Ah, yes. It was a Friday.
All I wanted to do after leaving the office was head home and make myself a snack: French fries.
They’re quite simple to prepare. Wash a potato, peel said potato, wash it again, cut it up, and rinse off some of the starch. Season with very little salt, pepper, and onion powder. I didn’t use the smoked paprika. I was going to add a pickle spice mix after cooking them in the air fryer.
So, there I was, chopping away at said potato. I was thinking about my conversation with my editor of Twice the Demise regarding the finished manuscript of Book Two and the relaunch of Book One as a second edition. So many things were on my mind when—thack!
Oh, I felt that.
I released the knife instantly. It clanged against the cutting board with guilt. The potatoes began to look like beets.
I had sliced off the tip of my finger down to the bone. It was still attached, however, hanging unabashedly by a flap of flesh. My intrusive thoughts nearly took over. I wanted to remove it. My frontal lobe, however, insisted on bureaucratic red tape. I must add that this has never happened to me in the kitchen. Now, outside the kitchen is a whole different documentary.
Alas, I held my pinky beneath the faucet and rinsed it with water. I applied pressure, only to be met with Behr’s latest red palette. I wrapped my finger in gauze and several paper towels that certainly lived up to their marketing claims. Then I cleaned the blood with a diluted bleach solution, per bloodborne-pathogen protocol.
The bleeding would not subside, and I had to use more gauze and paper towels. I continued applying pressure while walking myself to urgent care.
After a short wait,
I was seen. The doctor examined the flap and advised me that I needed stitches. I did not want a lidocaine injection. If memory served me correctly, it was somewhat more painful than the injury itself.
The doctor refused to stitch me without it. Apparently, she, like me, also had boundaries. She was probably the only trusted adult in this situation.
After the medieval torture of anesthesia—two injections!—the good doctor gave me three stitches. I asked if I could record a short video naturally, without her face in it.
As I left the clinic, ready to send out the pictures and video, I remembered that the one person who would have truly appreciated the flesh-flap fiasco was my father. I placed my phone in my bag and headed to my favorite sushi restaurant for dinner. All those flaps of raw tuna lay across my plate, mocking me as they received the admiration my own flap had been denied.
None of my friends wanted to see it—except one. He loves gore. Naturally, he was permitted access to the footage.
I also had another friend in mind, but the sight of a perfectly ripe banana would make him decompensate. My father, however, would have demanded the complete collection: photographs before the stitches, footage during the procedure, and a follow-up documenting the healing process. He believed in continuity.
Three Stitches and One Trusted Adult
This was the same man who once recorded the removal of a bone spur at his podiatrist’s office so he could show it to me later over whiskey. He did not merely tolerate the macabre. He preserved it for private screenings.
Years ago, he accompanied me to have my wisdom tooth removed. It was my birthday. As a medical assistant and a nurse attempted to take my blood pressure, they became concerned that I appeared to have no pulse. My father watched this investigation unfold until he finally stood up and turned on the machine. I was alive after all-a birthday miracle.
That was our peculiar little bond. We sent each other pictures of stitches, injuries, and medical procedures with the enthusiasm other families reserved for vacation photographs. There was no recoil, no unnecessary concern, and certainly no request for a warning before opening the image. We admired the craftsmanship, assessed the damage, and asked for additional angles.
Grief in Unexpected Moments
So, there I sat, surrounded by raw fish, with three fresh stitches and excellent footage, missing the only person who would have appreciated the full production. Grief is strange that way. It does not always arrive during birthdays, holidays, or solemn occasions. Sometimes it appears over sushi because you have sustained a magnificent injury and your preferred audience is dead.
I am now typing this with nine operational fingers and one furious, heavily bandaged pinky. Every keystroke has been purchased with suffering. Still, I persevere. This article had to be written. The public deserved to know about the flesh flap, and I have apparently inherited my father’s commitment to documentation.