Modern-day Commentary

Fortunately, those calming sands of time have downgraded the painful memories associated with breaking a pinky toe to mere inconvenience, rather than what it clearly was, the most alarming, nightmarish ordeal any fifth grader has ever gone through. I’m almost ashamed to admit that if it weren’t for this paper, documented for the ages two years after the fact, I may never have remembered the horrors, the “scream never heard before”, the intense wailing, the “arctic” bathtub water, the embarrassingly “odd slipper” I had to wear, or the general “exploding pain”. Thank goodness I packratted this two-sheet with me when I’ve moved multiple times over the past quarter-century, so that it will be available as future biographical documentary voice-over material. If Morgan Freeman ends up unavailable at the time, I’d settle for Gary Sinise or even Norm Macdonald.

I do remember one thing particularly well about this, and you’ll hear it here first. The “strange reason” that the board fell out of my hands and onto my toe was that I was in the process of slamming it to the ground in an effort to jolt the snow and ice which had become encrusted on it. I never did admit that to anyone before, feeling like it made the whole ordeal my fault. In hindsight, I don’t think that implicates me in any way, I was doing my best work.

Now, I never considered myself a dramatic kid, and when I’ve heard stories from my niece and nephew about the traumas of their lives, I’ve always been intrigued by the details that they add in order to enhance the story and sympathies of those listening. There was a recent retelling in which after a basketball game, my sobbing niece reported that she had gotten sidelined after receiving a debilitating punch to the throat. Every word was more halted and choke-laden than the former. But, upon reading my own interpretation of this event, I see that perhaps I had a bit more feigned drama in my young life than I recall now. I’m sure I was “playing for the cameras” on this essay and knowing the teacher, I wouldn’t be surprised if the assignment of this particular paper was to use more flowery speech than normal.

Whatever the case, back in 1988 I was preparing to fill the house with the intense smell of cured, pressure-treated plywood, burning in our wood stove, with the vent and fan wafting over me and my lungs, and the worst thing that happened was a broken pinky toe. I’m a survivor.

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English
March 5, 1990
Mr. Luzi

One incident from which I can remember every single event that happened, took place on January 30, 1988.

I was completing one of my usual Saturday tasks which was cutting up wooden skids that my father got from his printing job. (They put paper onto the skids.) I was bringing over the skids that my father would cut with a chainsaw, after which my mother would stack the wood that was to be burned, against the house.

Unfortunately for me the process didnlt go along too well. I was carrying a skid across the cement walk, when all of a sudden for some strange reason, it slipped out of my hand and landed right on my left foot. As I ran crying into the house I let out what my mother described as “A scream l id never heard before. ” My father followed close behind me, and passed me in the kitchen. He began running
cold water in the bathtub and ordered me to get in. After immersing my foot in the arctic water, my mother said we were going to the hospital. My sister put some odd slipper on my foot because I couldn’t even fit a sock on my foot. I finally made it to the car and to the hospital as my sister carried me into the emergency room. (I couldn’t put any weight on the foot without feeling an exploding pain.) They began asking questions I barely knew the answers to! They took four x-rays and after what seemed like hours determined that my littlest left toe was broken. I kind of already knew that, considering it was bent to the side.

I got a pair of crutches and went home. That was the hardest day of my life, trying to walk with them. On Monday I had to miss school to go to another doctor who wrapped it up and twisted it into brand new and amusing positions.

The next few weeks went by as years, but after a month, I was able to walk again and wear normal socks and shoes.