My fracture & me

A foots tale

by

Ainz

1:30 AM

Puri, Orissa

The sound of the heavy waves crashing on the beach are loud and drowned only by the slightly druken yells of the four boys playing soccer by the Pink Hotel. The film festival is winding down to its last screenings but our heros, a couple of beers and a bottle of wine down, are more interested in playing on the beach. A boy, who's nick name rhymes with a popular milk based Punjabi drink, lands the ball at his feet. Yours truely, goes out to challenge him and retrive the elusive sphere filled with air. The drink named boy moves towards the outer edges of the 'undefined' playing field. I move in... right led... he dodges.... swiftly with the left I try to block... he again moves it away... blindly and with a determined force I again move in my right leg... CONTACT !!! But wait... its not the ball... as a tromendous amount of pain shoots up from my foot to my head I realise that I might have hit his leg or rather (as I like to remember), his leg hit me !!

"Oh fuck !! Oh fuck !!", I jump about in my customary fashion. Pains like hell... but after a minute of terror I'm back in the game... I run... dodge... and score goals (Yes ! Actually ! Take that nay sayers !) and half an hour later I'm limping on the beach with the others as we feel the cold eastern winds breeze through our hair.

"Agar fracture hota, to teri phat gayi hoti! Tu chal nahi pata" (If it were a fracture, you would've lost it! Theres no way you could've walked), Lil' Piggy says to me the next day at Bhuvaneshwar Airport. Hmmm... makes sense... I've never had a fracture so I wouldn't know. I limp my way to the aircraft and back to Delhi.

3:30 PM, Next Day

Faridabad, Haryana

"There is a lot of swelling... eat lunch and we'll go get an X-ray", my mum tells me 20 minutes after I reach home. I quickly gobble down the mattar-pulao (these low cost airlines don't feed you) and limp my way down to the car.

5:30 PM,

New Delhi

"Hmmm.... I thinking that fracture this", says this idiot of a medical student holding my X-ray against the light. What he was pointing out was one thick line running thru the middle of my foot. "He is gotta be kidding", I mutter. And surely enough... like I had suspected, and as the doctor later pointed out, the fracture was in my fouth finger (from the left) on my right foot. The second bone from the top was broken. "Cast and for 3 weeks", he says out loud giving me a "this-is-what-happens-when-you-break-your-bone" look.

Son of a bitch.

Present Day,

Faridabad, Haryana

So here I am... six days later... getting adjusted still to the 'hopping on one leg routine'. The first three days were complete bed rest. I could only move using my grandma's walker. Hopping around. But now.... I've gotten one of them cast shoes... So I can imitate something that resembles a walk... but its any day better to be on your two feet than clinging onto some walker.

This three weeks house arrest is gonna get to me. My mind should not be allowed to sit idle for so long. I'll drive myself nuts. Luckly... I fly down south to family & cousins on a two city-ten day trip. The day I return will be the day the cast comes off... so now i'll be a limping tourist !!

Being semi-handicapped makes you appreciate the strenth and the courage of the people who haveta go through it fully and forever. Its embarassing to walk across a room while limping silly.. people give you all sorts of looks... I know I'll be out of it soon... but what bout the people who'll never be 'out of it' ?

Thats courage.

I've also been thinking... I think a broken arm is better than a broken foot. Atleast you arn't that confined. I mean... I can drive with one hand. Go watch movies... hang out with people... but a foot... you gotta rest it... can't put the whole weight on it the whole time. Hmmm... another interesting thing I heard on Seinfeld (great show) was... Whats the worst part of being blind ??

Apart from the fact that you can't see... Hmmm... I wonder....

Also I'm not gonna be able to drive for a month, (counting the Puri days) and that sucks !

View from the hotel window. The tiny red circle in the middle marks the approx. spot of my first fracture. Towards the upper left is the Pink House.