Reasons why I am weird #394
I’ve always wanted to break my leg.
When we were eight, Oona Longridge broke her leg in Greenwich, on a school trip. She went to hospital, we went round the Cutty Sark. When we swung by the local casualty department on the way home, she was resplendent in a toe-to-thigh plaster cast, and sat in state on the back seat of the coach all the way home. For the next six weeks she was the centre of attention. And in a refreshingly good way too – owing to her unfortunate accident (involving seven Boy Scouts and a mechanical horse) she was unable to indulge in her usual school-trip pastime of stealing from the gift shop. Honestly, the girl was a kleptomaniac. She was once chased round the gift shop of Hatfield House by Mrs Lawson after attempting to make off with a box of country fudge and a fridge ornament in the shape of Lady Jane Grey. Oh, and she nicked a tenner off the dinner ladies once and we all had to go into the headmaster’s office one at a time and say in a loud, steady voice “I did not steal the money” and using his amazing-Derren-Brown-powers of mind control he sussed it was her and beat her with a slipper.
But anyway.
Oh yes. Centre of attention. For the duration of her time in plaster, that girl was feted like the heroine in a bad nineteenth century romance – and why? So that we could have a go on her crutches, of course. I can still remember how important it made us feel (well, me anyway) – lurching round the playground like little spastic robots, hacking people’s ankles and periodically falling over. Meanwhile, a succession of small boys and girls attended to her every need, to the extent that I disturbingly have an extremely vivid memory of a teacher demanding that I accompany Oona to the toilet, in order that I might hold her leg up while she had a wee. Seriously. On the school’s Tudor Day (excruciating – our mothers had to make our costumes [I was Catherine of Aragon, resplendent in a green cordouroy curtain with some wire in the bottom hem and a weird wimple thing made out of cardboard and an old velvet blazer, and declaimed my divorce from Henry VIII in rhyming couplets thus: “I had baby Mary/ he wanted a son/so in came the next Queen/and out went One”] and mine made me walk down the high street afterwards still in my dress and I wanted to DIE) she was allowed to lead the procession across the playground and declare the buffet open. Which excited everyone, but nobody more so than Charlie the School Dog who spent a fabulous hour or so stealing sandwiches and pushing his nose into the crotches of various startled parents.
So yes, I’d still quite like to break my leg*. Except I wouldn’t go to work while I was in plaster – I would make the Other Half leave me a picnic every morning and I would lie in bed and watch telly and if people came to visit and were sufficiently nice to me I might let them have a go on my crutches.
Except I probably wouldn’t. I’m selfish like that.
* But only if it didn’t hurt, or make me look stupid while it was happening. I wouldn’t want to get run over, for example, because that would just be embarrassing. Falling off a horse would probably be alright. Is it possible to get on a horse after an epidural (for the pain)? Probably not. I’d need some help of some sort, which would be undignified. Maybe skydiving then. Or rescuing a drowning puppy. Ooh, that would be alright, because then I would be a hero into the bargain. I’m not sure how you break your leg while rescuing a puppy from the river though. Maybe it would involve slipping over on the riverbank, and now we’re back to undignified. I know! I know! I could dive into the river to rescue the puppy and break my leg (bravely, and in quite a sexy way) on a submerged shopping trolley and Robbie Williams would dive in and rescue me and I’d be a size eight and have a clingy wet t-shirt on and then when I got out of hospital (looking pale but still bravely beautiful) he would whisper urgently in my ear how he had to have me now….
….and in an ideal world I’d get to keep the puppy and everything. Result!
When we were eight, Oona Longridge broke her leg in Greenwich, on a school trip. She went to hospital, we went round the Cutty Sark. When we swung by the local casualty department on the way home, she was resplendent in a toe-to-thigh plaster cast, and sat in state on the back seat of the coach all the way home. For the next six weeks she was the centre of attention. And in a refreshingly good way too – owing to her unfortunate accident (involving seven Boy Scouts and a mechanical horse) she was unable to indulge in her usual school-trip pastime of stealing from the gift shop. Honestly, the girl was a kleptomaniac. She was once chased round the gift shop of Hatfield House by Mrs Lawson after attempting to make off with a box of country fudge and a fridge ornament in the shape of Lady Jane Grey. Oh, and she nicked a tenner off the dinner ladies once and we all had to go into the headmaster’s office one at a time and say in a loud, steady voice “I did not steal the money” and using his amazing-Derren-Brown-powers of mind control he sussed it was her and beat her with a slipper.
But anyway.
