Broken and Bloody

BROKEN AND BLOODY

I must have learned something about falling while I was in "The Desperate Hours". In this show, my job was to appear with a gun and as I was drawing my weapon to shoot the invaders, get shot and have to collapse as I did a forward roll down three wooden stairs. Then after landing face down on the floor, I would reach up and puncture a blood pack under my shirt and then be escorted out the house moments later with blood running down my chest and dripping between my fingers.

It was a pretty dramatic scene, but I found after playing this role that I really didn't like playing ingénues. While it is fun to be the love interest, there really isn't much challenge. I guess all of my experience falling during my formative years must have helped me stay uninjured during the show. Even though I repeatedly flew head over heels down the lightly padded wooden stairs, I never remember getting any bruises from the stair somersaults.

My luck wasn't always so good in college. I still have a kink in my neck from playing some pickup soccer. I really hadn't played that much, but there must have been someone I was trying to impress because I jumped up to save my side from a possible goal by kicking wildly in the air. The problem became evident when I landed on my neck. Then I decided soccer wasn't my game.

The only other problem I remember from Utah State was that I was getting a lot of roles as old men. Egeus (Hermia's father) in Midsummer Night's Dream and Fender in the Bespoke Overcoat. Egeus doesn't get what he wants, which is for Hermia to marry Demetrius. The funny thing is that both of these actors were at least three years older than I was. Fender was so old that he dies during the play. Luckily, I get to come back in that show and get the coat I've already paid for. But the future didn't look bright. I was playing characters who were so old they died of old age in the show. I began hunching over and walking slowly at times when I didn't need to, and one day as I was walking to the dorms, I noticed I was hobbling across the lawn like I was ninety. I stopped and looked around to see if anyone was looking. Then, just in case someone was watching, I ran the rest of the way. I’ve already told you about injuring my ankle playing a jester at a Tupperware convention. I made twenty-five dollars, but injured myself yet again.

After getting an ankle cast, I also got to see how fast I could run with one ankle immobilized. I made the mistake of showing my wife her birthday present before her birthday, and she grabbed it and ran down the street, pretending to open it. I think I believed she would actually open it since she had confessed to opening her Christmas presents early as a little girl and then carefully rewrapping them. I ran after her as fast as I could hobble, and as she ran faster, I tried to run faster, too. The cast broke right at the ankle as I grabbed the present and her.

The recasting of the ankle didn't get properly billed from the old Budge clinic and my wife and I got our first taste of a credit report problem. After I found out there was a problem I went and paid the bill which stopped my wife from opening her present early - - only ninety dollars.

Even when I do something as non-threatening as trying to start a tiller when I’m gardening, I usually find some way to injure myself.

Just this week I was trying to get the old Sears tiller started up. It was working just last week, and I was able to get some good tilling done. But when I tried to start it yesterday, it wouldn’t start. I’m pretty stubborn, so I like to keep trying when most people would have had the sense to stop.

The more I pulled, the more I wanted it to start. But it just sat there mocking me. As I got more worn from pulling the rope, I started to get careless.

This tiller has a handle that curves back to the front, and there is supposed to be a cap on the pipe handle. Of course, it was missing, and when I pulled hard but kind of sloppy, I rammed the back of my hand into the pipe. I scraped my hand pretty hard from the wrist to my index finger.

It’s okay. I’ve had fake blood run between my fingers. It hurts less than the real thing.

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