I've fallen, but I'm back up again!

Brace yourselves. The pictures you're about to see are quite graphic!

I woke up as normal. My alarm going off at 4:30am, a pleasantly soft and rising tone that eventually turns into a full orchestra blast unless I turn it off. Ten minutes later I got out of bed and proceeded with getting my ration of fluids and taking care of toilet issues. At 5:04am precisely, I was heading out of the apartment into the still dark night.

It was dark, drizzling, but I had my wind-breaker jacket on and even though it was a bit cool, I was comfortable. In my ears, Aretha Franklin was cranking out Jump! Jump! Jump! to it!

In 3 minutes I had reached Eglinton by which time my legs were fully awake, my body bouncing along lightly, and I felt like a god!

I always enjoy that first stretch along Eglinton. It's flat with a slightly downward incline once you cross the intersection at Martin Grove road. This is certainly the best way to wake up the body, at least for me, that early in the morning. The hills will come later. I continued to cruise along Eglinton, not paying attention to anything in particular, listening to my music and keeping my steps light and short, bouncing on my forefoot. Under the 427 highway and now going uphill towards Renforth Avenue where I made a left turn onto Renforth heading south toward Burnhamthorpe Road. It was possibly around 5:30am at this point. But Renforth is nice and quiet. There's enough light from the streetlights that it's easy to see where you're going. And the gentle curves left and right and left and right so that it's not a boring straight path. And it's all downhill with a slight rise as you get towards Burnhamthorpe Road.

Burnhamthorpe is a busy road and after the peace and quiet of Renforth my meditative state was disrupted. I had to pay attention to cars and the occasional person. Burnhamthorpe also runs over highway 427, a bridge, unlike Eglinton which goes under the 427, and so I have to run on the bridge over the speeding cars below. The 4-foot sidewalk is now just the side of the bridge, next to a railing with a long drop to the highway below. I hate looking down at the fast moving traffic going in the opposite direction it makes me feel unbalanced. The same feeling you'd get if you were spinning around on the spot, around and around and around, with your eyes closed and then you stopped and opened them.

It must have been about 5:45, or anyway a little before 6:00, leaving Burnhamthorpe road I turned left on Martin Grove heading now north as though back towards Eglinton. I like this stretch of Martin Grove. Its residential, old residential, with nice looking homes and large trees. Very quaint. Very quiet. At that time in the morning you really can't see the homes, but it's good to be in silence again.

Martin Grove at this time in the morning was indeed very very dark. The sun hadn't risen yet. Martin Grove is lined with old mature trees. Big trees. Tall trees. So the sidewalk was difficult to see in places. The street lights don't penetrate to light up the sidewalk. In some places, I could only faintly make out the sidewalk. It is an uphill run from Burnhamthorpe but even close to an hour of running I still felt normal. As I got closer to the top of the rise I noticed a couple of people ahead walking their dogs.

They're walking away from me.

Not a problem, this isn't new. I see people walking their dogs early in the morning from time to time, especially around Martin Grove, Islington and Kingsway.

If they're walking away from me, in the same direction that I'm running, I step onto the main road, leaving the sidewalk. This is so that I don't startle them as I pass them. It's also because in nearly all cases, the dogs are scampering about in front of them, on a long, long, long leash. I've found that dog owners are selfish this way. A sidewalk is barely capable of allowing three people to walk comfortably side by side, let alone two people passing each other in opposite directions trying to avoid bumping into each other, but dog owners believe, have strong convictions, that they alone in the universe own any sidewalk, or space for that matter, that they find themselves in. So in most cases, the dog's owner is normally well behind, either smoking, or talking on a cell phone, with dog scampering about at the end of a leash that's a mile long.

If I pass by the walker, startle him, or her, I'm then between the walker and the dog. And dog's get excited when they see you running. It's a call to play for them. But they're also especially protective of their owners, and if they see their owner startled, or the least bit frightened, they move into attack mode.

So I've made it a habit to step onto the road to pass any dog and their walkers, especially when its early in the morning. If they have their backs to me. On the other hand, if they're walking towards me they'll see me coming, I'll look at them, they'll look at me, and if I see them pull the leash to control their dog, then I might stay on the sidewalk. Sometimes they might just continue staring at me, in which case I'll point out that obvious rudeness by stepping off the sidewalk onto the road. Sometimes I make a point of running right in the middle of the road and looking over nervously at the dog. I've had a few run-ins with dogs so I don't take any chances.

Back to the story.

There I am, running up Martin Grove. I see the couple, and dogs and they can't see me. It's dark. I can barely make out the sidewalk so its time to leave the sidewalk and run on the road. It's going to be perfectly safe, there are no cars on the road and I'll be under the street lights instead of running in the dark. All positive advantages.

