As I was hobbling around the house yesterday it came to me that there's an aesthetically pleasing symmetry here: the last time I ripped out this ankle was the week before I signed the contract on the loft, and it was an act of deep faith in the medical profession to proceed with the purchase and renovation of a fifth-floor walkup. Now the loft is just on its way out, and damned if I'm not hobbling around on a cane again.
At the time, of course, it was just stupid. I was at one of the last few renditions of my friend Carlo's dance parties, which had moved from the top of the gowanus arts center in the taxi-garage Brooklyn lowlands between Boerum Hill and Park Slope to the St. Ann's school theatre space in Brooklyn Heights. And I had a crush on a red-headed co-worker whom I was desperately trying to impress. So after she left the party I took another few turns around the floor, and a spin, and a leap...
As I remember it, I didn't even try to get up and walk -- I just crawled off the dance floor and sat on a folding chair savoring the pain. Some friends eventually come over, helped me hobble outside and get a cab, and recommended a doctor who was open saturday mornings. So the next morning I learned about the verb "to Schwarzkopf", as in "You really Schwarzkopfed that ankle" and the fact that ligaments take longer to heal, so that I was actually in worse shape than if I'd broken the ankle.
Twelve weeks of rigorous wrapping and exquisite sensitivity to the slightes change in pavement slope later, I was fine, except for a the callouses and a little residual nerve damage in my cane hand. I even thought at the time that it was the kind of thing that every able-bodied person should go through at least once, just to get an idea that those reserved-for-the-handicapped signs aren't kidding.
Now if you're really good I won't tell you about the first time I tore up that very same ankle back in college, and spent a week walking a a mile each way to classes before I got it looked at, thus missing the chance to be on crutches for a week. (And how limping eregiously didn't attract anyone's noticed, but walking with a cane drew instant sympathy.)
Posted by wallich at October 20, 2003 11:50 AM