Originally published in The Griff Network Blog, July 15, 2015
You’re eight years old and you’re playing with your best friend in the mud, with sticks as your swords. Your best friend’s mom warned you about the rocks hidden in the mud, and how the rain made everything slippery, but you aren’t thinking of that. You’re busy thinking of how your friend got you with his stick six more times than you got him, and now you have to gain the upper hand.
There’s mud in your shoes, and when you go to take a long stride, your foot slips and your knee hits the dirt painfully. Your knee scrapes its way across as you try to stand, and pain strikes you much harder than your friend’s stick. There’s some red mixed into the brown dirt and your whole knee looks like a dozen tiny, red tic-tac-toe boards. The sting of the mud on your wound only makes it ooze more.
Your friend sees your injury and drops his stick. He goes running back towards his house, slipping in his own shoes as he calls for his mom. You stand up to follow after, but the burn of pain singes its way up your leg. You hobble towards the house, wondering if there are rocks buried in your knee, which would explain why it hurt so much.
Your friend’s mom comes out with a worried face and a medical kit. She leads you to sit on the driveway and wipes at your knee with a hand towel. You try apologizing for getting blood on her towel, because that’s distracting you from your pounding heart. You know the spray she’s going to put on your wound is going to make it sting like a dozen bees, but you know there’s no way out.
She manages to get the injury pretty clean, and does pry away a couple of tiny pebbles that felt more like huge boulders. You dig your nails into the asphalt of the driveway as she puts the stinging spray on your knee. You’re blinking away tears when she pulls out a huge, square bandage. As you watch her peel away the bits of paper from the back, an unconscious thought registers in the back of your mind that you know this bandage is clean and fresh because of those little strips of paper.
As soon as the adhesive bandage is pressed to your knee, the worry and fear of pain are gone. When you go to stand, you know your injury still aches, but the stinging sprays are over with and the bandage will act as a support if you slip again.
You’re back to running around the backyard, hobbling a little as you pick up your stick once more to challenge your friend. Your friend’s mom warns you to be careful as she picks up the scraps of paper to throw away.
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Rayna J Lewis 