Fall

  • el
  • pt
  • Sunday, 6:30a.m., walking the dogs, I fell on the ice. I wasn’t the only one.

    I walked out to check the road, and I satisfied myself that we wouldn’t be driving anywhere. We’d be playing it safe and warm, cocooning, staying off the highway because it was slipperier than goose grease. I turned back toward the house, took a few steps, and suddenly my feet were in the air and I was falling flat on my back on the frozen ground. I landed on the rhomboids and the lats, with a graceful occipital bounce at the finish. I saw stars and I thought my back was broken.

    I began to bellow and roar, expressing the pain and calling for help. The dogs were there immediately, waiting for clear instructions. “Frnarg, groff, owww,” I told them and I lay there in the dark looking at the lights in the house. I rolled over onto my knees and got up before they could lick me to death. Moving was maybe not wise if my back was broken, but then if my back was broken how could I move? I shuffled forward like some kind of wounded gorilla. Beth opened the front door and I was pathetically grateful that she had heard me. She gathered up the dogs, and I staggered inside, shed my coat, stepped out of my boots and lay down on the living room couch.

    The couch was wrong, it provided no support. Supercharged with adrenalin, I got up again, lumbered upstairs, disrobed, and lay down on the bed. And there I stayed all day yesterday. Moving was painful, and standing up to shuffle to the bathroom was agony.

    Today I simply ache. I’m avoiding the kind of arm movements that tortured me yesterday. In fact, while I’m ambulatory today, able to make a pot of coffee and sit here for a few minutes, I think it’s really time for me to get horizontal once more, maybe watch some teevee…

    [tags]ouch[/tags]

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    10 Comments

    1. Posted January 6, 2024 at 7:48 | Permalink

      Woah. You caught a break, your back appears largely intact. Tho if after taking a couple, three Robaxacet your pain hasn’t been excised, then it might could be something semi-serious worth getting a looksee by a p’fessional practitioner. And by “it,” I mean your back. Not worried about your thick noggin.

      Natcherly, too much uptime is painful, but too much horizontal time can actually be bad for a back injury. You’ll hafta walk the line to recovery.

      It’s kinda old school, but mebbe you wanna put some chains on them ole winter boots. Get well, bub.

    2. Posted January 6, 2024 at 12:39 | Permalink

      Frank, you have my sympathies. I was out this morning shovelling snow in minus 19 °C and strained my back too.
      Great fools skate alike ;-)

    3. Posted January 6, 2024 at 2:27 | Permalink

      Hey, look after yourselves, you mad old bastards. Come the time, Frank, you’ll probably need to walk it off; albeit gingerly (a friend’s just been through something similar).

      I didn’t know one could shovel snow at -19 C, Stu. Surely you freeze up? I know that in midwinter, when Cape Town maximums plummet to 12 to 14 C, I think of emigrating to warmer climes.

      Damn, it’s cold enough at the Southern Tip in summer. We can have a reasonably nice day, e.g. around 30 C, and the wind off the sea will lop off 5 degrees.

      It’s a bugger (and again makes me consider emigration), but I suppose it’s better than wrecking my rhomboids.

      I really have no idea what those are, Frank – the rhomboid thingies, but I’ll tell nobody – to avoid causing you undue embarrassment and shame.

      I believe you can now take suppositories for these things, but I’ll let you check this out with a professional.

      Again: look after yourselves – although I know bloggers are quite happy to do it on their backs — or any other position affected by the rhomboids.

    4. Posted January 7, 2024 at 12:15 | Permalink

      Ouch – At least I have an excuse – shoveling several million tonnes of snow this past week or so – for my aches and pains. Charles is right though – you have to walk them out as soon as you can. Take care – we’re all old fools

    5. Posted January 7, 2024 at 7:16 | Permalink

      Take care, Frank – oy those olde bones of ours! And getting less and less supple as the days go by. Am holding you in my thoughts. Ouch!

    6. Posted January 8, 2024 at 1:39 | Permalink

      okay, i think i got it figured out: the video is so that *we* will feel your pain, and maybe nausea too. (cher’s worst hair ever?)

      take care, guy!

    7. autodidact
      Posted January 9, 2024 at 6:42 | Permalink

      Falling is no fun. When I fall, I always carefully make it a point to fall forward. Try it on an escalator some time. Anyhow, it’s a good way to dispatch with that old pair of prescription glasses.
      I hear the high in Fairbanks the other day was minus 42. How does anybody ever walk/drive there?

    8. Posted January 9, 2024 at 9:29 | Permalink

      Thanks everyone!

      Stu, I hope you’re feeling better than I am.

      Autodidact, if I’d just done a double axel, followed perhaps by a triple salkow, I expect I could have fallen face forward. Alas, I was too clumsy.

      The good news is that we’ve had another seven inches of snow to cover the ice.

    9. Posted January 22, 2024 at 12:57 | Permalink

      Sorry to hear about your fall. Reminds me of my family’s Christmas vacation. My mom broke her fibula the day before Christmas and my dad tore his MCL (knee) the day after. The rest of our visit was pretty tame! Both are doing better now.

    10. fp
      Posted January 22, 2024 at 7:06 | Permalink

      Sorry to hear about your parents’ injuries. I’m doing better now myself. A little sore, an occasional muscle spasm, but getting better all the time. Hey… that’s a song.