Health and Wellness

Fragile Lemon

LaShelle

I knew it was a bad idea the moment I had agreed to it. The gravity of how unbelievably stupid I had been didn’t fully register until I was holding on for dear life, staring at my muck boots while watching the ground skate underneath my heals. I kept recalling all the times I walked by a mirror and was struck by the realization that I’m not as young or as thin as I once was. My age and poor judgment left me with a crippled right hand, a limp, and a trip to the emergency room.

As I was withering on the ground with pain sending shockwaves through my body, I wondered how I was going to explain what happened to my friends and family. I didn’t last more than a handful of seconds before going bottoms up and mooning the evening sun. I tried to do a mental inventory of my extremities, but I had already assessed that something felt broken. Perhaps multiple things and there was no way I was going to be able to write for a while.

One moment I was screaming and the next moment I was uncontrollably laughing at the absurdity of the accident. My husband looked at me in horror. Blood was pouring down my hand, running over my arm, and dripping off my elbow. He doesn’t do blood. He handles it well because he was a soldier, but the sight of blood makes him sick to his stomach and causes his head to feel woozy.

“I’ve never seen someone get so injured going under five miles per hour. Why didn’t you hold on better?”

“ME? Why did YOU speed up?”

“Well, we’re not exactly tiny people Lish. I had to build up momentum!”

“Yet I was begging you to stop! I think I broke something. No, I KNOW that I broke something.”

He helped me limp my way to the house by slinging my arm around his shoulder and we left that stupid minibike where it fell. If I didn’t need one good leg to stand on, I would have kicked it out of spite as we were hobbling by. I had spent all day gardening. I was sunburnt, exhausted, and possibly a little heat sick. That’s the only reason why I recalled agreeing to his request. That and my desire for a little excitement. The walk up our driveway had looked especially daunting and the thought of a cool breeze getting tangled in my red hair sounded magnificent.

“Want a ride to the house?” he asked

“It’ll be fun! Come on… live a little. You won’t have to walk!”

“You’ll be fine!”

It looked like a bad idea. I said as much but he’s always good at talking me into stepping outside my comfort zone. Yet a conversation I had with Izzy just a week or two before didn’t resurface until after the accident. Rob had attempted to convince her to ride on the back of that stupid minibike too. She came into my bedroom laughing about how ridiculous someone would have to be to take him up on it. She talked about how there was no way they both would fit because there was barely enough room for one adult person. That’s when I told her that saying “No” was probably the smartest decision she had made that day. Yet somehow, I had forgotten to say no.

“Eighteen years babe. You should know by now not to listen to my bright ideas.”

I snorted, laughed, and then admitted that he wasn’t wrong.

Two broken fingers in my right hand, tons of bruising on my side, a possible fracture to my right kneecap, and I had obtained some wicked road rash on my palm and knee as well. I almost needed surgery and I had to re-learn how to do things. I still have months of physical therapy to tackle in order to get my middle finger to bend correctly. What’s interesting is that this isn’t even the first time that I’ve broken the exact same middle finger.

I can no longer make a fist without flicking people off which to be honest… may have come in handy a time or two. Yet I didn’t grasp just how messed up I was until the night after the accident when it took over two hours to open the bottle of painkillers that the doctor had prescribed me. Or the almost three hours it took me to accomplish farm chores the next morning (not including all the regular housework I had to do later in the day). Hauling feed, tossing hay, washing dishes, opening packages were only a few of the things I began to dread doing.

While contemplating the state of my existence and waiting in line to order my favorite drink from our local coffee shop… the barista asked me what had happened to my bandaged hand. I laughed nervously, trying to decide if I should add the fact that I injured myself on a mini dirt bike or if I should go ahead and leave that part out to make myself sound cooler. In the end, I relayed the truth of it and had her grinning. Then with a mischievous spark in her eyes, she said something that profoundly changed the way I saw myself… curvy body and all.

“Yeah… but at least you got on!”

At least I got on. I stepped outside my comfort zone. I tried something extremely stupid. I failed, but I got back up and I had been physically and mentally open to doing something spontaneous. As my husband had slung my arm around his neck to help me limp back to the house, he beamed at me and shook his head.  

With a chuckle in his throat, he said “Think of it this way my fragile lemon… you have a good story to write about.”

He wasn’t wrong.

Taken with my “good camera” of one of the ducklings on our farm a couple years back.
A cellphone picture I took of Nikolai and his cousins playing with our baby ducklings in our kitchen sink.

Published by LaShelle

Tea drinking, mountain living, wife, and mother. Writing and photographing my way through through the south.

54 thoughts on “Fragile Lemon”

  1. Oh my goodness – brilliantly written, LaShelle. Your broken fingers haven’t hampered your talent one bit. And more than that, all the perspectives you take in on this accident are just beautiful. I’m so sorry you got injured but thank you so much for sharing the story and letting us laugh, learn and try right alongside you! Sending my best wishes for healing!

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      3. I’ve been trying to tell you you’re welcome for a couple hours now 😂

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      5. I think it knows I talk a lot and about nothing important.. so it just removes the riffraff 😂

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      12. Thank you so much! I’m taking nikolai to the park right now with my hubby so I’m a little bit preoccupied 😌 but it’s a GORGEOUS day and I wanna sit in the shade and write my heart out!

