Walk, don't run

I used to love water parks. A new one had opened in Singapore, “The Big Splash”. In my 6-year-old memory, the water slides tower to the heavens, a rainbow of graceful plastic slides majestically curving down to a myriad of pools. Tide pools, wave pools, hot pools, the people squealing with delight as the air rushed by their faces as they zoomed to the waters embrace at the bottom of the ride.

Well, I had never seen anything so amazing in all my life. To top this off, there were official “slushies” being sold throughout the park. Back in New Zealand there wasn’t (at the time) anything so wonderful as crushed frozen ice blended with syrup by the fine people from coca cola - this was quite possibly the worlds perfect beverage – to a 6 year old. If memory serves, I’d been told not to run, but the sun, the water, the prospect of slushies had all gone to my head that day.

My father had promised both my brother and me a slushy, Jason, my brother was off doing something cool that 8 year olds do that 6 year olds can’t possibly fathom. Apparently at 8 you had an image that your younger brother would ruin. I was sure I’d seen him in the wave pool, and my father said that once we found Jason we could have that slushy.

Well, off I went, sprinting as fast as my 6-year-old legs would take me. When you see those signs by the side of the pool saying don’t run, believe them. As I was steaming along the immaculately kept grass inset with round paving stones I lost my footing, fell and cracked my right knee open.

I was carried to 1st aid where my father joined me with my very annoyed brother. (This was always my brothers reaction whenever I was sick or injured - severe annoyance, as though I'd done it on purpose just to irritate him. I broke my arm once when I was roller skating with him and a neighbor, he made me sit at the side of the rink until they were done skating rather than call my mother to come pick us up early.) I remember sobbing “I don’t want a slushy anymore.” Even in the midst of pain, with a crimson tide streaming from my knee that slushy was still on my mind.

The medic informed my father that I needed to go to hospital for stitches. My father never handles the sight of blood well, and being naturally pale he turns almost translucent, as his blood, firmly enclosed in his body, rushes from all his extremities giving him a pale glow.

He’d made friends with a taxi driver, Rasu, in Singapore, and as it was rush hour he called Rasu to pick us up. This was apparently going to be a lot quicker than going by ambulance, what with it being the Singapore rush hour and all.

Anyway, we arrived at the hospital, and after the nurses had made sure it wasn’t my Dad that needed treatment but rather me, I was whisked away into the operating room. I was given a local anesthetic around my knee as the doctors put things to right and sewed me up.

Now, the thing that remains clearest in my mind is the nurse holding my hand turning to me and saying “Be a brave boy, you like superheroes don’t you? If it hurts just yell out the name of your favorite superhero!” Then she yelled “Superman!” really loudly to demonstrate that it was quite ok to yell in the OR, and maybe to show that the yell wouldn’t affect the surgeon at all.

Even at 6 I had some sense of propriety, and I began to laugh really hard as all I could think was that I was NOT going to yell “Wonder Woman” in the middle of the OR.