A Wounded Soldier Stance

Just put a flute in my hand or tom drum around my neck and I will fit in perfectly with those famous boys coming out of battle. It all started as I lazily walked down the stairs of the creepy corridor known as the Mosaic Church basement/storage area last Sunday. This area could easily double as either: the beginning of a haunted house, a place where you’d tell friends that the last owner “used to keep the slaves,” or a very intimidating wine cellar for your creepy French friend with teeth all askew. So as I began one of my first strides at the bottom of the stair case, another church volunteer was rearranging some boxes filled with children’s toys and accidentally bumped into a large black box with a black sheet draped across the top. The box quickly tipped over and squarely hit me across my right thigh and knee. She offered a quiet mumbled “..sorry ‘bout that.” I didn’t know if I should cry or yell some obscenity, this was church after all. She realized how badly I was hurting when I couldn’t lift the black box off my leg by myself. As it turns out, this previously presumed empty black box was actually the top of a piano. The two of us used our force to get the piano off of my leg and all week I’ve enjoyed watching my bruises go from black to purple to yellow. To add insult to injury..no..actually to add injury to injury I was hurt again in soccer practice last night. As preparation for Saturday when we are playing a group of young men who are already performing facial artistry with their zig-zag designs in their teenage beards, the coaches played against some of the players. As I came up simultaneously on the ball as one of the larger players on the opposite field, I cocked my leg back for a big down-field pass. I think she had a similar idea. I caught the tail end of her cleats against my bare legs. Again, not able to show how bad it hurt, I played on with a little limp. After the game I put my leg under the glow of some street lights and saw that I had bloody cleat marks and two black and blue golf ball sized lumps on my shin. Last night I propped my legs up on some pillows on the couch as Rebecca and I watched a movie and applied a frozen pack to my shins..that was until I noticed the pack (formerly included in a gift of gourmet brownies sent to the house) read “DON’T APPLY DIRECTLY TO SKIN.” Perfect..