Feb 12th, 2006
Drunken Diva Wheelchair Club
I would like to preface this story by stating that I am a heterosexual.
That being said, last night, the Drunken Diva Wheelchair Club (DDWC) of John Adams Hall held their inaugural event. It started when a couple friends and I returned to the halls inebriated after an evening in Soho, feeling somewhat unfilled and unprepared to go to bed at 2AM.
Walking in, we found Aphrodite, a young Greek girl who had broken her ankle and was confined to a wheelchair, sitting on the staircase looking sad. When prodded about her morose nature, she admitted her broken ankle was getting her down.
“Have you considered drugs?” I asked innocently. “Maybe some codeine?”
The question was ignored as my friend George started asking Aphrodite to sing, as she was an operatic vocalist back in Greece.
“No, I don’t feel like it,” she responded, but we persisted. Eventually, we managed to convince her to come to George’s room and sing for us.
After a few moments of nervousness, she began singing with one of the most incredible voices I’ve ever heard live. It was an old Greek song that she had known from childhood.
After she was finished, there was complete silence. I think George may have even been crying a bit. Suddenly, the three of us burst into applause as Aphrodite smiled nervously.
“Another,” we shouted.
“I want to sing something in English so you will understand me,” she said to Mike and me.
Mike asked her to sing Andrew Lloyd Weber, but unfortunately, she admitted that she did not know the lyrics to the song. Suddenly, her eyes lit up as she said, “Oh, I know the song from Titanic. I just don’t know how it starts.”
Without hesitation, I began my best impersonation of Celine Dion and she quickly joined in. Throughout the next hour, we collectively sang (or rather, Aphrodite sang while the three of us whined like banshees) Toni Braxton and then Whitney Houston’s classic, “I will always love you,” from the Bodyguard soundtrack, during which time I picked George up and began carrying him around the room, bringing to mind Kevin Costner’s classic pose where he is cradling Whitney Houston in his arms.
The night came to a crashing halt when the Hall manager came and yelled at us. Sadly, we all departed for our rooms but not before we made a pact never to tell anyone of what happened that fateful night.
