SuperNova Afterglow

Hand Injuries vs. Steel

It’s documented somewhere about my athletic pursuits. A poem about blocking a layup and resultant injury to hand in three-plus feet of elevation to hunt down the basketball Randy Snowden decried was goal-tended (against rules).

I’m goddamn Superman, alright? Chose to surround myself with kryptonite.

And, since I’m limiting myself to one newsfeed comment a day, a hilarious game of mime begins. So, purge thoughts in reaction to what I read before further musing on hand injuries…

What finger? *scrolls up*

*aware of the why* Reads to wife, wondering which notion for response illicits response and type where she hovers across the way in kitchen…

Over-use (nothing)
Old injury (nothing)
*like footballs tossed in thinktank, talks it out* not wanting to make it sexual, does the tree…no, you got anything…? Nah, attempts at humor when someone is ahead of the joke seems like piling on when you want to contribute in that vein. By tomorrow, like Biden, a story downstream.

The basketball story came to me after realizing the polar opposite, 19, just moved back home, cape at cleaners, argument with old man over who knows what, frustrated after moving in (maybe too much stuff) and haul out a heavy wood laminate end table, with poly from krypton sealing it. Wouldn’t be enough. Holding it by the top in my left hand I swung and swung again at it with my right fist. Spun that fragmenting structure until every surface exposed, after who knows how many haymakers, until smithereens on the grass.

I wasn’t done. Turned and threw my fist full into our full grown apple tree. Immediate regret. Hand stung. It was already red, yet no blood. No obvious injury or remaining pain in this adrenaline-fueled state. Abrasions and some stiffness with swelling over middle and ring fingers followed but really nothing. Yet, when you tomahawk a 29.5” diameter ball and slam your hand into a glass backboard with no gravity to support your body…a little bit worse swelling. Harder to handle and shoot a basketball the rest of that game.

My hand never got the ice or anti-inflammatory meds, let alone medical attention. Didn’t get 30 points that night…that much I know. I do remember two things: the guys who told my wife I was a ‘hot head’ in city league and how Snowden remarked once, ‘we knew we could get you riled up’. Surprised by that, not unlike the box and one defenses that I wasn’t aware of, I asked, ‘did it work?’ We had a laugh and a drink over that one.

Irony has the word iron in it. I must be steel?

7.21.24

Yeah, just caught some glimpses of this jack-assery. Needs edits...

"nailing it (unembellished) "