Because my Dad was in the Navy, they would occasionally request that he work on a ship for an extended period of time. The longest stint that I remember occurred the year I turned 8.
My Mom had to deal with an 8yr, 6yr, 4yr, and 2 month old all by herself during that time...
I did not make it easy on her. She didn't know about my climbing out on the roof all the time- I did my best to spare her that knowledge. :)
It was a normal weekday evening there in San Diego, CA. The weather was great, I had just finished a fun game of "hockey" using my Dad's tennis rackets and basketball with the neighbor kids. As I was picking up, I noticed some toys that belonged to my friend, Kevin, across the street.
Obviously, I needed to return them while it was still light. So I headed across the street. I was wearing my rollarblades and didn't want to change into tennis shoes- that would take too long and it was almost dinner time. (We had a lot of problems with rattlesnakes there in CA and going barefoot was NOT an option.)
I climbed the cement steps to my friend's house and delivering his toys began my descent. However, several factors prevented me from safely making it back home:
a) cement stairs and rollarblades just don't mix
b) leaves will make even a professional blader land in a heap
c) exasperated Moms who are trying to get dinner on the table and herd four little girls by themselves for 6 months...are a little distracting
Combine those three and ANYONE will fall. It's a miracle I only broke my wrist! A random leaf was sitting on the stairs. I was so busy trying to explain to my Mom that I was coming and did not see it. My wheel caught, slipped, and down I went catching myself with my wrist.
A neighbor came with some awful old plastic "wrist mold" and tried to force my wrist into that unnatural thing. When it was finally limply lying in that mold, she offered to watch my 3 little sisters so that my Mom could take me to the ER. sigh*
A girl in my 3rd grade class had just broken her wrist on a desk during school the week before, so I was a little excited...all that pain it had BETTER be broken. I wanted a "trophy" in the form of a cast too!
After all the x-rays, as I sat in the hall with my Mom, I bounced back and forth between excitement about my first broken bone and terror at having to wear the cast for a LONG time...I mean a couple of days, sure! A couple of months...sigh* I would laugh one moment and cry the next.
I got my cast. It was my right wrist- but I happen to be a lefty so it did not impede my writing or schoolwork. I was proud to have a cast at school, but the other girl (not a lefty) had also broken her right wrist and so the teacher would kneel at her desk and help bubble in the answers...I was a little jealous.
Not only was I not the "cool" one in school for all of this pain, but we had to make a second trip to the ER and shave some of the cast off. It was cutting off the circulation in my thumb.
Oh well. At least I have a neat story with mine...how many people can say they broke their wrist while rollarblading down stairs?
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