In my History of Non-Western Art class today, one of the graduate students did a presentation on Central African portrait photography. I wasn’t really expecting much, but after seeing what she had to show, my mind was BLOWN. Two of my favorites were Sedou Keita and Malick Sidibé. Such amazing photos, backgrounds, and clothing! Drooool.
Among the souvenirs and knickknacks found in the veritable Cave of Wonders that is my grandparents’ home, my mother and I stumbled across several photo albums. Some of them date all the way back to the 1930s when my grandfather was just a little boy living on a farm. There are also some amazing shots of him as a boy scout in summer camp. Several things amaze me about these photos. First off, it’s incredible that they had cameras around this often to document these amazing moments. Also, I understand that this is how real live people dressed way back then, but I can’t shake the feeling that I’m looking at film stills from a very convincing period piece. It’s so real that it looks fake. If that makes any sense at all. And ohmyGOD, I want a time machine.
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After bringing in all of the boxes from my grandfather’s home a few days ago, our home began to look even more like an episode of Hoarders. Today, in preparation for the Saint Patrick’s Day party we’re having this evening, my mother and I started bringing some of the boxes into the attic for long-term storage. Ever one to get distracted when work needs to be done, I started snooping around our attic and re-discovered some of the old books we had lying around up there. When I was little, my family constantly went to local library sales where you could get an entire bag of books for just $1. My sister and I stocked up on these books and many others including old Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew stories. I doubt I’ll ever read any of these books, but it’s just so nice to have them around. It’s like instant nostalgia!
Whenever I come home to Buffalo for a break, my mother immediately enlists me in numerous projects and chores. This spring break was no exception. Two days ago, my mother brought me over to my grandfather’s house to take the last of the things that needed to be cleared out. I knew that I wanted many of the things in the house, but I really had no idea what sort of treasure trove was waiting for me. When we arrived and my uncle let us in, the stuff I saw made me shit my pants so hard that blood probably came out. As I sat on the floor wrapping item after item in newspaper, I occasionally let out a small moan or a squeak. My uncle and his family couldn’t wait to get rid of all of this junk, and I couldn’t have been more excited.
In addition to enough carnival and milk glass to sink a boat, there were dozens of vintage souvenir plates, old eyeglasses, glass figurines, and toys. Oh, and books. So many AMAZING books. I apologize if this post crashes your browser from the number of photos it needs to load, but I couldn’t help myself.
So, I really like the idea of thrifting and buying cute vintage stuff for my apartment, but up until recently, I did not know that such a thing was possible in New York City. Things like flea markets exist in New York, but they’re usually just overpriced yuppie craft fairs masquerading as flea markets. This is why I was beyond excited when Daniel from Manhattan Nest agreed to be my new thrifting buddy and take me to the elusive and magical junk shops that I had only read about in fairy tales but never knew existed. Daniel is pretty much a thrifting master. Just last month, he purchased a Bertoia Diamond chair for $60 and a pair of Eames shell chairs for $50. NUTS, right? I knew I would be in good hands.
For our first thrifting excursion, Daniel suggested that we go to this place in Bushwick called Green Village. Don’t let the website fool you. That place is a hot disgusting mess of AMAZINGNESS. A junk store with a capital J. “Don’t be offended when I start climbing mounds of furniture like an ape,” Daniel warned in an e-mail. He wasn’t kidding:
After spending a heavenly two hours trolling through the beautifully cluttered isles of Green Village, I narrowed my purchases down to a few amazing items: a delightfully shabby-chic red tin bread box, a miniature metal card catalogue, a white industrial school chair, and a few vintage photographs. All for under $50. Yay!
Here’s the bread box. Look at that amazing handle!
And the card catalogue which I turned into a mini tool box:
I put both items on the lower shelf of my coffee table. They look pretty cute there!
As for the white industrial school chair, I used it to replace the boring IKEA folding chair I had at the desk in my room. I’ve always had a thing for school furniture, so I was especially psyched about this find.
Here’s one of the vintage photographs I purchased. It’s a second grade class photograph from 1952.
The back:
The next weekend, Daniel and I hung out again. In addition to seeing the epic and thought provoking Justin Bieber Movie, Never Say Never, we also visited another junk shop in his neighborhood. This one was aptly named “The Mystery Shop.” After digging around for a little bit, I unearthed a set of gorgeous vintage plates ($1 each) and this amazing set of books published by Time Life in 1969:
Each book cost $2 and features Life Magazine photographs for each decade of the twentieth century. On top of the incredible photographs they house, the books also feature absolutely stunning cloth-bound covers, each in a different pattern.
