I Shouldn’t Be Alive: Mom Edition

Before I begin, I love the show I Shouldn’t Be Alive, first because it makes me feel superior to rich fools who think they can swim the Amazon instead of lying at home and watching the Discovery Channel, and because even though you know the people survive because there they are on the screen, it still manages to keep up the suspense. That is why I bring you:

I Shouldn’t Be Alive! Queen Mother Edition

Voice-over: This week on I Shouldn’t Be Alive – a seventy-year old woman falls in her breezeway. How does she survive? On (pause for drama) I Shouldn’t Be Alive.

The Queen Mother (not her real name) was a typical suburban seventy-year old. Her outdoor activities had been limited in the last few years by post-polio syndrome, a condition that affects survivors of polio and is marked by weakened muscles. This can be difficult when coupled with the damage done by the initial polio, in QM’s case atrophied arm muscles.

QM was in the breezeway, a room in the back of the house between the den and the kitchen, searching for a nice treat to end her pleasant day. It was 7:30. She rooted through some un-emptied grocery bags. It was Friday, and Ellen would be there to empty them that Sunday. As she reached in to a grocery bag, she felt herself lose her balance.

Next! on I Shouldn’t Be Alive – Is QM able to get back up? Has she broken a hip? Find out when we return on I Shouldn’t Be Alive.

[Commercial: This Friday! July 14! Live on the Levee Brings you Sister Hazel and Better Than Ezra playing Live under the Arch at the Saint Louis riverfront! Free! Friday! Friday! Friday! Come downtown, eat Saint Louis style pizza, and meet some friends at the BTE concert!]

Previously seen on I Shouldn’t Be Alive: QM is reaching for a grocery bag in her breezeway when she unexpectedly falls. Luckily, she doesn’t break a hip. She remains conscious and after collecting herself tries to stand up, but her legs are too weak to stand and her arms are of course unable to pull herself up. After thirty minutes of spinning on the brick floor like an upturned turtle, QM manages to get to her knees and bloodies them knee-walking to the kitchen. There she snags a broom with her good hand, and tries to get off her knees but hasn’t the strength. Instead, she puts a bag of napkins under her head, lies on her back and pushes herself with her Mighty Legs through the kitchen and family room onto the the carpeted hall, where she hopes she can get to her feet. Can she? Tune in for more I Shouldn’t Be Alive.

[Commercial: Come Friday the 14th to the Better Than Ezra show under the Arch! Sister Hazel might only sing for half an hour, but the Ezra concert will be great! Dance with the Ezralites! Rock on Oblivious That Your Mother Is In Danger! Friday! Friday! Friday!]

Previously seen on I Shouldn’t Be Alive: QM has fallen in her back room and crawled half-way through her ninety-foot long house to reach the carpeting. Unfortunately, her exhaustion keeps her from struggling up to her feet, and the effort of break-dancing on the carpet has made her considerably weaker now. She looks back at the kitchen where her cell phone with her daughter’s cell phone number is. In a critical decision, she decides not to push back into the kitchen to snag it with the nearby grabber. Instead she plans to lie on her back, propel herself into the computer room, and call her daughter’s house from the speakerphone, unaware her daughter and son-in-law are not at home on this Friday night, but instead are deafening themselves at a concert standing fifteen feet away from the speakers, where they couldn’t possibly hear their cell phones anyway.

SurvivoMom makes it into the computer room, and before tackling the phone uses her Mighty Legs to assemble a campsite. She has the broom, a throw, the bag of napkins, and the speakerphone out of reach on the desk. Can she make the call? Will she be rescued? When we return on I. Shouldn’t. Be. Alive.

[Commercial: On the Discovery Channel: a documentary recounting how on July 3rd a woman killed a penguin with her bare hands. What would cause a woman to commit such a horrible crime? Was it love? Was it for money? Decide for yourself on Pudding and the Penguin, next week on the Discovery Channel.]

Previously on I Shouldn’t Be Alive, QM has made it through a harrowing ordeal to crawl back to the computer room and get to the speakerphone. She eyes the phone. She weighs her options. She grasps the cord with her big toe and yanks it down to the floor. She rolls to the speakerphone and punches numbers. Her daughter’s voice mail answers and she speaks into the speakerphone. But what QM doesn’t know is that the speakerphone doesn’t work. So instead of taking a message, an automated voice says it hasn’t received her message and she can hit 4 for more options. Disgusted, she hits 4 and finds the best she can do is to mark her silent message urgent. Then she rests her head on the napkins and listens to Dateline.

[Commercial: Live at the Levee! Come downtown! Dance Under the Arch! Watch young folks who evidently follow this band take photos of BTE with their cell phones, and then snap photos of the Arch like they’ve never seen it before. Enjoy the Saint Louis pizza that is still stuck to the back of your teeth. Decide, hey, lets stay for the fireworks, the dog was never house-trained and nothings calling you home ANYWAY.]

Previously (etc.): QM has fallen in her back room, possibly dented the brick floor with her Hips of Steel, crawled through her house on her back into the computer room where she has yanked down the speakerphone and left a message for her daughter, who is selfishly acting like a child downtown and then is stuck in traffic at 11:00 because the exit to the bridge to her suburb is shut entirely. Ellen doesn’t get home until 11:30, when she picks up her voice mail. “Huh,” she thinks, “I didn’t even know you could leave urgent messages OH MY GOD THIS IS FROM MOM’S NUMBER WHAT’S WRONG WITH MOM? THERE’S NO MESSAGE!” Ellen calls QM back and heads there with Gary to haul her up onto her feet and give her water and healing V-8 Fusion.

The QM reports she will continue to walk in her breezeway and that she remains at the ready to drink her own urine and saw off her arm with a penknife if need be. Oh, and she is happy to be alive. Her daughter and son-in-law are relieved. Ellen reports that while she is relieved she is still going to renege on the deal she made with God that if her mother was okay she would never go to another concert again and will be at the Cheap Trick concert next weekend.