Last Friday Hubby and I celebrated our 17th anniversary. Being the good hubby that he is, he took the week off from work so we could hang out together.
Tuesday morning found Hubby out in the front doing yard work. He ran across a soaker hose the previous owners had buried in the flowerbed. It was rotting, and just generally all-around gross, so he decided to pull it up and get rid of it. Little did he know, that soaker hose had a mind of its own. It didn’t want to be pulled up. It resisted Hubby’s efforts to pull it up. But, alas, Hubby finally won out and yanked that sucker, um, I mean soaker, out of the ground. But again, having a mind of its own, and being none too happy about being yanked from its habitat, the soaker hose had one last trick up its proverbial sleeve. It resisted Hubby’s efforts alright, up until it just couldn’t hang on any longer. Then, as Hubby made one last valiant effort to slay the mastodon (I’ll explain that phrase another time), the soaker hose resisted just long enough to catch Hubby in the middle of a really big yank, then let loose and came flying out of the ground. Seeing as how Hubby was pulling with all his might when the hose came loose, Hubby went flying backwards. And, as all yard inhabitants work together to foil the yardmaster, there just happened to be a very large boulder conveniently placed (for the soaker hose’s revenge) directly behind Hubby. So, Hubby went flying backwards, stumbled over the boulder, and while instinctively trying to break his fall, landed full force with all of his weight on his right hand. The hand stuck rather than slid, abruptly stopping the fall, which led to the bones in his wrist and forearm being forced violently upward.
Hubby wasn’t too happy, to say the least. He sent Son#1 inside to get me. I don’t do yard work when the temperature is above 65 degrees, and seeing as how we live in an area of the country that’s hotter than hades and more humid than a sauna, you’ll only find me outside November. But I digress ~ back to Hubby. Son#1 came inside to get me, and I found Hubby sort of prancing around on the front porch holding his right arm. I had flashbacks to a warm day in April 1999 when Son#1 acted in pretty much the same way, only he was crying and yelling, "I broke my arm! I broke my arm!" at the top of his lungs. Hubby didn’t cry or yell, but the prance was the same. You know, that funny walk/prance we all do when we’ve really hurt something, and we don’t really know what to do, so we walk around in circles lifting our feet really far off the ground ~ yeah, that prance. So I asked Hubby, "Is it broken?" He replied in a very civil manner that he didn’t know, but perhaps the next time Superman flies by he can check it with his x-ray vision. I suggested that rather than wait for Superman, we might consider making a visit to our local hospital to let them x-ray it. Hubby thought that was a grand idea.
So it was settled. We were going to the hospital. "But first," Hubby said, "I need a shower." Now, I’ve known Hubby for a long time ~ we dated in high school, and I was his biggest fan. I went to wrestling meets and football games all over Montana in support of my then-boyfriend. I’ve been next to, hugged and kissed by, and generally dripped and slobbered on by Hubby after some grueling wrestling matches and football games. In short, I’ve been around him many times when he was sweaty, nasty dirty. But trust me, in this instance, I agreed; Hubby needed a shower. I helped him take off the yucky work clothes, and he took a quick, cool shower. It wasn’t easy, but he managed to shower and put clean clothes on. Then we were off to the hospital.
When we got there, the hospital emergency room was empty, which we took as a good sign that maybe we wouldn’t have to sit there for hours waiting to be seen by a doctor (again, flash back to April 1999, when my then 9-year-old son broke his arm and we went to that very same emergency room). It was a good sign ~ Hubby saw a doctor within 30 minutes of our arrival. X-rays ensued (thanks to the x-ray tech since Superman never bothered to show up). Sure enough, Hubby had a broken arm. Broken elbow, to be more precise. All that pressure when he landed so hard on his right hand shoved the arm bones upward into the elbow and sheered the tip off. Ugh. Ouch.
So, Hubby has been walking around with a cast from his hand to his arm pit for a week now. It was good for about 2 days of sympathy around the house, but after that I got tired of babying him. He went back to work yesterday, and the cast got him 1 day of sympathy there. Poor guy.