As I'm passing a house on my left, I decide to run down its driveway to my right which slopes nicely to the road. But I step to the right a little too early and my foot trips on something, possibly the edge of the driveway where it meets the lawn. It takes less than a second to fly face down to the ground. My hands don't even have time to react and I land on my left side. My face hits the ground somewhere above my left eye and I feel the asphalt, almost taste it. My left hand is still facing inwards so my knuckles also hit asphalt. My right hand slides forward to control the fall, too late.

My right knee takes most of the hit. I don't know how that happens because I mostly fall on my left side. My left leg lands well, straight.

 

But I pick myself up quickly, take inventory and start running again, slowly. I find it difficult to breathe because my left hand landed under my ribs and they're sore. It's difficult taking deep breaths, so I take short, shallow breaths. Each time I breathe deeply, it hurts and so I sip the air. I contemplate walking but I'm too far from home. At Rathburn Road I turn right, heading towards Kipling, which I pass and on to Islington. It's about 2 or 2.5 K from where I fell till I get to Islington, and by that time my right knee has stopped really hurting. Thoughts of stopping and walking have subsided so I feel mentally relaxed again. I'm able to complete my morning run.

I manage to run all the way home, and that's when I see the damage that was done. My right leg is bleeding all the way down into my socks. That looks like a lot of blood but surprisingly I don't feel too much pain. I stretch my knee and it feels sore, but not broken. My kneecap feels OK. That would have been a worry, any leg injury would be a worry to a runner. I have to wash my clothes then shower have a quick bite and head into work. After my shower, trying my best to wash my knee I notice that there are two especially deep cuts, holes, in my knee. They continue to drip blood.

I bandage the wound because it won't stop bleeding. By the time I get to work, the bandage that I put on is soaked through and there's a patch of blood on my jeans near the knee.

 
I change the dressing in our wellness room at work. It also gets bloody in less than 30 minutes.

 
By 10:00am I decide the best thing to do is remove the bandage and air the wound. So I roll up my jeans, remove the dressing and allow the wound to have some air. Blood is still coming out from the lower part of the knee. There's an especially deep hole in one of those wounds. It's dripping slowly. I use napkins to keep wiping the blood that's dripping down my leg. By noon I'm getting a bit worried. The wound hasn't dried up. It's getting harder to walk. I'm lucky that the only meetings I have are in my office so nobody can see under my desk where my jeans are still rolled up to my thigh.

 
By 3:00pm I've made up my mind to go to the walk-in clinic after work. I decide to go to the one at Richview near my apartment. I get there after work, close to 7:00pm. Once again the dressing I put on just before I left work bled through. After a relatively short wait, short for a clinic or any type of hospital, the doctor comes and sees me. He asks a few questions, puts on a glove and gingerly touches the knee, asks me if I think I need x-rays, if I think I've broken anything. I answer in the negative. I don't think anything is broken. He finally gives his recommendation, or prescription, which seems fairly obvious. Just keep cleaning the wound, keep applying Polysporin to help healing, changing dressings. If things don't look any better in a couple of days, return and see him. He also advises that I should take a tetanus shot, a booster he calls it. He then walks out saying that the nurse would be there to clean the wound for me and give me the booster.

The nurse is extremely gentle as she cleans my wound. Applying almost no pressure just soaking a piece of gauze in antiseptic and laying it on the wound. Not scrubbing at all. She uses long q-tips to apply generous amounts of a gel on the wound. I'm assuming that was Polysporin. And finally does a professional job bandaging my knee. She then does the same for my knuckles.

I'm still worried about the upcoming booster shot. Needles are not my favourite and I have particular memory of a vaccine that I received at Kenyatta Hospital in Kenya a long time ago. I must have been close to 12 years old but the pain I felt still reverberates 37 years later. Like the big bang that created the universe. The nurse prepared the needle, it looked small, non-threatening. I tried to laugh, joke about the pain factor, nervous. She asks me which arm I'd like it on. I say my right arm. I ask her if it will hurt. She tells me that the pain goes away in a couple of days. She then asks me which hand I write with. I tell her that I use my right hand. She says that perhaps we should inject the left arm. My brain wonders what kind of pain wouldn't allow me to keep writing. I don't tell her that I use both arms since I mostly type these days. I take my left arm out of my shirt. She proceeds cleaning a spot on my upper arm, takes the syringe, grabs my arm and after taking a few breaths (she takes the breaths since I'm holding mine) says, "here it is!"

The needle's a non-event. I feel nothing. Other than a tiny pin prick, there's no pain at all. I've felt more pain sneezing, and there's much more pain still on my left side when I breathe.

It's been at least 5 hours and I still don't feel any pain in my left arm. Perhaps tomorrow.