Amazing, right?
Okay, I know that you all have been on the EDGE OF YOUR SEATS waiting to hear about whether or not I still have my left testicle. Before I go any further, you can all breathe a sigh of relief. All of my balls are totally intact. Sorry for spoiling the ending.
Anyway. Last time we left, off I had just been informed that I would be needing surgery on the aforementioned left ball. As soon as I found this out, the hospital wasted no time in getting me into the operating room. I was immediately asked to jump onto another stretcher which was then whisked off to the OR. As I was carted along the halls and finally into place along the wall of the dimly lit waiting/recovery room, Shannon and Rachel trailed behind. As soon as I was in place, I was seen by several residents, surgeons, and anesthesiologists who all asked me more or less the same health-related questions.
The anesthesiologist wanted to know if I had any loose or chipped teeth, because the breathing tube that they would be sticking down my throat might break them off. Another woman asked me if I had any tongue or body piercings. A cluster of urology residents then came over and asked me to drop trou so that they could inspect my testicular region. All of this would under normal circumstances be incredibly humiliating, but the combination of the pain and the excitement from all the attention I was getting actually made it quite exhilarating. Despite being in an overwhelming state of discomfort, my mood could not possibly have been better. I smiled brightly as doctor after doctor came to visit me and even cracked a few jokes. My gallows humor seemed to worry some of the nurses though, especially when I asked one resident if there were any papers I would need to sign, “in case I, you know, die or something.” Even when one of the urology residents told me that I could potentially lose my testicle during surgery, I shrugged it off. It’s not like I’m planning on having my own children anyway! My attitude towards the entire experience by this point was one of LET’S DO THIS.
Soon, a very short man with a loud, extremely thick Brooklyn accent came up to my bed to join the already large crowd of doctors. He would be my surgeon. Everything from that point on was kind of a blur, but I do recall him saying something along the lines of, “this is easy-peasy! We’ll just cut you open, sew you up and then we’ll go home!” A little bit surprised, because I was under the impression that I would at least be staying the night, I asked, “you’ll go home? Or I’ll go home?” He laughed heartily and told me that we both would be going home that night.
After this brief conversation, I was once again whisked away, this time to a brightly lit operating room filled with roughly ten doctors and residents. This is when things began to get really hard core. I was disrobed and brought onto a thin, cruciform operating table where my legs and arms were strapped down. A nurse came over and put a few heated blankets on top of me and removed my socks. A resident behind me put an oxygen mask over my face while the anesthesiologist attached something to the IV in my arm. Somebody turned on a radio and some wretched Dave Matthews/Jack Johnson/Jason Mraz kind of music began playing. That’s the last thing I remember.
I woke up around an hour later back in the recovery room. Shannon and Rachel were once again by my side and, although my speech was slurred and my face was contorted into a freaky wide-eyed frown, I had Shannon start taking photographs of me. My hospital robes had been put back on me along with a hair net, some new grey socks, and a jockstrap filled with gauze. My crotch was also covered in ice packs.
A nurse came up to us and instructed Shannon and Rachel to go to the waiting room while she got me prepared to leave. She handed me several drinks (a water, an apple juice, and a ginger ale) and told me that I would not be able to leave the hospital until I peed. Just to make sure they didn’t seriously scew up down there. Still a little bit drugged out from the anesthesia, I sipped leisurely at my drinks and observed the comings and goings of the doctors in the recovery room with bemused interest. When I felt that I had drunk enough to go to the bathroom, I signaled for the nurse who helped me out of bed and walked me and my IV into the bathroom.
The nurse placed the IV bag on top of the paper towel dispenser and left me alone. I opened my hospital gowns and lowered by underwear apprehensively. The small bit of scrotum that wasn’t concealed by the jockstrap was dark purple and highly swollen. After this momentary inspection, I commenced with peeing, which went perfectly well considering the circumstances. I then left the bathroom and walked back to my bed. The nurse removed my IV, took some tape off of my body and allowed me to get dressed before bringing me out to the waiting room to greet Shannon and Rachel.
What these surgeons did is nothing short of miraculous. Within a span of exactly twelve hours, I began to experience a mind-blowing amount of pain, went to the hospital in an ambulance, spoke with what seemed like a billion doctors, had surgery, and was able to go home fully intact and in not much pain at all. Aside from walking a little bit funny for the first day or two, I hardly experienced any pain or discomfort. For about a week, my testicles looked as though they had been beaten with a sledgehammer and then eaten by a rabid dog, but they seem almost normal now. The scabs are nearly gone and whatever’s left of the stitches is barely noticeable. I really have a new respect for doctors in general after this entire experience.
