blood blisters

Yesterday I slammed my finger into a file cabinet drawer, the old school metal kind with the satisfying click when the drawer closes. The click isn’t so satisfying when the tender skin of your finger is caught directly on the pointed metal corner. A blood blister formed almost immediately, though nothing bled through the skin.

When I got home, I put a band aid around my finger, more as a mental barrier than a physical one. I didn’t really need the reminder. As I stood in the kitchen making lunch, I checked the oven three times to make sure it wasn’t on. The throbbing heat of the blister felt like I was too close to a source of heat. I pulled off the band aid and ran my finger under ice cold water, held it against a bag of frozen vegetables until I got bored.

It hurt the rest of the night, turning darker and darker purple. I fell asleep on the couch for a bit, waking to a darker sky, a reminder we still aren’t through the gloom of winter, not even close. It hurt, and I felt silly for letting it bother me. It hurt, and I felt irritated for feeling silly. It hurt.

I’ll never make it through a zombie apocalypse, apparently, if this tiny thing became a big thing — and injury that didn’t even bleed. The biggest actual effect seems to be that I can’t take off my chipped nail polish, so I’m attempting to cover it with another coat. It might work to fool people from afar, but I can see the chips when I look down at my fingers.

My finger feels better today, the long purple slash fading to maroon, the pulsing heat cooled to whatever temperature fingers should be.

I had a point when I sat down to write this, and I lost it along the way. Maybe it had to do with the healing power of time. Maybe it had to do with giving myself a pass on being tough. Maybe it had to do with how much something can hurt, even below the surface.

My idea, whatever it was, faded more quickly than the blood is absorbing back into my body, and that, at least reminded me of a tangible thing I used to do. I used to always have a notebook, jotting ideas, words, or lines I wanted to use in the future. I didn’t always reference it, or when I did, some of the scribbles felt less important than they had when I wrote them. Either way, I carried a notebook, and I think it’s time to start carrying it again.