My sister's head

I've always been the clumsy child within our close extended family. I stub me toes all the time. I get my foot caught in my own pyjamas when I'm wearing them. I still trip over cracks on the pavement. It's embarrassing too. Especially when it happens in public. I still remember my little tumble in front of school a couple of years ago. The Girl Who Took Care Of Me In Highschool and Brainiac Boy had to pick me up and set me on my feet. And I got a run in my new tights. When I was little my family had a nickname for me, 'pulthadiki' which translates in English as 'she who stumbles over grass'. Yes, there have been incidents when foot comes into contact with an unfortunate blade of grass and down down...humpty dumpty had a great fall.

Of course, these should have resulted in some horrific accidents but it didn't. I've never had a broken bone or had to get stitches. While a few falls result in minor scrapes, most of these tumble-stumbles result in my guardian angels helping me regain balance before I make contact with the ground. So without the grace of God, I would have been the Late Prisy a long long time ago.

But it's different for my sister, The Old Hag. She's usually poised and very unclumsy but she's been rushed to the ER more than once for cracking her head.

The first time was in Madurai, when she was three. I would have been around six at the time and Old Yeller would have been four. We were playing in the bedroom. It was a really stupid game consisting of me and Old Yeller holding opposite ends of a bedsheet and The Old Hag holding the middle and all of us running around in a circle around the room. Then all of us tumbled and fell. My brother and I were up again, laughing, but Old Hag was wailing. We tried to colm her down until we saw droplets of red on the ground. Mummeeeeeee!!!!!!

Mum rushed her to the hospital and The Old Hag came back with some stitches on her forehead.

The next accident was around a year later. Now there were these nice people who lived in a big house across the street. We were acquainted with them because their dogs were related to my uncle's dogs by marriage. There was also a pretty little three year old girl living there who became fast friends with the Old Hag. One day her Mum invited us to come over. Old Yeller and I immensely enjoyed the visit especially because they had cable TV. The Old Hag sat in the living room and played with The Pretty Little Girl Across The Street. I don't know what my sister did but somehow The Pretty Little Girl Across The Street got angry with her. She picked up a hard toy and hit my sister on the head. It must have hurt because The Old Hag had this really priceless expression on her face. A mildly surprised, moderately furious and extremely disgusted expression.

But before I could laugh, The Pretty Little Girl's older brother suddenly yelled out, "Ma, she's bleeding."

The Old Hag heard that one mention of blood and spontaneously burst into tears. Mum was called to take The Old Hag to the ER for more stitches and The Pretty Little Girl Across The Street came by later that evening with her Mummy to say sorry.

The third notable incident happened when The Old Hag was nearly ten and we were living in a flat. I remember that it was around December and that it was a Saturday evening. We had just finished Saturday Class which was a small weekly Bible lesson Mum had every Saturday for us, our friends and some children from the slums. The lesson had been on Creation and now that everything was finished, I was sitting alone in the living room drawing a picture of the Garden of Eden. The house was very quiet; Mum had stepped out to have a chat with our neighbours who lived on the same floor of our apartment building. Papa wasn't home from work. Our cook must have gone home by then. Old Yeller and The Old Hag were in the kids' bedroom with our eight year old neighbour, The Kid Next Door (this child deserves a whole post on him which I shall write one day).

I was enjoying my solitude when suddenly Old Yeller rushed The Old Hag out of the bedroom and into the bathroom. The Kid Next Door followed looking frightened. I can hardly remember this part except there was blood, panic and me and The Kid Next Door rushing to the neighbours' for both our mothers.

So this was what happened. The Three Amigos, my brother, sister and their pal were playing Dark Room in our bedroom. Dark Room is a lot like 'Kikeri' in What Katy Did. It's just Hide-And-Seek in the dark. And, oh, so much fun. It was Old Yeller's turn to be the 'It' or the seeker or whatever you call it. My genius sister found an ingenious place to hide. She climbed and sat on top of our tall bookshelf.....and got found out. Now it was her turn to be 'It' and she therefore she needed to get down from her hiding place. But Madam, being to lazy, decided to JUMP down rather than climb down. She figured that with enough care she would fall safely on the bed in the middle of the room. But she forgot to take into account our ceiling fan....which was running...on high speed!

So she jumped and----BANG! Her head came into contact with the blades from the fan.

So Mum took her to the ER and she got some new stitches. The Kid Next Door's eldest sister made special iced coffee with ice cream, specially for her. She even sang in the Church Choir the week after, wearing a huge bandage around her head which made her injury look more serious than it was.

The Old Hag was really lucky. Her injury wasn't serious at all. It was only a small cut to the side of her head. She could have easily lost an eye, a ear or suffered a brain injury.

Like the Psalmist said,

For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways.
On their hands they will bear you up,
lest you strike your foot against a stone.
(Psalm 91: 11,12)

The fan was irreparable and had to get replaced, though.

And needless to say (but I'll say it anyway), like 'Kikeri' in What Katy Did, Dark Room was banned in our house (and the entire apartment building).