Oh yes. Centre of attention. For the duration of her time in plaster, that girl was feted like the heroine in a bad nineteenth century romance – and why? So that we could have a go on her crutches, of course. I can still remember how important it made us feel (well, me anyway) – lurching round the playground like little spastic robots, hacking people’s ankles and periodically falling over. Meanwhile, a succession of small boys and girls attended to her every need, to the extent that I disturbingly have an extremely vivid memory of a teacher demanding that I accompany Oona to the toilet, in order that I might hold her leg up while she had a wee. Seriously. On the school’s Tudor Day (excruciating – our mothers had to make our costumes [I was Catherine of Aragon, resplendent in a green cordouroy curtain with some wire in the bottom hem and a weird wimple thing made out of cardboard and an old velvet blazer, and declaimed my divorce from Henry VIII in rhyming couplets thus: “I had baby Mary/ he wanted a son/so in came the next Queen/and out went One”] and mine made me walk down the high street afterwards still in my dress and I wanted to DIE) she was allowed to lead the procession across the playground and declare the buffet open. Which excited everyone, but nobody more so than Charlie the School Dog who spent a fabulous hour or so stealing sandwiches and pushing his nose into the crotches of various startled parents.
So yes, I’d still quite like to break my leg*. Except I wouldn’t go to work while I was in plaster – I would make the Other Half leave me a picnic every morning and I would lie in bed and watch telly and if people came to visit and were sufficiently nice to me I might let them have a go on my crutches.
Except I probably wouldn’t. I’m selfish like that.
* But only if it didn’t hurt, or make me look stupid while it was happening. I wouldn’t want to get run over, for example, because that would just be embarrassing. Falling off a horse would probably be alright. Is it possible to get on a horse after an epidural (for the pain)? Probably not. I’d need some help of some sort, which would be undignified. Maybe skydiving then. Or rescuing a drowning puppy. Ooh, that would be alright, because then I would be a hero into the bargain. I’m not sure how you break your leg while rescuing a puppy from the river though. Maybe it would involve slipping over on the riverbank, and now we’re back to undignified. I know! I know! I could dive into the river to rescue the puppy and break my leg (bravely, and in quite a sexy way) on a submerged shopping trolley and Robbie Williams would dive in and rescue me and I’d be a size eight and have a clingy wet t-shirt on and then when I got out of hospital (looking pale but still bravely beautiful) he would whisper urgently in my ear how he had to have me now….
….and in an ideal world I’d get to keep the puppy and everything. Result!
posted by surly girl at 8:31 pm
14 Comments:
i kinda had the same desire myself
people who broke their legs were oh so glamorous, and i recall swinging around on someone's crutches (we were all taking turns)
also, the injury had usually been sustained on a skiing holiday on account of me going to a posh school full of people with rich parents
so probably i didn't want to break my leg, probably i just wanted rich parents who'd take me on skiing holidays
(i was also never keen on the pain element)
The phrase 'go on, break a leg' must have been invented for you.
I have never broken a bone, although I did dislocate a thumb once.
Unfortunately, they hardly ever put you in a cast anymore. They make you wear a removable boot that you can walk on.
Where's the fun in that?
I wanted to break something (maybe an arm) so that everyone would write how much they liked me on my cast.
I have yet to break something, but not for lack of trying.
Breaking your leg on a submerged shopping trolley just isn't going to happen.
Funny... normally this would be one of the things you worry about but weirdly, this is in fact on your wish-list.
How about diving into a canal to save a drowning puppy and getting caught in duck-weed and a pile of briezeblocks (after throwing the pup to safety) and you would have to dive under the water and - get this - break your own leg to get free... but it wouldn't hurt because you would be pumped full of adrenaline which would act as an anaesthetic.. and then Robbie would turn up and we return to the script?
..any good?
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your little dream scenario was the funniest thing i have heard in a *long* time. i often have similar scenarios running through my head. unfortunately, i have already broken several bones, in the most decidedly unglamorous of ways....mostly involving bicycles. odd.
Only instead of Robbie Williams, you'll get the guys who read this site...
www.castfetish.com
It's funny, but these lunchtime conversations only sound weird when I go over them again on your blog. At the time they sound perfectly rational.
I love the Robbie Williams part! If there was any chance that he would be there to save me, I would break my own leg!
wow. i've never heard it put quite that way.
I think i would enjoy the cast part, but not so much the pain of it happening. But then after its healed, you will probably always feel it - you know when it rains.
I don't think its worth it. Yep, i've decided.
I broke ribs, which is decidedly unglamorous and tiresome. I had to wait until my 40's to break something meaningful. My humerus, but I didn't laugh; no plaster cast. Curses. All that waiting for nothing.
I make do with glasses instead.
They don't ache when it rains.
Rather than suffer the trouble, pain and eventual smell of a cast, just be a princess instead. You get to pee in solitude, wear a tiara and carry a sceptre. And if you were a magic princess, the sceptre would be a WAND with a pointy star on the end and you could whap minions with it.
Sherbert - I never considered that upside of breaking your leg and using crutches - no more bingo wings. Fabulous.
i think i like first nations' suggestion better.
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