Well folks, the shark bite-Frankenstein hand is shot again. It’s time for my five-year overhaul, and I really wouldn’t mention it at all but it’s show season, and I feel like I should probably explain why I appear to be giving the finger to the entire world, 24/7, just in case photos surface.
Kind of hard to believe this gross old hand led to a book.My 20-year “battle of the hand” has been bittersweet. This injury is ultimately the reason I fell into such an awesome job, writing for Overdrive and traveling with my best friend and true love in the best-looking Freightliner on the road. (Hush, Troy Huddleston, I know yours is prettier, but I love ours like no other.)
Quick re-cap, for those who haven’t read the book (wink, wink). I tore the mess out of my right hand when I was pregnant with our son. Six weeks before he was due, I was cleaning windows and had a pane of glass fall into the web of my hand, between my thumb and index finger. It not only cut the you-know-what out of me, the glass shattered and went forth into my hand-guts, to rip and shred around for a while, because I refused to have it operated on until after I delivered the baby, and poor ol’ Doc “M” couldn’t get to all of it before he sewed me up.
(Side note: I am forever indebted to this man, he sewed me up and took care of me, and we still see him as our GP to this day. There is no way in hell I could walk into a family practice with a tore-open hand, pregnant out to here, bloody, sobbing and hysterical, and get taken care of in this day and age. No way. Doc “M” knew I needed him, and he did what good docs do, he took care of me. He’s a good man.)
Anyway, I’ve had the thing opened up and worked on three times since then, and not because the hand surgeon isn’t fantastic. The hand was just pretty destroyed, and each time Dr. Barre carefully pulls bits and pieces together, I bash around and break them again. Takes me about five years to forget I have a Frankenstein hand, and I do something stupid, like fight with the lid of a pickle jar until I feel the tear, and my middle finger quits doing anything but standing straight out, like it belongs there.
So before anyone gets their feelings hurt by thinking that big-mouthed broad, Wendy Parker, had the nerve to flip them off for no reason, please accept my apologies for the misunderstanding. It’s also nice to think that maybe some of the people on the highway who feel inclined to give truckers the one-fingered salute are just showing you their Frankenstein hand. It could happen.
