One of my cousins recently commented on a couple of my older journal entries and reminded me of a night that left me scarred for life.

It was December 5th, 1986, and it was raining off and on. I had plans to go to the bowling alley with my friends, and Meredith and I decided to walk from her house to Rochelle’s before leaving. It was dark, but it was only a short way up Bullock Street. We didn’t even think to bring umbrellas; so naturally, while we were only halfway there, it started to pour.

We ran. I remember feeling the pounding of the pavement beneath my feet. I wore light corduroy canvas shoes; the thin soles did nothing to absorb the shock of gravity, and the canvas did nothing to keep the spattering rain from soaking through to my socks. Yet it felt good to run. I was light on my feet, a steady and athletic runner, and I could have run all night if I had to.

…until I felt an excruciating pain in the sole of my left foot as it came down on the ground. I gasped, and I think I might have made some kind of yelping sound as I faltered.

Meredith slowed, and then stopped. “What’s wrong?”

I wasn’t sure what to tell her. It felt like I’d been stabbed in the foot, and when I arched the foot a little, I felt whatever pierced the flesh pop out. “Oh, God… I think I stepped on a nail or something.”

“Oh, my God.” She helped me get steady as I tried to pull the damn thing out of my shoe with the rain pouring down on me, but the culprit seemed stuck. All I wanted to do was cry, the pain was so awful, and there I was trying vainly to remove the evil thing so I wouldn’t poke myself again.

“Help me, Meredith. I can’t get it out!” She worked at it and soon found that she had to “unscrew” it to get it loose. When I finally had that thing in my hand—it was the sharpest, meanest looking screw I ever saw—I was so upset that I threw it out into the rain before limping on to Rochelle’s house.

We were met at the door by Rochelle and her aunt, and by that time I felt so soaked to the bone that even my waterlogged shoes felt heavy. It turned out, though, that my shoes weren’t just waterlogged; my left shoe was almost completely soaked red with my blood. All I could think of then was “Damn! These are my favorite shoes!”

Rochelle’s aunt, being a nurse, made me follow her to the bathroom and take off my shoe. She cleaned and inspected my foot, asked me a few questions, and patched me up as best she could. While she was at it, she told me I could die from this and pretty much ruined the rest of that night for me.

“When was the last time you got a tetanus shot?”

“I don’t know. What’s that?”

“Well, if you haven’t had a tetanus shot, you should probably get one now. The screw could have been rusty, and you could get lockjaw.”

“Lockjaw? What’s lockjaw?”

“Well, you could die from it.”

“Oh…” The ramifications of that thought made me numb. “Does this mean I can’t go bowling?”

“I don’t know. If you’ve had a tetanus shot less than 10 years ago, you might be okay.” Then she sent us girls away to the bowling alley to have our night out, me with my red-soaked shoe included.

Needless to say, I didn’t die of lockjaw that night. Heck, I’m even able to bowl every now and then. But I still have that scar on the sole of my left foot.

Yeah, I know. I was screwed.

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