Poems

No Jumping!

45 Comments

Today’s post comes from Bathtub Safety Officer Rafferty.

At ease, civilians!

Keep your feet on the ground and you’ll be fine, unless you’re standing over some kind of a sinkhole. I’m here to tell you about a public safety menace currently making the rounds – namely the cavalier public discussion about, and reviewing of, Sunday’s vivid basketball injury to Louisville’s Kevin Ware.

If you operate a TV station or cable channel that is constantly re-running this footage, shame on you! If you are someone who has been describing this injury in gruesome detail to people who didn’t see it, shush. And if you haven’t heard anything at all about it all, please, never mind.

In all my years as a professional alarmist I have worked hard to unsettle audiences everywhere by sharing explicit injuries using full-color photos, close-up videos and the most powerful tool of all, words. But I’ve never seen anything like this. Ware’s tibial twist threatens to make jumping the new smoking. And it has sent people into their respective camps.

I have learned that there are really only two different kinds of people – The Squeamish, and Everybody Else. One type is nearly incapacitated by the mere thought of a traumatic injury. The other type shrugs.

If you are a Squeamling, you know how little of someone else’s pain is required to send you into the full fetal position. If you are a Shrugger, really – you couldn’t care less. But I still want you to stop jumping, so I’ve made up a little poem to help you remember.

Be careful when leaping
Stay low when you soar
Go up just enough,
not a quarter inch more.

Between you and the ground
do not put too much room.
your leg bones are not
as tough as you assume.

So be frugal when launching
yourself into the air.
Because when you return,
you don’t want to be Ware.

Yours in compulsive, marginally irrational caution,
Bathtub Safety Officer Rafferty

Are you squeamish, or are you a shrugger?

45 thoughts on “No Jumping!”

  1. Good morning. Squeamish, at least sometimes. I first realized that I was that way when I nearly fainted in a college class where we were getting blood from the ears of rabbits. The rabbits had been injected with a plant virus to produce anti-bodies to use to test for the virus. To get blood from the rabbit we had to use a razor blade to make a cut in the rabbits ear and collect some blood from the cut. This caused me to almost faint before leaving the room. I also nearly fainted watching my brother-in-law cut into a dog he was operating on in his vet clinic.

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  2. Rise and Shine Baboons!

    I am squeamish. As an empath I feel your pain, especially if it is a movie or TV and not real. I cry at the movies. During a wrestling meet I move with the athletes. I did not see the leg break BOSR refers to, but the footage and descriptions made me squirm Sunday.

    Happy Spring. Enjoy the sun.

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  3. I don’t know how high Ware jumped when he broke his leg because I decided not to view the video showing his accident. I am in no danger of jumping high enough to put myself at risk of having a bad accident. I was good was jumping when I was young. Now I can barely get off the ground. BOSR’s didn’t need to warn me about the of dangers jumping too high.

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    2. Depends. I do not watch replays of injuries. But blood and such do not bother me. Watched some operations at the U back in the 60’s. I could not watch them cut the skin, but after that it was fascinating. Like Jim, I have bled many a rabbit when I was a lab tech at the U. Vomit used to bother me then I had children. Then it bothered me. Then I got grandchildren. Helped butcher many a chicken, beef, and pig at a young age. Smell of rotted flesh bothers me, despite growing up in the woods. You cannot be in the woods much without coming across bodies in various states of decay. My dog was a dog, so he rolled in dead stinky animals.

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      1. I think I would be able to get blood from the ears of rabbits without feeling faint if I had to do it on a regular basis. I was surprised that my first experience at doing this made me light headed. It might take some time for me to over come my negative reaction to this kind of thing.

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  4. Morning. I’m not too squeamish; I’ve helped with surgery on cows and dealt with a lot of dead animals. There are limits of course. When Kelly bought her tonsils home in a bottle they were fairly gross. And I told her I didn’t want to find that bottle in a kitchen cupboard some day because that would freak. me. out.
    And after calving, if I cow didn’t clean properly so the placenta was still hanging there…if it was still warm I could handle it. But having to touch a cold placenta was ‘icky’ and I’d have to use paper towels or something to touch it. Ewwww. Still gives me the shivers thinking about it.
    But all the blood and slime with the birth, that wasn’t a problem.
    Hope you all have good, non squeamish days!

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    1. Forgot that. I would gag when I had to shovel the placenta out of the gutter after the birth of a calf.

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      1. Dad put a barn cleaner in when I was about 15. So I didn’t have to deal with shoveling it out much. But I remember cleaning the gutters before and *trying* to run the wheelbarrow up the plank to the spreader. Sometimes I could get it there and either not tip it over before the spreader or lose the entire wheel barrow into the spreader. (The spreader sat lower than the barn, so it was only a slight incline to dump. The plank was a 2″x12″. It was a bit more of a challenge when it was raining and the board was slick.)

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        1. I wrote about my struggles with the barn cleaner in my novel. Me and the barn cleaner did not get along.

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    2. When I was young I saw a cow give birth to a calf on my Uncle’s farm. I thought it was an amazing sight because had never seen anything like that.. The cow licked the calf apparently cleaning up some of the slime on the calf. The I watched the calf get up and take it’s first steps.

