TheMommyBlog

Saturday, July 26, 2008 Me, Me, Me, Bad Mood Dude

So there I was (in the Congo), washing the car in my driveway, ponytail high and swimsuit rockin’, when I leaned over to get the font fender… and fell right into the rosebush.

This isn’t any ordinary rosebush; no one knows how old it is or who planted it. Suffice to say that when in full bloom it completely obscures my car from the neighbor’s view. Daphne was dancing around me, begging to use the long-handled brush or spray something, anything, so I asked her to squeeze into the space in front of the car and get the fender and license plate. I may as well have asked her to pick up a dead squirrel. Peasant work.

So I edged around, leaned over, grateful for this wonderful brush that let me get into spaces that, well, would really not be a problem had I just backed the damn car up two feet. Just as I swiped the license plate from the passenger side fender, I started to wobble. And then I fell. It was the slowest descent ever. I saw where I missed a spot under the bumper. I noticed that there were a lot of very big rocks between the rosebush and its diminutive, hardly-worth-mentioning neighboring bush. I wasn’t sure if I would continue to pitch forward and crack my elbow on the rocks or fall back into the barbed wire masquerading as foliage.

Into the barbed wire I went.

That wasn’t even the worst part. It was being stuck, not knowing how I was going to get the leverage to get up, feeling thorns tearing into my skin and my new swimsuit (damn!) and white surf shorts (double damn!) and lodging there while I hesitated between sinking further and lunging out of there. Of course, getting up did nearly as much damage as falling.

My daughter came running out at that moment so ask if she could spray some more, and skidded to a stop when she saw me wincing as I rinsed the last of the soap off the hood before going into the house for what I was sure would be a long, painful shower.

“Mama?”

“I fell, hon.”

“Are you okay?”

“No, I’m really not. Can you call Phil for me and ask him to come help?”

She ran inside to tell Dylan to come look, and I asked her to take photos of the side and back of me so I would know where all the bits of thorns were. I wasn’t sure where Phil was and I might be doing the search and retrieval myself. I was dripping blood from my forearms and my leg was on fire.

Luckily, Phil was already on his way and arrived just as I was drying off (gingerly) and finding something loose-fitting to wear.

“What happened??”

“I fell in the rosebush. We’re going to need tweezers. Oh, and could you please get the thorns on the bathroom sink? I was pulling them out in the shower and I don’t want the kids getting them.”

“Nice. You could make a necklace,” he suggested. He’d brought Logan a strand of shark teeth the week before in South Carolina.

I stood in the kitchen wiping away tears as he pulled thorn bits out of my skin, cleaned everything with antiseptic, and applied Neosporin everywhere. I took a handful of Tylenol and passed out on the couch, putting down a blanket first in case I started bleeding again.

Daphne patted me and said she was so sorry, and that she would take care of me, just as she’s always said she would. Between Phil and the kids, I was completely safe. It’s a nice feeling.

I’ll have whole day to rest before I pack for the Pampers Parenting Institute in Cincinnati on Monday.