throughout this post?
Get the answers to these questions when you check back in on Friday AND get healthy recipes for summer snacks and blended drinks that'll keep you cool even without an AC!
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