The one truly common thing between the two games is of course that you need to ice skate. On Friday night, Michael and Sam had their first ringette practice and of course neither of them had ever been on the ice before. So when I looked out and saw kids a foot shorter than them hurtling up and down and skating backwards, I worried somewhat for their egos and with Sam in particular, about how his willingness to give the game a go would fare. After all, I still remember dragging and bribing him into the basketball stadium the first time and watching him refuse to go on the court for the entire game!
I’ll let Caroline fill people in on the joy that she’s had chasing down the equipment that you need for the game, because she’s had a heap of fun trying to avoid spending hundreds of dollars when the stuff may not be used for long. Basically, you need all the same padding as ice hockey. Which meant that for the first half hour, we waited patiently whilst Michael and Sam got padded up with some assistance from a couple of ladies and their kids who had people on the ice already.
It was very cute to see a young girl of about Sam’s age enthusiastically helping him to put on elbow pads and helmets and things. Of course, whilst appreciating the help, I don’t think he was at all interested in any further sort of friendship there!
Finally though, they carefully made their way down the stairs to the ice. Michael was the first one out, hanging desperately to the side of the rink and the guy that was helping him. Sam ventured out even more tentatively to give it a go as well. The sticks were very quickly discarded in favour of simply trying not to end up on one’s arse.
Michael was of course the one more willing to try and Sam to his credit had a bit of a go, but seems to have some balance issues. After a couple of minutes he came off the ice and sat and I was worried that his entire ice skating career would end right then and there. But to his credit and my enormous relief, he was talking about having another go when he’d had a rest.
Michael decided to come off for a rest as well. He came back through the gate in the rink and the woman helping us closed it behind him. It was at that point that we heard Thomas cry out and realised that he’d managed to get his thumb caught and crushed in the hinge side of the gate! It was quickly opened again, but it was at that point that the blood started flowing. He had a cut about a cm long down vertically down the pad of his left thumb.
A quick and desperate search for medical aid and ice (ironic how hard it can be to find ice at an ice rink) ensued. I ended up out the back of the rink with the rink attendant getting a bag of ‘snow’ from where it had been dumped by the zamboni whilst someone inside had managed to find an icepack. (The attendant told me that they’d been cleaned out the day before when someone broke their ankle ...(ouch?!)).
I quickly took Thomas to the car and left Caroline with the other three at the ice rink as we dashed off to the Fort McMurray hospital.
Thomas was super brave. Once over the initial cry, the next most upset he got was when he was talking about his trip to the Port Lincoln hospital in the ambulance and how he’d been given a bear. The tears really started to flow when he realised that he didn’t know where the bear was! The poor little guy was devastated at the thought.
We managed to get to the hospital without doing anything silly in the car, though it was a tough trip for me, torn between wanting to get there as fast as I possibly could and sticking within the law of the road whilst Thomas casually bled in the back seat.
The first stop was triage. We were quickly directed to the registration desk where the fun started with getting entered into the computer system. I bit my tongue and answered the questions, noting the 25 people already sitting in the waiting room. It was about 7:50pm.
“No I don’t have a health care card, its still being processed.”
“Yes, I am from Australia, but I am on a work permit and living here”
“I’ll have to pay by credit card.”
“I realise the doctor may prefer cash, but I simply don’t have any and have to pay by credit card.”
As we went through this, I pulled the ice pack off Thomas’ thumb to see how he was going. There was still plenty of blood seeping from the wound and he was quite red down to his wrist, but it had slowed significantly. Of course, all we’d had to put on the wound at the rink was a band aid and an ice pack (and this was clearly a cut that would require stitching) so I asked if they might have something more appropriate to dress the wound with. A nurse walked past at this point and the wonder of a blood stained child came to the fore. Suddenly the registrant was told the rest could wait and we were whisked away to x-ray to see if there was any further damage from the crush.
After some quick x-rays we were taken through the waiting room (no doubt being cursed by everyone there at getting treated so quickly) and beyond the magic door to wait in the treating area.
And we waited.
Caroline showed up with Michael, Sam and Emily. Emily was very cute with her concern for her brother, asking every now and then, “Are you okay Thomas?” concern etched into every feature.
We debated whether Caroline should take the kids home and I catch a taxi with Thomas, but decide to see how things panned out for a bit. Michael went to the car and picked up his portable DVD player which entertained the four of them.
At some point a nurse came in and we thought we were getting close to being seen.
Vending machines were raided to provide a little sustenance as we continued to wait.
Caroline went out with the other three to get some dinner which ended up consisting of Wendy’s on the front step of the hospital.
We waited some.
At some point in time Caroline asked about timing and we found out that there was only one doctor on duty. Ouch.
At about 10pm (though it could have been a little later), a nurse came in and told Thomas that she would put some numbing stuff on the wound to prepare it for stitches so that he didn’t have to have a needle which was something of a relief.
Then of course, happy that things were happening, we waited some more.
At about 11pm we were asked to move rooms and were taken to a room clearly set up for minor procedures such as thumb repairs. At last it looked like we were going to reach the place we needed to. So we waited. And of course as we waited, I wondered about the fact that the bit of numbing stuff that been put on had been put on something like an hour ago. I wondered just how effective the external application of it would be.
Finally, some time after 11pm we saw the doctor for the first time. He apologised for the wait and then quickly disappeared. He returned again about 15 minutes later, ready to go to work. The first thing that he did was pinch Thomas’ thumb with a pair of tweezers to see if Tom could feel it. He said that he could. He did it in a couple of places around the wound and Thomas felt all of them. Then he pinched air where Tom couldn’t see and asked Thomas if he could feel that.
Thomas laughed for the first time in several hours, saying,”No, you didn’t even touch me!” Very perceptive and amusing, but of course it also meant that the numbing agent had been pointless.
So the doctor picked up a needle.
Enter Michael the Useful.
As the needle was picked up, Michael takes one look and exclaims, “Woah!” And takes a backward step, which of course does just so much wonderful stuff towards reassuring Thomas, who was about to have it stuck in himself about how painless the anaesthetic might be. I moved Michael out the way and the needle went into Thomas. I felt for the poor little bugger. He’d been so brave all night, but that was too much and the tears escaped. Though it must be said, he was still as controlled as he could be, which considering how much sleep he’d had and the time of day was amazing.
Then came the stiches. Emily of course was fascinated as the doctor started to put a stitch in Thomas’ thumb. But only for the first one. I think the whole bloody wound and needle in my brother was a bit much for her then, so she sat down quietly.
But four neat little stitches in one by now, bruised and swollen little boy’s thumb and we were done.
And at 11:55pm, we all walked out of the hospital, simply glad to have Thomas back in one piece. Even if he is tied together with string.
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