Don't Try This at Home

I am thrilled when my kids get out their art supplies, crayons, paints, magazines, and I forget about being The Enforcer, I let down my guard and desist with the dire warnings about why we need to pick up messes, why we don't run with scissors. Don't let this happen to you! The kids had just sharpened their pencils, were doodling away, when we had to take a break so they left the pencils--and everything else--lying on the floor. Coming into the hallway quickly, I tripped over a pencil and --voila--that is how I ended up with a pencil stuck in my foot. Of course I pulled it out, but then the whole pencil did not come out, so a good part of the lead stayed lodged in my foot. Yes, it hurt, and I also felt like a dunce for not being careful.

I took some alone time to work at removing the pencil out of my foot. I sterilized a needle, tweezers, and nail clippers, and started picking away with tweezers. I succeeded at not throwing up at the sight of the flesh--ouch!--but could not get the pencil lead out.

The next day was Birdie's turn to bring snacks for the kindergarten, so I put SHARP tweezers on the grocery list, grabbed the kids, and hobbled off to the store. As I do every time, I lectured Dylan about the rules for going to the store, the parts about staying with me, not grabbing things off the shelf. Once at the local Tweezer n Snack mart, however, Dylan was overwhelmed by the Christmas displays.

He gets credit for seeming to be trying to follow the rules--how does he manage to do this?--but it was too hard, and after three minutes I noticed an elfin figure whirring down a distant aisle, a Santa Claus hat on his head, pushing the shopping cart as fast as it would go and then jumping aboard for a thrill ride. I limped down to where my unruly son was. He was smiling hugely, and the passing customers were grinning at his impishness. When I caught him I stopped the cart with my foot (the one without the pencil in it) and I hissed, "You are being obnoxious..you are supposed to stay with me..."

A nice old lady came up to me admonishing, "Just let them be kids, they are only young once." I gritted my teeth.

Birdie said, "You're being obnoxious. I have to get my snacks."

Dylan took off at top speed down the aisle.

I limped after Birdie to select the junk foods that were not too junky for the kindergarten snack. Birdie and I found the tweezers, picked out the really sharp ones, and went to check out line.

Birdie was gripping the granola bars and cheese Pringles like a starving child. The checker had to come around to the other side of the counter to scan the food since this junk-food junkie would not let go of the boxes. Dylan was nowhere to be seen.

We waited around at the exit and then went for a search and found a weeping Dylan in the Christmas aisle. I had hurt his feelings; he felt very criticized. I gritted my teeth.

I hobbled out to the car, snapped in Birdie, and waited for Dylan to emerge. Eventually he came out, not kidnapped, but sulking and sniffling. We would have to discuss this later.

After the kids went to sleep I got out the really sharp tweezers, took several ibuprofren, and tried again: no luck.

"You have to get it out," DH told me in the morning. He said he had pulled plenty of spines and splinters out of his flesh. He told me he had lanced a cyst he had on his neck, once, using a needle. This is a guy who had operated on his cat, and closed the wound with superglue. I was not going to get a lot of sympathy from him. He did, however, agree to try to get it out, if I wanted, "but it will probably hurt." My foot was hurting enough anyway, so I said, "do it," and got out my little diy surgery kit, including the really sharp tweezers. Offering my foot, I closed my eyes, and began counting backwards from 100 as he started picking away. I made it to the count of 95, then I told him to stop. I was going to the doctor. I think Birdie was right when he said, "If you keep trying to get it out yourself, then you will really need to go to the doctor."

That afternoon at Urgent Care, I got a couple of numbing shots in the foot, and then finally Dr. Mogle-Lichten got a half-inch long pencil lead out. I was so relieved, and light-headed, and leaned back on the gurney. When the nurse said I could leave, I said I felt faint and I was going to sit there for a minute. "Does this happen to you often?" the nurse asked.

I turned the question over in my mind. Was she asking whether I had objects stuck in my foot often? Or whether I often felt faint after having my foot cut open? Was she just making conversation, as in, do you come here often, or was she trying to get me to vacate the gurney so another unlucky patient could take my spot behind the curtains? It didn't really matter which question she was asking, since the answer to each was the same: "No."