Barefoot

Throughout most of my childhood, whenever possible I was barefoot. Shoes, in my opinion, were totally unnecessary and got in the way of developing the proper amount of hardened callous which would render my feet impenetrable to all sorts of assault. Due in a large part to this perspective, my feet were often recovering from various misfortunes.

Once when playing softball I managed to land barefoot onto a sharp stick and drove a piece of it several inches into the arch of my foot. This was a rather magnificent injury in that there was a large amount of blood and it happened in front of my cousins and my sister. This meant there was an appreciative audience and my sister, who previously in softball had pitched one straight into my eye and told me it was my fault for not ducking, actually tried to carry me inside. The drama was quite satisfying even though there was also quite a bit of pain. My sister couldn't carry me because, although I weighed slightly more than a paper bag, she was not in any way athletic. Still, it was admirable that she even would try considering how much she detested my presence most of the time. When she gave up on trying to carry me, she helped me hobble into my aunt's house where my mother and aunt had been enjoying a few minutes of adult-themed leisure.

Now my mother hated blood and even went so far as to yell at my sister and I "Don't bleed on the carpet!" when we would come home after various mishaps. My aunt's house didn't even have carpet except for one room and that was deep burgundy red probably chosen no doubt for its blood hiding capabilities. My aunt had three kids all prone to nose bleeds, so she was immune to blood-induced anxiety. She was also very matter-of-fact about injuries. Between the two of them, I was in queasy and capable hands. First, they put me up on the kitchen counter and soaked my foot in running water. My mother blanched from it all, but my punctured foot seemed to fascinate my aunt. She was saying things like "Look, here is another piece of it." as she would squeeze the wound to try and dislodge the stick that was jammed inside. After a few rounds of this, I wanted no more and luckily my mother also was getting more pale with each of my aunt's forays. It was decided that the stick would just work its way out.

Now in the perfect families of TV land, I would have been rushed to the doctor. In the reality of my world, we seldom went to the doctor. Perhaps it was the distance because we lived miles from civilized life, or maybe this was some offshoot of survival-of-the-fittest mentality. Whatever it was it meant that we received a sort of 'field dressing' to most wounds and were told to be on the lookout for any red lines, the sign of blood poisoning, running up from any injuries.

I had been the victim of blood poisoning before, also caused by being barefoot, but that time it was from walking over oyster shells while wade fishing. The bottoms of my feet had been cut up but within a couple of days, there was a red line going from my foot into my lower leg. This had brought about a visit to the doctor's office. Our doctor, a gray-haired woman of German origins had given me some antibiotics and told my mother to keep my foot wrapped in wet washcloths until the infection went away. This meant I had to wear a plastic bag around my foot and soak my foot several times per day, but it worked and I survived.

My mother decided to use the wet towel method on my stick punctured foot. Sure enough, within several days the rest of the stick eventually worked its way out of my foot. As it healed this injury left a very impressive scar and I always used to love the visceral reactions others would have as I showed it to them. "This is where the stick went into my foot," I would casually remark, and nine times out of ten the person I was showing would shudder.

My worst barefoot-related injury came from an attempt to wear shoes. At least that was the way I choose to remember it. My cousin and I were playing in my uncle's woodshop. His shop was a rather large building next door to his house which meant it was across the street from my house. My aunt, my mother, and a lady from down the lane all worked as carpenters in the shop. There were many different types of equipment from drill presses to band saws to table saws, and scraps of lumber all around. Everything was coated with sawdust. There were always staples and nails on the floor which were often obscured by a heavy layer of sawdust. It would be hard to imagine a worse place for anyone to go barefoot. So of course I was barefoot in the shop.

Usually, my mother was very accepting of my shoeless condition. I am sure she would have rather me wear shoes, but she also probably would have rather I acted more like a girl-child and less like the free-range feral child that I was. If she had her way I would wear dresses and have combed hair and take an interest in personal hygiene. As it was she had to choose her battles, so she settled for demanding dresses only for special occasions, and even then I got to wear shorts underneath. She made me comb my hair only for these special occasions and school, also. The hygiene we fought over and she insisted I take a nightly bath and would check to make sure I hadn't just pretended to get in the tub. Running barefoot she took for granted except in one instance. I was never to go into the woodshop without shoes. Never. Ever.

So, there I was in the shop barefoot and I was aware of my infraction. I had even gone as far as to bring my shoes with me, but before I put them on I was distracted by my cousin and lured into the shop. Midway through looking at something particularly captivating the door opened and my mother and aunt entered the shop. Their arrival reminded me of my barefooted condition.

I sprang into action and quickly sprinted toward the back of the shop where my shoes lay untended but about halfway there my left foot collided with a sheetrock cutter. Now for those of you who have never seen one of these, imagine a five-inch curved blade, almost C-shaped, attached to a handle. The handle of the blade was trapped under a couple of pieces of sheetrock until my foot collided with the blade. The blade caught me between my little toe and ring toe and sliced in deeply. My forward momentum took me past the contact point and although I knew something very bad had just happened my first instinct was to run away.

On an adrenalin surge I ran out of the shop around the back of my cousin's house and then climbed a tree in his front yard before I paused to survey the damage. I was hoping it was just a scratch and something I could hide from my mother. No such luck. There was a deep slice almost to the bone which was bleeding profusely. Not only that but it was beginning to hurt in a big way. I sat up in the tree crying for a while and compressing the wound but it wouldn't stop bleeding. Finally, I realized I would have to consult my mother and this was almost more unbearable to me than the cut itself. Climbing down out of the tree was much harder now that the pain had set in and so was the long walk back to the shop. When I got to the shop I had to send my cousin to get my mother who was not at all pleased to find me wounded. All the way, from the tree to the shop, and while I waited for my mother to come, I tried to think of some way I could have gotten this injury without admitting the truth. If I could find some explanation that did not reveal the details of my shoeless in the shop portion of the incident I felt I could avoid getting into trouble. Try as I might I could think of nothing that could explain the nature and seriousness of the injury. I settled for trying to explain to her that I got injured trying to obey her. I was walking over to put on my shoes when I got hurt. She did not buy my logic and became very angry with me. I again had to endure the sink treatment by my aunt but this time with my mother radiating fury at me. I was bandaged and given very little sympathy and even my cousins were told not to sympathize with me seeing as how I was the cause of my misfortune.

The lack of sympathy rankled me more than just about anything. Here I was with a magnificent injury that was sure to leave a legendary scar and I was not allowed to talk about it. Every time I mentioned feeling pain I was told "That's what you get for going barefoot". I think she thought this would be an excellent 'life lesson' for me and after this, I would wear shoes. No such luck. After the wound healed I was as shoeless as ever although I did learn something. From then on, when I was barefoot in the shop, I was much more careful.