First Hurts

One of the great side benefits of going to PT is the discussions we have. An adorable little girl, who belonged to the patient on the next table, sparked our memories of first hurts.

Her mother was obviously in for a shoulder injury. I was being treated for my ongoing leg and hip condition. I remarked that the 5-year-old had never experienced the pains we brought to the PT table. The PT guy reminded us that instead she got to experience hitting her thumb for the first time with a hammer and other similar first pains. Here’s my recollection of those firsts in my life:

– When I was about 4 years old, I was applying an iron to my doll clothes for the first time with the ironing board quite low. I happened to run into my arm with the hot surface long enough to form two humongous blisters. I can smell the “Foil” my mother slathered on my burned arm.

– A few years later as I was looking forward to my first swimming party in a public pool I sliced into my finger with a very sharp knife. That’s one of those times when you are sure you will bleed to death. Layers of gauze and a Bandaid swathed that finger, which I must have held up out of the water. The huge pool was lovely at night as the chlorine filled the air.

– I learned to saw, hammer, and put in screws when a friend and I built a doll house that filled half my bedroom. We made couches, bunk beds, drop-leaf tables, and even a car for our doll family. He knew how to do the basics and I’m sure my father consulted when we had questions. We both pounded our thumbs multiple times as the doll house took shape.

– I was jumping rope at a neighbor’s house, looking forward to my first crab feast at another neighbor’s house that night. As my big toe bent under my right foot, I came to understand the crabs would have to wait for a few years. Instead I spent the next several hours in the ER getting X-rayed. I was mortified to find out I would have to wear tennis shoes to Sunday school.

These were the simple first pains that most children learn in their first decade. Pains of the heart would wait for a few years and not be so easily fixed with a Bandaid.

The discussion moved from childhood injury to book suggestions, with everyone in the therapy room adding their recommendations. I was happy to be distracted by book talk as my hamstrings screamed out in agony. Sometimes even 10 seconds seems like an eternity.

My PT guy, who is a master of multi-tasking, had sent me an e-mail message with the book list by the time I got home. Have you read any of these?

When Nietsche Wept
The Madonnas of Leningrad
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Weight, by Jeanette Witherspoon (or something else from the Canongate myth series)
The Art of Possibility
Sitting Still
Those Who Save Us
Breakfast at the Victory