SIBLINGS, SYNCHRONIZED*

Let it never be said that two hearts cannot beat as one.

This is a plea to my dear sister, Melissa, author of the wildly-successful and endlessly-entertaining "Grossly Unimaginative" weblog: Please, Melissa, do not do anything catastrophic to your body, such as breaking a leg, or pulling a butt muscle. Or, God forbid, spraining your nose. And I ask for a purely selfish reason: You see, we seem to be in alliance.

She broke a window with her butt a few weeks back. I followed suit, mere days later, when I broke a table with my butt. See the synchronicity? Wait. It gets more diabolical. Recently, she smashed her finger in her back door. (Yes, that sounded bad. And, yes, I did it for effect. Sue me.) See, she closed the back door of her house on her finger when she went outside to let her hounds o' hell relieve themselves. Her fingernail turned blue and she may lose it. If you want to read about it, go to her writing spot. Here is where it gets scary:

Last night I played basketball, as I am wont to do. I am a guard. I rarely rebound. Perhaps I should bear that in mind in the future. I went up for a rebound, trying to tip it towards the goal and--shlump--I jammed my right index finger back towards my hand. The pain was instantaneous. (Plus I didn't get the rebound.) I looked at my finger, and, had I been a cartoon character, it would have been throbbing and red (that sounded bad) and stars would have been encircling it. I grabbed my finger and pulled at it. Ouch. Fuck it. I shook it off and played--albeit somewhat badly--for another hour-and-a-half. My shot? 'Twas definitely affected. But, no excuses on the battlefield o' basketball.

I went home and iced it for about ten minutes and called it good. Looking sternly at my finger before I retired for bed, I admonished, "Don't fuck with me tomorrow, dickhead. Heal thyself. Overnight. Or I'll be pissed."

My finger doesn't listen too well. I awoke this morning to a finger swollen to twice its size and a bit bruised, as well. It had not heeded my warnings. But what could I do? I went about my life.

I'm moving and I decided to rent a U-Haul, again, on Thursday, to clean out the final bit of garbage from my apartment and, while I was there, the man behind the counter looked at my finger and said, "Ouch. You should probably get that looked at. Take it from me. I'm still hurting from when I was a young guy like you and didn't take care of myself when I was hurt."

Signing the reservation notice with my index finger pointing straight up in the air, I said to him, "You know? Maybe I should. It's probably just jammed, but, maybe I should."

Seeing as how my doctor's office is conveniently located about a mile down the road from the rental place, I stopped in on my way home and had them jack some radioactive light into my knuckle and its surrounding joints. All turned out well. There is no breakage, just a second-degree sprain. The doctor prescribed me some Motrin (I wanted Vicodin) and he said to monitor the finger's progress over the next week. He told me that using it would actually be a good thing--kind of like built-in physical therapy. Which I knew. I had just wanted to make sure that 'twasn't busted. 'Twasn't.

So. That's my "Finger" yarn. It is now time for me to go to work--late--and fulfill my job requirements with 80% of my right hand. Sounds fun, no?

*As far as I know, my other dear sister, Alexis, has not joined in this sibling one-upsmanship. Maybe because she doesn't live in the state of Michigan? For whatever reason, it's a good thing. Pain hurts.