Riverdance

I woke up the day before yesterday to find myself virtually off the grid, or is that off the virtual grid?  My cable, phone and television provider had disconnected my account … one month early for my upcoming move in July. Somewhere between a simple mistake and epic ineptness on behalf of the customer service agent who had spent no less than TWO HOURS with me on the phone the day before arranging all the details of my new move. I suspect the young lad (or is that Luddite?) typed in a 6 instead of a 7 for the month field when he finalized the order. Easy to do perhaps … and apparently VERY easy for the computer to cut my FIOS completely in the wee hours of the morning before daybreak.

No land line. No Internet. I could care less about the television, because I was LIVING my own daytime soap opera. I would vascilate between anger and angst as my mind went into warp speed meltdown. Queue the music ♫ ♪ ♫ Escrow papers needed to be signed. All of the brokers had my house number which this morning unceremoniously told everyone was no longer in service. So of course they sent emails which sat in my mailbox unable to be seen. My cell phone would become locked during the course of the day because my hours of pleading with my land line provider would result in my exceeding my mobile phone “family allowance” and I had NO access to the internet to re-adjust my numbers. Catch 22MB.

In a nutshell, I lost my Zen head and worried like a wart for 10 hours. Yes. TEN HOURS. Because apparently it only takes a single bit out of place to instantly turn my life into a nightmare but it takes a King’s Army, royal ransom, star fleet, MIB and the whole partridge family in a pear tree to get FIOS turned BACK ON after a system error. Or in my case, one determined redneck who called after my failed attempts at begging all morning and who had to watch me dissolve into a puddle of presentiment for much of the day. In short, he “explained” my situation as only he can, and then he “suggested” that he STAY ON THE LINE until the problem was resolved. Bless his heart. All three services were restored and then turning the nightmare on hellcrest street over to my son, who spent the next TWO HOURS working with tech support to activate the wireless router.

You see, in order to FIX the situation, they had to DELETE my transfer order. Which seemed harmless enough, but in doing so they actually DELETED my account history and my account of over a dozen years. We could no longer verify who we were, where we lived and it wasn’t until the next day that I realized the dial tone that was LIVE on my land line … was NOT my home phone number. I lost my home phone number of over 25 years. The one that I had migrated through several moves and the one I was ASSURED I could bring with me to the new home next month.

I hate when I can’t seem to face a situation with grace and style. I so wish my autonomic system would “play nice” under pressure, but part of the dysautonomia by definition means it won’t and I shouldn’t be surprised when I can’t stop shaking and I feel as if I’ve been hit by a bus. My favorite line of the day, was a seriously sweet lady from the company’s “elite” team, who said to me very sincerly that morning … “You are handling this better than I would.” And I assured her that despite my “calm” voice I was in fact not handling this well at all. And she said knowingly …. “Ahhh, you are doing the riverdance. All still and composed on top and your legs are going a mile a minute beneath you.” And that was it exactly. I was doing the river dance. I hope one day, I’ll be able to sit back and watch the leaf float down stream without the attachment that I still have to the flow of the water. But best I can do in the moment is try and be gentle with myself. Accept all of who I am at this point in time, and do the best river dance that I possibly can.