For three very dark minutes this morning, I thought that life, as I know it, had come to an end. Foraging the bathroom closet for Bandaids, I found only empty box heaped upon empty box, each taunting me like a bent syringe taunts a heroin addict. Or so I imagine.
Some people drink when they’re under pressure. Okay, so I have been known to drink simply because there’s a cold one in the fridge and it would be a shame not to extend to it the warm hand of my fellowship. But anyway. . . Other people’s faces are where their stress can be seen, new, taut lines etching their way between frequently furrowed brows. Still others scream and yell and stomp their feet. Oh wait, I’m confusing stress with “Dancing with the Stars.”
Me? I wear Bandaids.
If you want to know how close I am to a Newspaper or Yearbook deadline, all you need to do is look at my thumbs. Wearing a Bandaid? Must be a deadline around the corner. Wearing two? Looks like the printing-press stars have aligned for both publications.
I’ve been wearing two Bandaids for about the last three weeks. This does not bode well for the Christmas Spirit. Or my students’ well being.
As a kid, I was a nail chewer. Not because I was stressed so much as because my mouth enjoyed a little activity between conversations. At one point, in fact, I could nary imagine a world without a mouthful of homemade half-moon shaped keratin kibbles inhabiting it. Eventually, though, my exquisitely developed palate moved beyond my taste for keratin.
And so, I became a cheek chewer. Of all my oral fascinations, this proved to be the most troublesome of habits. No one likes to talk with someone whose fist is jammed in the side of her face, incisors feverishly working the soft flesh inside. And, frankly, I can’t imagine it did much for my breath, either.
Now, though, I’ve settled into a dependable pattern of chewing my thumbs. Not sucking them, mind you. No, I’ve never been that weak of spirit. Nay, I just fiddle with the dangling participles of skin that embrace my thumbnails.
I tried other fingers but found their flavor to be a little too oaky with an unpleasant tannic finish. And so, the thumbs have it—as in my utmost attention, come deadline time.
As I type this, my decimated digits are snug in their newest garb, the dependable if a bit too noticeable Bandaid classic—the ½” sheer. True, I’ve grown partial to the ½’ Clear, but, alas, they are nowhere to be found this morning.
Sometimes, one’s will is put to the test. Looks like this is one of those times.
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