That weren't no funny bone!

I am visiting my adult children for Christmas.  I want to be useful and helpful, so that I get invited back again. That is how it works, right? 

I love dogs and I love to walk, so I walk the dogs.  Easy and enjoyable! Coming back from a brisk cold walk early one afternoon recently,  I decide to shovel the sidewalk in front of my daughter's house, and also do their front walk. About a half inch of light, fluffly and sparkly snow has fallen.   I know it will take me five minutes to do this little chore.

Well, I breeze through the sidewalk in five minutues, so up the front path I trot, dragging the snow scraper behind me, prepared to turn around and shovel the snow away in one quick, fell swoop, down to the sidewalk.  The pathway is quite short.

Well, I went W-A-Y, W-A-Y  too fast.  The cement path slabs were NOT even, nor was the scraper handle level with my lower abdomen, to give me strength.  Nope!  I hit the very uneven last slab HARD! It was like hitting a brick wall with your fist.  Only it wasn't my fist. It was my lower pelvic area.  It hurt... hurt...HURT!  I immediately thought, "OMG, I have cracked my pubic bone!"

Well, I made it into the house without CRAWLING on all fours, so I figured I was going to be okay.  However, I needed to do something about the pain, and quickly. My cell phone rang and it was my mother calling.  So of course I take the call, all the while taking off my coat and boots, mitts, and boots, thinking, "I need ice FAST", and trying to keep up my end of the conversation.  I manage to chat, though not as long as my mother would have liked, I am sure. I hang up and tell my son-in-law, "Quick, I need an ice pack! I hurt myself shoveling".  As he is rummaging around in the freezer, I think "A bag of frozen peas is NOT going to cut it here!".  He hands me a freezer pack, and yells out to me in a concerned voice as I scoot up the stairs, "Did you fall?".  "No", I yell back as I close the guest room door, throw myself on the bed, pull off my pants and long underwear, and slide a 5 inch by 7 inch ice pack between my legs. Lying there for twenty minutes, I have plenty of time to figure out that I don't know how to use a snow scraper properly.

I ended up with freezer burn on my inner thighs, and a very bruised pelvic area.  Not that I have taken a look, mind you.  It has been four days and it STILL hurts when I sit down or apply any pressure.

So another lesson learned by this Boomer. DO NOT, and I repeat, DO NOT use your pelvic area as a brace for your handle, when scraping snow off your sidewalk or front path. It is far better to feel like you have been sucker punched in the stomach or lower abdomen, than to feel like you have broken or cracked one of the more strategic and important bones in your body. Fais toujours attention à la bizoune, comme qu'on dit en Acadie.