The Tipping Point

Literally! Honest!

I found it next door, which turned out to be a lucky thing if one is absolutely determined to tip. Or even, as I was, simply klutzy enough to tip. It was one of those curb cuts in the sidewalk for the driveway. The three-wheeled scooter always tilts a little on the top side of those, but it's much more drastic next to the street. Steve likes to avoid them completely, preferring to ride along the edge of the street. I have seen those nuts out there driving down our streets, and figure the sidewalks are safer.

Even though they tip.

I must have been tired yesterday. I was certainly inattentive, nearly home after a morning of lapidary and ready for lunch. At any rate, I let the scooter roam too close to the street side, then tried to over-correct.

Didn't work.

Even so, I count myself lucky. When it happened to my dad, tipping over in his extra-heavy scooter, he had to be whisked away by ambulance to the local hospital in order to get one of his artificial hips replaced in its artificial socket. They needed to be replaced yet again because this set was prone to having this happen.

No such fuss for me. My scooter is smaller, lighter, highly portable. This is the second time I've tipped it over, and while everybody around me freaks out, I just get away with a little bruise. Or anyway, I did the first time. This time I was wearing shorts, so let's start with a little pavement rash, landing as I did in the street. It's such a little thing, but so-o-o-o-o annoying. I knew a little clean up and a Band-Aid (large) or two with antibiotic cream would take care of those spots, even though that was what was hurting. Heck, they weren't even bleeding, a surprise once I thought about it enough to remember I'm taking Warfarin this time around.

The scooter, however, was pinning my lower leg under it. It's light enough that I just used the other foot to push it up, slide my leg out, and start to sit up. That's as far as I was going by myself without either help or a lot of planning. I do not do well getting up off the floor. Yes, I can, but the knees give me hell, and I try my best to avoid that.

Help was coming from two directions. Ahead I could see the neighbor across the street rush out of her house, but stopping when she saw I was getting help from behind. The vehicle I had been hearing coming up the street and stopping had disgorged two strong and helpful Hispanic men, likely one of several sets who regularly do yard care in the area. Their first and frequently repeated question was, "Do you need to go to the hospital?" It was followed closely by, "Do you need us to call an ambulance?"

While they were setting my scooter up, putting the battery back in correctly, and helping me to my feet without managing to kill my shoulders - a pretty neat trick - I continued to reassure them I was fine, merely needed to get on my scooter, and hey: home was right there, one yard over. It wasn't until the last that they finally decided that I was good enough to go those final hundred feet or so and they had done what they needed to. I thanked them and they left after I turned into my driveway without tipping again, presumably assuring them that this crazy gringo lady really was OK.

Steve was up, finally. He'd been running a light fever and spent much of the last 48 hours in bed. I asked him to fix me an ice pack while I went in to my bathroom and cleaned the dust off and some of the dirt out of the scrapes. Even if I wasn't bleeding visibly, and couldn't see it yet, I knew I would be bruising fairly spectacularly fairly soon. After all: Warfarin.

I kept the ice pack in place for nearly an hour. It was big enough to cover the two sorest spots, the front and side of my downhill knee. Despite the ice, my pavement rash was still the loudest complainer. I never felt the bruising. Once the ice melted and we found the leak in the ice bag, I applied a little first aid to the scrapes and finally fixed lunch. Then I got to spend the rest of the day watching the color rise to the surface.

The kneecap is the ugliest, full black and purple, skin still stretched tight over the extra volume within. That bruise in much lighter form heads halfway down the front of my shin. I thought it was just how the living room light was hitting my leg last night, but then Steve saw it. It really is blue-grey. At least it's not painful, unlike the kneecap and that pesky pavement rash off to the side. This morning revealed another spectacularly blue bulge lower on the inside calf, where the cart was sitting on my leg. I never felt it, saw it, nor of course iced it.

Yeah, now that I know it's there, I feel it too. But that damn silly pavement rash is still the worst part, and in that I'm lucky.

It's also strategic. It needs a big enough dressing that it's hard to keep one on without adding extra tape, which is stark white. That's enough to draw attention when I run to the bank to withdraw my last CD from them ever. EVER! If you want to know what that's all about, read my next posting.

Meanwhile I need some breakfast.