After leaving the hospital that night, Shannon and I took a car back to my apartment while Rachel biked there to meet us. After regaling my roommates with the crazy events of the day, Shannon, Rachel, and I walked down the street for a much needed and much deserved dinner.
Thank you so much to everybody who helped me through this painful and exciting ordeal. It was actually much more fun and entertaining than I would have thought possible.
So, when we last left off, I was on my way to Long Island College Hospital in an ambulance. As I began to throw up into a kidney-shaped plastic container, we pulled up at the curb next to the hospital. The paramedics carried me onto another stretcher and wheeled me into a waiting room of sorts. Shannon was furiously texting Rachel who had, at this point, biked to three different hospitals before finding the one I was at. I looked around at a line of stretchers filled with elderly people who looked to be on the verge of death and wondered, yet again, if I had over-exaggerated the severity of my situation. As I hunched over in pain and felt another vomit coming on, I figured probably not.
While waiting to go into triage, the paramedics tried to keep me occupied with light conversation. The male paramedic seemed to be extremely concerned (men especially seemed to get queasy when discussing my situation) and kept asking me if I needed anything. I ultimately settled for a cup of ice which he quickly brought over.
Shannon told me that Rachel was in the waiting room and she exited to go find her. A few minutes later, Rachel came into the stretcher area. I immediately grabbed her torso and brought it towards me in an awkward, crippled sort of hug. She then allowed me to hold her hand and I grasped it so tightly that I thought I might break her bones. Rachel is currently a surgery resident at another Brooklyn hospital. It was kind of wonderful having my own personal doctor with me to explain what, exactly, was going on.
Although technically only one visitor was allowed in at a time, Shannon managed to make her way back into the waiting area before I was escorted into the ER. Up until this point, this entire experience had been extremely surreal and it continued to be so for the rest of the day. Up until last Tuesday, I had never been in an ambulance, I had never been on a stretcher, I had never been hospitalized, and I had never had surgery. As I was wheeled into the ER, I looked awkwardly around at doctors milling around with clip boards, nurses drawing blood, and patients lined up in beds along the wall. I was ultimately wheeled into a corner of the ER next to a pair of awful plastic armchairs. A nurse came to ask me a few questions and told me that a doctor would come to see me soon.
Although I was still in an excruciating amount of pain, this did not keep me from my obsessive need to document every moment of my life. Ignoring the pretty obvious “NO CELL PHONES” sign posted up on the wall, I logged into the hospital’s wifi network and began Twittering nonstop. I then handed my phone to Shannon and instructed her to take as many pictures as she could before the doctors returned.
You get the idea.
Eventually, a doctor came over and told me I would need to take off all of my clothes and put on a hospital gown. I told Shannon and Rachel to please hide from view and stripped down. Once I was fully undressed aside from a hospital gown and my underwear, the doctor returned.
“What seems to be the problem?” she asked.
Still a little bit awkward about my ball situation, I hesitated slightly before saying, “Uh… I have extreme testicular pain. In my left testicle.”
She proceeded to ask me a whole slew of questions about when the pain started (8:30am), whether I was sexually active, how old I was, whether or not I had had surgery before, etc, etc, etc. I didn’t know it yet, but by the end of the day, I would become an expert at answering these questions because I would be asked them probably A HUNDRED TIMES. After the questioning ended, the doctor put on a pair of gloves and began to examine my groin region. As she moved from the right to the left testicle, I began shout in pain. “Ow, ow, ow, OW!”
She took off her gloves, told me that I would need to get an ultrasound, and informed me that somebody would most likely be coming over to give me some morphine. After she left, Rachel returned and I told her everything the doctor had told me. As I waited to be brought down to the ultrasound area of the hospital, Rachel and I had another impromptu photoshoot.
I was never given any morphine, but a woman did eventually come over to wheel me down to the ultrasound lab. After weaving through the maze of linoleum and bad wallpaper that was LICH hospital and taking the elevator down to the basement, we arrived. I was immediately brought into a very dark room filled with computers and was introduced to a portly, friendly-looking man with a mustache. After the stretcher was pulled up beside a flickering computer screen, the man proceeded to lube up a small probe. I warned him that my testicular region was extremely sensitive before he brought the probe down and began rubbing it all over my junk. Aside from being a little bit cold, it was surprisingly not uncomfortable. I looked up at the screen and saw, for the first time ever, what balls look like inside of a scrotum. As the man brought the probe to various areas along my nether region, he took screen caps on the computer.
