Pam’s Pictorama Post: It is a Pam post today as I share news of my newly busted left paw. Monday, Memorial Day, I got out of an especially cozy snooze with Blackie curled up on me and a wool blanket to fight off the wet chill that was permeating the apartment. I coaxed myself into running garb after my usual half a nectarine, some green smoothie and some cold coffee.

I always run slowly (I have written about that here and here) and I was extra pokey on Monday, tired from the weekend of travel. I had taken a short break at the top of an incline ramp and started running again when my sneaker caught in a cobblestone-hexpaver and I went down, hard. I tried to regain my balance, staggered and fell on my left side with my hands breaking my fall.

I sat there for a moment clearing my head and assessing the damage. Knee hurt but not too badly, left hand hurt more and fingers were swelling. A nice man (who ironically was wearing a Hospital for Special Surgery Orthopedic fleece) who had been walking with his wife (I as assume) and a child in a stroller approached me. He had put his N95 mask on. He asked if I was alright (was I?) and kindly offered to help me up.

I put my now damp mask on and gladly accepted a hand up. He made sure I could walk okay before continuing on. The knee seemed functional, but the hand throbbing and well, slightly crooked. I considered calling Kim to come help me home (I was just blocks away), but decided that since my legs were willing it was better to get home quickly and assess the situation from there. So I ran, very slowly, the remainder of the way home.

I knew that I had to head over to the Urgent Care walk-in medical facility on 86th Street as soon as possible so I wiggled out of my sweatshirt and leggings and had the foresight to pull on a tank top (easy on and off) and loose sweats – which have become my uniform now, one arm in a hoodie sleeve. I had no appetite, but ate a piece of toast because I figured it could be a long adventure. I did my best to gently wash my scraped up hands.

This facility on 86th Street has knitted itself into the ongoing fabric of our lives. While I was skeptical of it at first I am something of a convert. As it happens, I was just there weeks ago for a Covid test before visiting my mom. While there on that occasion they introduced me to another Covid-testing patient, Patti Butler, who is the same age as me – a sister from another mister indeed. The fact that we where there at the same time caused the staff some confusion and after straightening it out they made introductions. Patti is a singer and has performed in our hall and we hit it off and have remained in touch.

This facility was where we started our journey when Kim had a problem with his gut which lead to the ER and surgery. (I was in a cast from foot surgery at the time – delightful.) It has seen us through food poisoning (Kim again) and post-op foot issues (me) and it is comforting to know it is there – an option before the ER and easier, with better hours than your doc. Having said that, it is a place utterly devoid of character or warmth. The fast food version of medical care. During the holidays testing lines went around the block.

Lucky for me they saw me quickly on Monday. A young man took my info at a computer in one of the rooms. I complimented on his natty rainbow clogs and black medical gloves (very super hero I told him) and we chatted until a doc came, told me the swelling was sort of crazy in my hand. After an x-ray she told me I had two broken and dislocated fingers and that with the swelling I could not wait, but had to get to the ER and see a surgeon immediately.

By now I was cold and sore all over. I went home, brought Kim up to speed, packed a book and a charger for my phone and shuffled into a cab. A temporary splint held everything in place which helped the pain and also assured the cabby that I wasn’t bleeding in his backseat. Post pandemic the ranks of cabs have thinned significantly here. I have not yet returned to Uber however, in part in sympathy with the yellow cabs.

At Lenox Hill hospital they admitted and wrist banded me up quickly and then put me in the smallest imaginable space with a closed door (I assume this is a Covid thing), where I sat and read one of my beloved Camp Fire Girls books (a few of those entries are here and here) for about an hour, which was a good distraction.

A visit with a sporty young hand surgeon, Tansar Mir, lead to to more x-rays and the extremely and memorable relocation of the fingers. I will spare you. I was re-wrapped in this puffy dressing, forbidden to remove it or get it wet and bidden to see him in four days.

When I finally got home and started to clean up I realized I had smacked my chin too (no memory of that) and a large black and blue egg had risen on my chin. The hazards of wearing a mask in the ER – none of us saw it!

Dr. Mir’s card announces that he is a doctor of plastic and reconstructive surgery. I showed up in his rather swell Park Avenue digs yesterday and the folks waiting were definitely more cosmetic than hand injury. (I later saw a fellow hand injured fellow on the way out.) When asked he told me that surgeons can either be cosmetic or orthopedic. Go figure. I will be seeing a fair amount of the good doc and his merry band of PT folks (they are in a storefront on 87th I have walked past hundreds of times) in the coming weeks and months. We never know where life is going to lead us.

Meanwhile, Kim has stepped up as always and is learning how to pull my hair back in a ponytail, tie my sneakers, cook fish fillets and generally open all containers – just for starters. It is not the first time I have had reason to reflect on the blessing of having him as my mate, but I do. I type this with one hand, hunting and pecking at a reasonable clip. (Siri or Alexa or whoever lives in my phone taunts me with offers of help, but can never seem to find what I am looking for or to actually be useful.) I am grateful for other things including, but not limited to, it being my non-dominant hand (I’m a righty), I didn’t break my wrists or my teeth.

As for me, I am taking it as a (pointed) reminder from the universe to slow down and off-load some of what I am shouldering. Fifteen months of trying to keep things afloat at work while dealing, like all of us, with the events of the world, has taken a toll. While I thought running was my solution to this, it is clearly taking me down a whole different path now.