Four Hours at the ER

Recently, The Roomie told me about an incident that occurred during their 4th of July trip to the lake. They had put their inflatable swimming island in the water just before a summer storm came up. A wind gust blew the island out of the water, and it flew up, struck The Roomie and knocked her into their boat, cutting a gash under her eye which necessitated a trip to the ER. She’s okay, but she spent four hours there waiting to get seven stitches.

Speaking of four hours at the ER, this reminded me of the day a couple of years ago when DH came out of the woodworking shop and said those eight words you never want to hear, “We need to go to the emergency room.” DH is a dentist who also plays classical flute, and he had sliced off the tip of an index finger while using a power saw. Of course, at this point I'm thinking, "nerve damage?"

We jumped into the car, but, instead of heading to the hospital nearest our home, we made the rookie mistake of going to the “emergency room of the day.” It was a Friday night, and we arrived at about 10 PM. It was pretty crowded with folks suffering from various illnesses, and by the time the triage nurse called DH in, I think he was over the worst of the pain. "Describe your pain from a one to a ten," she said. He replied, "If I tell you it's a ten, will I get out of here any faster?" Back out to the waiting room he went.

Four hours later, he had a few stitches, a $50 bandage, and an index finger that was slightly shorter than it had been before the evening’s woodworking festivities.

Two days after that, he was looking at power tools online and queried, “Do you think I should get a StopSaw so I don’t have to worry about cutting off a finger anymore?” I replied, “I’ll go get the checkbook.”