Thursday, January 18, 2007

Knife Wounds

I know three people with knife wounds at the moment. A girl I work with was making French fries and her right hand attacked her left. It was kind of like that Clive Barker story "The Body Politic," I think.

Wayne also got an unkind cut from an exacto knife, and Kate was prompted to ponder the color of blood with an artist's eye after a smilar slice.

Scars from the past
All that reminded me of the time I stabbed myself in the thumb. Christine and I recounted the story to my freedom-fry-deprived co-worker in empathy.

It was a Saturday night when we still had our apartment, sometime before the chain smoker moved in downstairs and prompted us to become home owners.

I was making an Italian chicken dish. I don't remember why I tried to open the drawer that was jammed but when I yanked it I got a knife - this little pairing knife with a thin blade went right into my thumb.

My actual recollection of the event gets a little fuzzy after that, I suppose due to the lack of blood supply to my brain. All of my blood was rushing out my thumb at that point.

It ain't easy bein' green
I wrapped a paper towel around it and staggered into the den, looking a little green, as Christine describes it. Green, I was, and glassy-eyed.

Then I used one of the words Cliff and Stewart have been talking about.

"I think I cut the (expletive deleted but it's bodily waste so I think you know which one it was) out of my finger," I said.

"Why don't you sit down?" she suggested.

Legend has it I sat down.

Then she walked into the kitchen, which she says looked like a homicide scene.

The next recollection I have of anything at all, we were at the local emergency room where we were processed by a clerk with indifference that achived remarkable degrees of coldness even for a jaded ER worker. After she took my information she sent us to the waiting room to watch TV while they dealt with people with larger wounds. It was a Saturday night after all.

There, somewhere just short of desanguination, the bleeding eventually stopped on its own.

The Fog
We went back home and in a bit of a fog I finished the Italian chicken and we went in the next day to a convenient care center for a tetanus shot. Since it was a stab it didn't require stitches, but it remained painful to turn faucets for a while after that.

It was really the worst injury-accident I've ever had short of the time I ate peppered shrimp at a social function and then rubbed my eyes.

To all those who've injured yourselves, I feel your pain.

5 comments:

Charles Gramlich said...

One of my nephews is a walking accident. He once shot himself accidentally with his pistol. As he climbed through a fence with the pistol in his belt, it fell out. He caught it before it hit the ground, but managed to pull the trigger and shoot himself through, fortunately, non-lethal and relatively unimportant parts of his anatomy. In the hospital we asked him if he wanted a new gun for Christmas. He replied. "No, you can give me a knife. I've stopped cutting myself accidentally."

Wayne Allen Sallee said...

hey, sid. i tell people in interviews that all my scarifications are purely accidental. my knife-cut didn't require stitches, so that doesn't count, but i have 37 scars and punctures. i'm kind of like the jerry lewis version of sgt. rock.

RK Sterling said...

Oh my. Well, Sid, it could have been worse, and let me tell you how...

My brother, newly divorced and way too hung over, decided to make himself breakfast before his eyes had fully peeled open. Knife, hangover, blind...not a good combination. Well, once the hand was well sliced and gushing, he searched the house in vain for bandages. The only thing he found was a box of "feminine products" his ex-wife had left behind. He pulled a pad out in desperation, then realized he would have to use his teeth to open it since he couldn't do it one-handed. He soon discovered there's glue on the back of those when it became entangled in his beard, and he ripped several hairs out trying to get it off. So there he stood, bleeding from hand and face, mini-pad dangling from his chin, wondering how he was going to explain that to the doctor. :)

Sidney said...

Wow Kate, that is quite a story, probably something good to work into a piece of fiction.

RK Sterling said...

I'd have to let him do it--he tells it so much better than I can. :)

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