After a few minutes of this, he left the room and came back with another doctor who gave him further instructions as he probed my balls. I was unable to understand all of their medical jargon, but I did pick up something about reduced blood flow. Once this was done, the two doctors left the room to examine the photographs. In the meantime, I snapped a few more photos.
Soon after, the mustached man came back into the room and informed me that the other doctor was making her diagnosis and in the meantime, I would be brought back up to the ER. I was again wheeled back through the beige maze and back to where I was before. Once I arrived, things seemed to be kicked into overdrive. Several workers came over to ask me more questions and have me fill out paperwork. A nurse arrived with a tray of needles and tubes and immediately inserted an IV and took about eight small vials of blood.
After I had been sufficiently drained and prodded, a scruffy looking man came up to me and informed me of the doctor’s diagnosis. As I had feared, my testicle was indeed twisted. Quite severely, in fact. In order to save the testicle from dying and becoming gangrenous, I would need to be operated on immediately. I would need surgery. On my balls.
Okay. Yesterday was probably the most random, insane, epic, weird-ass day of my life. It all started like any other day. I woke up, fought my roommates for possession of the shower, and got dressed. In the middle of this, however, I started feeling a fair amount of discomfort in my — get ready for this– left testicle. Over the course of an hour or so, the discomfort escalated to pretty intense pain. I texted my work and informed them that I would probably not be able to be in on time. This was around 9am.
I crawled into my bed and found that laying flat on my back helped to ease the pain a little bit. Unfortunately, neither Shannon or I had any pain killers, so I was left to try and wait the pain out. This did not work. When I left my bed, I found the pain to be so intense that I could barely walk. I texted my neighbor Nicole in the hope that she might have some ibuprofen lying around. She was at work, but directed me to go downstairs to her apartment to see if her roommate was there. I went down, knocked, and nobody answered. I hunched back upstairs and, upon entering my apartment, collapsed onto the floor. At this point, I didn’t know if I was overreacting or if there was something seriously wrong. I decided to consult the internet.
I know that it’s often a bad idea to look online for any sort of medical information, but what can I say? I’m a victim of my time. I googled things like “intense testicular pain” and came to the conclusion that it was either an extreme case of blue balls or something called “testicular torsion,” a problem that often arises from extreme shifts in room temperature. If it was the latter (which is what it ultimately turned out to be), it meant that one of my testicles was essentially being strangled to death by a spermatic cord and would die within a few hours if I did not get medical attention.
I decided to text my doctor friend Rachel for some unsolicited medical advice.
Me: Hey…. Are you working today?
Rachel: Nope! I just got up like an hour ago. I feel like a college student! What are you doing?
Me: Um…. DYING. I called off from work because I am in severe pain in my…. boy region. I’m trying to decide right now if I need medical attention, actually. It’s helping to lie flat, but I can hardly walk.
Rachel: Really? Pain since when? And where exactly? Peen or balls? If balls, one or both?
Me: Balllllllllllssssssss. Left one. Since around 8:30am.
At this point I decided to just call her and she instructed me to call my school clinic immediately. After battling with my embarrassment over having to call the clinic for this issue and discussing it with my roommates who were thoroughly involved at this point, I decided to just suck it up and call. This was at around 1pm.
Me: When are your walk-in hours?
Receptionist: Starting at 2pm.
Me: Can I see a doctor RIGHT NOW?
Receptionist: You’re going to have to come at 2. What seems to be the problem?
Me: I’m in severe pain.
Receptionist: Where?
Me: Uh…. the testicle region.
Receptionist: [Pause.] You should come in right now.
After I hung up, I waited for Shannon to get ready so she could take me in a car over to the school clinic. I hunched around my living room a bit, clutching my abdomen which was also severely effected by the pain radiating up and down my body. I ultimately got into a crawling position and clutched my head in my arms on the floor. The pain was so intense that I was pretty sure I was going to throw up. As Shannon and my other roommate Angela helped me get up to go out to the car, I grabbed a plastic bag in case such an event occurred.
As we waited outside for the car to arrive, I clutched Shannon’s body for support as I hyperventilated from the pain. I suddenly started losing sensation in both my arms and legs and couldn’t even hold onto my phone or my bag. “I CAN’T FEEL MY ARMS OR LEGS!” I shouted at my roommates. I felt like I was on an episode of House.
