Burnt Chipotle

          Here is a little story of what happened to me one night, totally unexpectedly just to show you that you need to be careful. Everyone gets hurt and college is a place where you might find yourself getting hurt more often but it can lead to some great stories to tell. My injury didn't happen in some totally crazy way like some people's but it was pretty ridiculous to say the least and it left me with about a week of going around my large campus limping with one shoe on one foot and a flip flop on the other. I also have a scar on my foot now from the burn so have fun but be careful!

            My day was going great. I actually woke up early to have brunch and have some fun with candy with a few friends. I got called into work, Chipotle, but that was still good because I was missing working more and I enjoy it so I was actually excited. I arrived at work around 4:45 p.m. and everyone was happy to see me because it had actually been a while since I worked last. Everyone was being nice, even the customers, and my night was just going really great as well. Unfortunately, all of this was just the calm before the storm.

            It was around 9:45 p.m. when everything went down. My night and the next few weeks would be ruined because of one small, silly accident. One of my co-workers began draining the water out of the hot side of the line that is scorching hot to keep the rice, beans, and meats warm throughout the day. She had starting draining it a lot earlier than usual so I forgot about it when a customer came. I moved over to the tortilla press to take the lady’s order. At that moment I knew, I messed up. When I moved I put my foot right under the area where the extremely hot water comes out into the drain.

            I pulled my foot away so fast but it hurt like crazy. When I looked back at what I had just done I laughed but it also made me feel like it was even more painful. The only analogy I can think of to describe what I saw was as if I had just poured noodles in a boiling pot of water and a ton of steam comes off of it. For me, my foot was the noodles and the boiling pot of water was the ridiculously hot water draining out from the heating station. I threw my shoe off so fast and held onto my foot trying to get the pain to go away. One of my coworkers helped the customer then got me some ice to put on my foot. She was also super sweet and got me some burn cream and Band-Aids as well. I was determined to keep working and help close because I felt too bad leaving early. The hard part was that anything touching my foot hurt horribly so actually putting my sock and shoe back on was very painful but I did it anyway. I limped around teary-eyed for a while helping put the foot away and clean until I just could not take it anymore.

            I went into the bathroom to take a better look at the burn and to put more burn cream on it. I could not get myself to put my shoe back on after that though. It just hurt way too bad. At this point I was crying because I did not know what to do and everything just hurt. Another key point in everything was the fact that my parents were not too happy with me going back to Olathe to work. They wanted me to stay on campus and have fun instead of worrying about work. This added a level of stress to the whole situation because I did not know whether I should call my mom and listen to the “I told you so” or deal with it on my own.

            Eventually, I went to the coworker who I was supposed to be helping clean the line and I told her I did not think I could keep working because it just hurt way too bad. She was really sympathetic and we went over to my manager to tell her that I should probably go home. She was understanding as well and allowed me to go home a little early. I limped out to my car with one shoe in my hand since I could not put it back on my foot. Once I got into my car, I dreadfully called my mom to see what I should do since I had never had such a bad burn before. She told me I should probably go to the emergency room but that I needed to file for workman’s comp first so all of the costs would be covered. That meant a whole lot more fun for me that night.

            The manager working that night did not really know what to do and her English is not the best so trying to figure out how to get a work comp claim was super complicated. Today, a few days since that night, I still am super confused on what all I need to do actually. She had me call the corporate office or whoever to file the claim which is technically not how it is supposed to be handled. An employee is not allowed to file their own injury so I had to give the phone to her but whisper everything back and forth because of communication barriers. It made the whole process even longer than the long time it usually takes regardless. After getting that phone called done with, the guy told us that they would call back on Monday to give the head manager the other information that is needed for actually getting everything payed for and all of that craziness. That mess is another story though.

            Once I finally got back to my car, I called my mom back to let her know how the phone call went and she told me she wanted me to come home so she could see how bad my foot was burned. I drove home, very carefully considering the foot I burned was my right foot so I was basically driving with my left. My mom checked my foot and said I needed to go to the emergency room because it was worse than she thought it would be. She was unable to take me because she had just taken her tremendously strong pain medicine for her chronic nerve damage so that meant I had to drive all the way to the emergency room with my left foot. I hated the fact that I had to walk into the emergency room without a shoe on one of my feet since you never know what could be on those floors or in the parking lot.

            I walked in looking like some bootleg version of Cinderella with my one shoe on and one shoe off but I, surprisingly, did not have to wait too long to get taken care of. It was actually a really fast and easy process unlike any other time I had been there for my little sister. I had never actually gone to the emergency room for myself except when I was really little for ear tubes. It was also really weird going alone instead of with my mom because she usually does the talking and knows what she is doing since she was a nurse before her nerve damage. Luckily, everything went smoothly and they were very knowledgeable about the workman’s comp deal since I was not too keen on what all I really needed to do. They gave me prescription pain pills and sent me on my way. Now it was time to drive all the way back to campus instead of staying at my house, which was way closer, since my little sister gets really upset when I have to leave to go back to school.

            At this point, it was around 1:30 a.m. and I was pretty scared to drive back with my left foot, in the pitch black with little to no streetlights, and a car that is not always the most reliable. Luckily, I made it back to my dorm in one piece with no complications and I felt pretty adultish at that point since I pretty much handled everything on my own. Walking back into my dorm at around 2:30 a.m. was interesting but the students at the front desk were super nice and considerate because they noticed my foot all wrapped up and everything. Once I got back to my room, I took the pain pills that were supposed to make me super drowsy but they actually did the exact opposite. I was not too surprised, though, since that has been the situation with most things ever since I was little. Soon I was fast asleep and that is where this story ends. I am sure there will be many more crazy stories in the future though.