Monday 22 September 2014

Self-harm

Oh, the pain. The pain.

I stubbed my toe this morning on the side of the lounger. For long moments my entire body tensed; I gripped the side of the chair tight and concentrated very hard on not yelling loud swear-words in consideration of the family next door with three little children.

The pain was all-consuming. When I looked down to check that my toe was still in some form of relationship with the remainder of my foot, the visual appearance of injury was under-whelming. It was a touch red.

When I was finally able to speak (other than suppressed swears) I looked up to see my darling waiting to find out what was wrong with his eyebrows raised.

This isn't from callousness, more's the pity. No - it's from routine. I have managed to injure myself at least once, and often several times per day since arriving in Australia. It's not the venomous snakes or indecently large spiders - no. It's some sort of inbuilt clumsiness that has decided to kick into high gear to help celebrate my time off.

I have stubbed my toe, twisted my ankle, managed to get a stick embedded in my heel, and this morning I gouged a new slit in the tip of my nose with my thumbnail while putting on a top.

Don't ask.

My darling has given up yelling in panic, 'What's wrong? What's wrong?' Now he just waits calmly for me to inform him, or makes a casual guess. 'Toe?' I nod. He nods back in sympathy. 'Looks like it hurts.'

Son of a b**** that's an understatement. I hope when I return to New Zealand my co-ordination returns. My guess is that the excessively high temperatures and long hours of sunshine have somehow thrown off my brain chemistry and resulted in this spate of injury.

If it's not, then farewell my friends. I'll be lucky to last out the year.

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