The car eventually arrived and I shouted at the driver to take us to the Willoughby dorm at Pratt (the location of the clinic). I then turned to Shannon and instructed her to keep Rachel informed of everything that was going down. We got to the dorm in no time and Angela and Shannon helped shuttle me in to the clinic. Once there, we walked to the receptionist desk and I said, “Hi. I called a a little bit earlier. I need to see a doctor.” Not quite grasping the severity of the situation, the receptionist asked me to fill out a few forms about my visit.
I was unable to even hold a pen at this point, so I had Shannon fill out all of my information. “For symptoms,” I instructed, “put SEVERE TESTICULAR PAIN.”
As I sat down rather uncomfortably in the waiting room, tears began to stream out of my eyes. Angela and Shannon sat down on either side of me and tried to console me as best they could.
A doctor finally came out to get me. Once in the examination room, she took one look at my junk and told me that I would need to go to the hospital. She helped me walk back out to the waiting room and had the receptionist call a car service. She, Angela, Shannon, and I then walked out to the dorm lobby to wait for the car. As I sat down and the doctor explained what exactly was going on to my roommates, I suddenly felt extremely nauseous. “I’m going to throw up,” I said. Angela quickly handed me the plastic bag I had brought and I started heaving into it.
The doctor, determining that my case was too severe for a car service, immediately called for an ambulance and brought me back into the examination room to lie down. As we waited for the ambulance to arrive, a nurse came in to the room to try to comfort me. “It’s alright, she said. You’re going to be fine. It’s okay to cry if you want to.” As she took both of my hands and clutched them dramatically against her chest, I thought, Who the hell is this woman and please get her away from me! My roommates looked awkwardly at her in silence.
The paramedics finally arrived. The doctor pleaded with them to bring me to Long Island College Hospital because they apparently have the best surgeons in the area. After a bit of haggling with the paramedics, they finally agreed and lifted me into a wheel chair. As I was wheeled out of the examination room and out through the dorm, I suddenly felt extremely awkward as everybody’s attention turned towards me. At that point, my embarrassment overpowered my pain and I managed to smile meekly as I was brought out to the ambulance.
Once inside, I handed Shannon my phone and told her to start taking pictures of me. In between throwing up and clutching my nether-region in agony, I managed to strike a few heroic poses. As I tried to position myself more comfortably and started to lean off of the stretcher, one of the paramedics asked if I was alright. “It’s okay,” I told her. “If I start to have a seizure, I’ll let you know.”
My phone started ringing. It was my father. The doctor from Pratt had called my parents to inform them that I was headed to the hospital and would most likely need surgery. I had Shannon put my father on speaker phone, but I could hardly speak. I suddenly felt a shooting pain and shouted, “Oh balls!! …. Literally!”
….To be continued….
It haven’t posted photos of my apartment’s living room since July 2008 and a lot has changed since then. I got two new sets of chairs, a new rug, a few new lamps, and some other fun decorative items. Although I really loved the way my apartment looked two years ago, I have to say that it’s come together a lot more over the past few years. In the above photo, you can see the gold chair I got from my grandfather’s house (Izzie is sitting on it). On the left side of the room is the lime green 50s chair I purchased for $20 at Sloan’s antiques.
This is City Honors School in Buffalo, New York. It’s where I went to high school. Although the school once ranked number four out of all high schools in the nation and boasts a full-IB program and outstanding college acceptance rates, I pretty much loathed every second I spent there. Despite my still passionate dislike for my four years in high school, I do have to admit: the building is pretty beautiful. Designed in 1914 by the architectural firm Esenwin & Johnson, the structure is a wonderful example of the Beaux Art style. Covered almost entirely with ivory-white terra cotta bricks, the building stood out like a shining beacon within one of the city’s most depressed neighborhoods. Lovingly called “the school on top of the hill,” City Honors up until recently resided atop a lush, tree-filled hill that ran all the way from its entrance down to Best Street. The hill not only functioned as a beautiful natural frame for the luminous building, it was also home to numerous school events like the annual back-to-school barbecue. These days are over.
As of this school year, the hill has been decimated. After the school accepted a hefty sum of money to revamp itself, it wasted no time at all hiring the worst architect possible to build what is, to put it lightly, a tumor on the side of its facade:
Although this wretched grey-tiled monstrosity of a building would be hideous all by itself, it is made all the more so because of its juxtaposition with its 1914 predecessor. To make matters worse, the structure, which looks more like the loading dock for a Wal-Mart than an actual building, is actually the first thing that people see when they approach the school. It actually blocks the original building from sight.