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      13. Well write your heart out and I’ll read. And I’ll make a valiant attempt to comment in a manner that’s suitable for you and WordPress lol!

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  3. The barista was right: at least you got on. It’s only in hindsight that we have the luxury of regretting something we did and sometimes the experience is worth the regret … if that makes any sense. But since it was your husband’s idea … I hope you don’t let him live it down … lol 🙂

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      2. 🤪 it didn’t! Everything is healed up other than my middle finger 😬 but I suppose me attempting to make a fist and flicking my husband off is well deserved 😂

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  4. a delightful read. I was with you all the way. I didn’t understand the meaning of the title at first or how you had succumbed to such injuries but that kept me reading to find out; it’s good to have a laugh at ourselves and, yes, to give things a go 🙂

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      1. the quality of writing, its drive and assurance, kept me reading . plus I recognized the elements of flash fiction in the tale: I have used such elements myself in my current post —

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      2. The funny part is that I truly know nothing about the specifics in regards to writing. I’ve not taken any classes, though I really want to! I’ve been researching writing clubs and basically anyone that might take me under their wing so I can learn and grow.

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    2. It just dawned on me that you probably haven’t read some of my other blog posts where I discuss why my husband calls me lemon. To sum it up he says that I am his wife from the lemon lot because I have a lot of health problems 🤪. So this time I was his fragile lemon 🍋 😉

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  5. So sorry the the experience didn’t end well but it’s still a big deal that you tried something new. Getting out of your comfort zone is a big achievement. And adorable ducklings!

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  6. I’m glad you are okay! What an amazing adventure you had. You got on and I bet for the moments before the fall you felt young, full of life, and thrilled at doing it. We have to take risks sometimes to feel the fullness of being alive.

    Happy healing.

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  7. haha oh no that sounds awful (the injuries) but the story was delightful LOL… my husband and I are the exact same… it’s like he has a little death wish.. and I’m always the sour puss on the sidelines telling him “YOU ONLY NEED TO DIE ONCE.. WE WON’T ALWAYS BE SO LUCKY!!!” but somehow we always survive whatever he convinces me to do…

    Well, he’s not wrong about one thing… good stories in our world/blogosphere are hard to come by and when you are gifted one, you must tell it as it happened! 🙂 Feel betttter! (love the nickname Lish)

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    1. Hahaha I’m so glad someone could relate! I’m curious now… die once? Is there a story to that?
      As for the nickname… I have SO many, but Lish is the name all my friends & family call me. 🥰 Rob calls me Lemon because I have a lot of health problems. I’m the wife he picked from the lemon lot because I had (have) a good body but I’m all messed up on the inside. 😂 Or at least that’s how he tells it.

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  9. What a story, but one that has a good moral to it. You tried, you survived, you got a blog post out to it. What more could a woman want? Love the idea that you may be able to give more people the finger. This seems like it might be a good thing.

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    1. LOL knowing what you devalue in your writing I’m not surprised that the idea of giving the finger more frequently is at my disposal. Knowing what I know about people… you’re not wrong 🤪

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  10. The post I’ve been waiting for! I shouldn’t laugh at your pain, but you do a good job of using humour to recall it, because what better way to go through pain than with a few laughs, am I right?

    I love your use of the language, such as the ground skating under your feet, or you mooning the sun. And yes, that’s how I always comfort myself whenever something bad happens to me: “At least I’ll have something to write about.”

    p.s. what software did you use for those pics? 😛

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  12. I read this the day you wrote about it, but I didn’t have time to comment at the time. How delightful to reread it today, LaShelle. You tell the story so that I’m right with you and your husband on the minibike. Well, not literally, because two of you barely fit on.😊 I think the story makes you cooler because you got ON the bike instead of not.

    I flashed back to a time when we had bought our first house. We had no money, so whenever something came up, I did the work. (I’m sure every job took 2-3 times as long as it should have because I’m not exactly Tim the Tool Guy.) I was painting the house at the time, squatted to paint some of the lower parts, and suddenly felt a tear in my knee. I knew it was serious. In the heat of the moment, one thinks of the strangest things. My first thought was, “What a stupid way to get hurt! I wasn’t even doing something fun.” Your way is much cooler.

    By the way, I noticed your absence and hoped everything was okay. We, bloggers, need to look after each other. I’ll give you a pass for going AWOL.😉 The other thought I had while reading was that you jumped right back into farmwork the next day. There is no calling in sick when you’re maintaining a farm. Glad to know you haven’t lost your sense of humor.

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    1. HAHA! I did jump right back into farm work. Oh goodness it’s tough sometimes when I’m really down but things have to get done. Thanks for reading and I’m so thankful that I kept you interested and engaged with the story! Hoping to take some writing classes to help me improve 💪

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  13. Pingback: Of Kisses and Magic – Everpine Forest & Farm

      2. At least it isn’t stuck straight up and flicking everyone off now 🤣. Instead it’s stuck in a bent position which makes it easier to hold things but not using my right hand as much is tedious!

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