It happened during the middle of a media ethics class. I started to crack.
The professor, who made a habit of handing out reading assignments and paper topics as if it was the only class we had, made us do a group presentation on public relations disasters. After hours of mind-numbing discussions about Exxon Mobil oil spills and Tylenol poisoning scares and dozens of horrendous Power Point presentations, I started sweating. A lot. And I got dizzy. And a little faint.
I went home and my boyfriend asked if somebody had died. I wanted to cry. Menopause-style heat flashes seized my exhausted little body.
I had to get out. Immediately. Out of the city, out of the state—hell, maybe out of the country.
Eventually it became clear that I had two choices: either take a vacation and get out of town, or take a swan dive from the Washington Avenue Bridge on campus and plunge into the icy waters of the Mississippi where my body would float like Ophelia’s beneath the surface of the icy water (except I’d been doing a little overeating lately, so perhaps I’d just sink—who knows).
Okay, so perhaps that’s a bit dramatic, but the point is that I needed a vacation. Badly.
I called my friend, Christian, who is an actor in New York and has a great little apartment on the Upper East Side, one block off Central Park. “Christian,” I said, “I’m slowly going mad here in Minneapolis. I need to come visit and get some R&R.”
“Jordan, you know you’re welcome here anytime,” he said, laughing. “Really.”
I laughed, too, but my laugh was crazier, more like the laugh of a frazzled person coming undone. Without further deliberation I grabbed my Visa, called my travel agent, and booked a flight. A week later I was in New York.
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(c)2005 Josh and Josh Are Rich & Famous
