Working wounds

I SLASHED my arm with a chisel this week at college. It was a bleeder! It took two, yes 2 plaster to cover it. It's my first proper tool related injury and without sounding to proud it was a goody.

It's amazing how whenever you show off a wound almost everyone (every men) have even better scars and wound stories than you do.

The "oh that's nothing" and "check this one out" stun me! I've had a mixture this week of real horror stories. From the mates of mates to them themselves my poxy chisel wound gash is an ants piss in the ocean. I heard someone lost the entire underside of their hand in a big planing machine. A nutter who had all his fingers cut off with a band saw and due to the lack of medical expertise at the time couldn't have them sawn back on so kept them on their work bench. (God knows how he managed to carry on with his job, mental note - ask how he carried on with his job). Then there were ripping off of finger nails and tips. And the efficient sanding down to the bear bone stories.

The one aspect of a good old cut is that it makes me remember that I'm just skin and muscle and sinew and blood and bone and fat. When the first Autopsy programme was on the box last year I had a real revulsion at the thought of seeing a body being cut up.
I don't have any moral problem with this kind of programme being on the TV. I never have any problem with anything on the box, you've got control of what you watch, but for me Professor Gunther von Hagens the creepy German human butcher and dead people being cut up made me feel a little sick.

However when the new series came on a few weeks ago I felt a little compelled to watch it. I seemed to forget what the programme would entail and sat there in anticipation ready to watch my first autopsy.
There were introductions and everything was keep completely scientific and clinical, everything was explained. But when this 90 year old woman was wheeled out and exposed all ridged and grey everything I'd forgotten to remember flooded back. I've never seen a real dead body. I find the whole thought of seeing one quite upsetting. I've never had any inclination to see the bodies of relatives who have died and when this body came onto the screen and the first incision was made my brain shorted. I got as far as the subcutaneous fat and I had to turn over.

I'm sure I'll never watch or attempt to watch an autopsy again, 10 minutes was more that I could handle. I realise that the body is just meat and it gives me a respect for doctors and surgeons how they seemingly have this ability to look at a body as an object to fix.

The way my chisel went into me like a knife through chicken may well have taught me to be a little more careful in the future. I'll make a promise not to jigsaw a finger off or bash a nail into myself. And Jeez you better believe there's no f*cking chance my bodies going to medical research!