Turn on your favorite beastie boys/james taylor/kanye/yo gabba gabba soundtrack and enjoy . (This blog clearly attracts a variety of different readers.)
The first memory I will share begins on a farm, as only the best stories do. Unfortunately, this story is about people rather than barnyard animals or fruit or any combination of those things. Your disappointment is only natural. Forgive me. Perhaps I can recapture your interest by letting you know that copious amount of blood will be described in the near future.
As I was saying, I was on a mission for the LDS church in Argentina and had volunteered to help a local family build a fence around their dilapidated farm. With the help of my companion and one of their sons, we completed the job thirty minutes before we were going to eat lunch. Their wise son seized the opportunity of having our service at his disposal and pleaded with us to help him find an orcheta. This is a spanish term (and I wholeheartedly authorize your criticism of my spelling in this case) which means a branch that diverges in the shape of a "Y" so it can be used to make a sling shot. Since his petitions seemed most admirable, we were powerless to deny him.
Leading us to the nearest tree, the boy indicated the branch he needed cut down. I volunteered to be the one to cut it down. Mistake number 1. Standing in a tree sawing off branches seems dangerous enough. It seems my preoccupation with caution in one area lead to a serious lack in another. Curse you saw warning labels for your diversionary tactics.
After successfully accomplishing my task, I proceeded to climb down from the tree. Interestingly enough, surrounding this tree there were several sticks that grew straight up from the ground. If you need a visual, think of a pit with metal spikes on the bottom where unsuccessful mortal combat fighters always seem to end up. Emphasis on the "end" part of that phrase.
Straddled between the tree I was in and a neighboring tree was a large pole. Its thickness and length feigned stability and strength. Lies...all of them. Placing my hand on the pole for support, I launched myself forward, pushing down hard as I did so, in order to clear the ominous spikes that surrounded the base of the tree. As luck wouldn't have it, the pole gave way, my jump was not sufficient to clear the spikes, and I landed directly on top of one of these sticks.
In writing this story, I am re-grimacing at the memory of that stick stabbing me between the legs. When I am required to endure something painful, the worst part is watching it arrive. Slow, inevitable, fated. Some would say its like death and taxes. I would say its like breaking up with the next girl I date. Either way, the devil had his way with me that day.
So, extending my toes as much as I can, I hop off the stick that had impaled me and landed face-first on the ground. Both my companion and the newly armed boy had already started walking back to the house, and returned only after I yelled after them. Before they arrived, I reached my hand down my pants to assess the damage. My fingers instantly demonstrated incredible chameleon-esque abilities as they changed from white to blood red.
Now the smart thing to do in this situation was call an ambulance and apply pressure to my newly obtained orifice right? I think now would be a pertinent time to remind my reader that in the last 10 seconds, I jumped out of a tree and landed on a spike. Intelligence had already taken a severe leave of absence.
Feeling bad that the family we were visiting had made a huge lunch from their meager circumstances, I stayed and ate lunch while my underwear turned red. As we left the house, I only made it half way down the dirt driveway before my left leg went entirely stiff. This had never occurred to me before, so I was a bit unsettled.
We called a taxi and headed straight for
So I know what you are all wondering. Given the location I described of the wound, you are probably wondering about...me. Or at least a very important part of me. If not, well thats what I was wondering about so I invite you to join me.
This is the one part of the story where that fickle friend we call luck decided to come hang out with me for a short time. Everything was right in the world, except for my wound...If you don't get this, your life is probably better off anyways.
Cue my realizing I should probably hit up the hospital and say hello to a physician or two. One more taxi cab later, I am in a small hospital room with an older nurse (your tendency to assume that the nurse was female would be accurate) stripping off my clothes. Having never undressed in front of a woman since I was roughly 2, this was slightly disconcerting. Especially since she was not exactly trying to hide her curiosity. She told me to lay on my back on a cold metal table as she went to fetch the doctor.
One hour later...
Don't worry reader, you didn't miss anything. I was just on the table, naked, enjoying the refreshing AC and elevator music hospitals are known to provide. I was a little worried about how much I bled (and continued to bleed) on their table, but I was too dizzy to think on it.
Finally my doctor arrived. After inspecting the wound, he explained that he felt it was necessary to check the depth of my wound. As he pulled a thin metal pole off the table next to me, I instantly became sympathetic for how a car feels when we so carelessly shove a dipstick down its oil pipe. He indicated that I should "let him know when it hurts" and...well...checked my oil. This was painful.
After this procedure (definitely for lack of a better term) he went on to explain that "checking my oil" wasn't all that helpful because my muscles could have possibly been aligned differently as a fell, and the wound could be much deeper. Double translation (all of this is happening in spanish) : Remember the time I shoved a stick in your puncture wound? It didn't really tell me anything helpful.
This was followed by the doctor spraying a syringe of liquid that made my lower abdomen feel the fiery pains of hell for about 60 seconds. At the very least, I think this was more helpful then the dipstick trick. He said there would be no need to stitch because if it became infected, it would carry the infection to my heart and I would die.
With this comforting goodbye, I left the hospital armed with many clean bandages, and one more story to add to my records.
wow, you learn something new everyday. I'm so glad a)the world was fine and b)the infection didn't get carried to your heart causing you to die.
ReplyDeleteMan Dan, the things you never knew you never knew.