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  5. I get squeamish when I think about injuries like the one that happened to Mr. Ware, but I can tolerate seeing them and dealing with them in real life.

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  6. An outdoors sportsman is forced to deal with stuff that works against being squeamish. That doesn’t mean I got used to it. So I guess now I’m somewhere in the middle, not fond of gore and mayhem but somewhat used to it.

    One of the most disgusting things I ever did was to field-dress the deer I shot. Actually, it was a complicated ethical act for me. I live with the guilt of being a carnivore. Since my living as I do causes the deaths of many critters, I feel I owe it to the natural world to kill a deer once a year and then force myself to field-dress it. It is my act of contrition and a disgusting way of reminding myself of the price the world paid all the time for my being alive.

    Arthritis put an end to my deer hunting, for which I’m deeply grateful.

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      1. Barbara, field dressing is a process that removes blood and guts and body parts that spoil quickly so that field dressing ensures that the value of the venison is protected. It also reduces the weight of the animal, making it far easier to transport the carcass somewhere where it can be butchered (cut up into usable parts). Field dressing is a messy, smelly process. I never got comfortable with it.

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    2. I have never helped dress out a large animal. I did help a friend kill and dress rabbits and was okay doing that. My grandfather was paid by farmers to do slaughtering. He had some equipment that he transported to farms to do this work including a tripod made of poles to hang the animals that he butchered. I went with him on one his trips to a farm to butcher a cow. I was too young to help with the butchering.

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      1. It is interesting. Squeamishness seems directly related to how “human” a dead critter is. Most people are relatively comfortable cleaning fish. Birds–like chickens or pheasants–don’t bother most folks that much. Mammals have appealing eyes and expressive faces, which runs up the squeamish factor. Large mammals are the worst. It bothered me some to clean fish. Dealing with a whole deer was agony.

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  7. I’m basically a shrugger, but there are limits. A little blood, vomit, or decayed stuff doesn’t phase me, especially if I can get some fresh air or some space, and I’m not confined. But I think a LOT would make me nauseous.

    Chicken blood is the exception. A friend had an injured chicken and I said I’d help her “repair” its wing. My job was to hold the hen while she did the sewing. I was trying to be very non-squeamish (what’s the word there?), but the blood finally got to me and I couldn’t finish.

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  8. All of this talk about field dressing, butchering, shoveling placentas and whatnot is enough for me to feel nauseated. If I had to eat only what I had personally killed, I’d be eating fish an vegetables, no doubt about it. For some reason I don’t feel squeamish cleaning fish, don’t know that there’s any logic behind that, but that’s how it is.

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  9. I think I fall into the non-squeamish camp. Husband had to look away and talk about non-injury related things when he got stitches in his hand (he cut it on a glass that broke while washing dishes) – me, I watched the ER doc stitch him up and found the process fascinating. There are things I find just gross, but not to the point of squeamishness. I probably would have flinched if I had been watching the game when Mr Ware was injured, but not much more.

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  10. Greetings! I am pretty much a shrugger — not many things make me squeamish. When I had stitches in my thumb from a factory injury, I watched everything they did. I was awake during my knee surgery so I could watch everything on the monitor. Very cool. Any surgeries I see on TV, I’m right up to the screen seeing everything.

    OT – I had developed cataracts in my eyes, so I had surgery where they replace the lens of your eye with a nice clear, new one made precisely to your glasses prescription. Just had the second eye done this morning, so I’m home and should be resting. AND I HAVE PERFECT VISION WITHOUT GLASSES! Well, except for reading glasses. But it is freaking amazing. I didn’t realize how truly BAD my eyes were and how dicey it was for me to drive before. But now it’s a whole new world and I can see without wearing glasses all the time. Every thing I see is precious and beautiful now. Take care, Baboons …. I’ll see you later.

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    1. Congratulations on your brand new clear vision! It reminds me of having to replace a fogged-over 18′ wide window in my living room. I was doing a session while they worked on it. When I walked into the room, I asked why they hadn’t gotten the job done yet, to which they replied, “It is done – the window’s in!”

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    2. That’s great. Joanne. I need to have that surgery as well, and have, true to form, been putting it off. Maybe it isn’t such a big deal after all. You got me thinking!

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      1. Joanne, I went from vision of 2100/20 and 2250/20 to 35/20 and 40/20 from the implants about 10 years ago. Because of the extreme change I had to wait five weeks between the surgeries. The five weeks of confusion and not driving was worth it. One of the most amazing things that happened to me. I was noted for my very thick glasses. One of the reasons people who have not seen me in a long time do not recognize me.

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      3. Clyde – I also had very thick, nearly 1″ glasses, don’t know the numbers you’re referring to, but my glasses prescription was around -16 diopters. I was told I would have 20/25 vision and it looks to be true.

        PJ – you really need to get it done. Easiest surgery ever — just 15 minutes and you’re pleasantly sedated without being totally under. You just have to do the eyedrops for a few weeks. Totally worth it. I’m not sure if money is an issue, but those eyedrops are also outrageously expensive. Everything was totally covered for me and I am absolutely thrilled!

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    3. i am amazed that they have to wait until you are almost totally blind before they can do that surgery. my dad had it and couldnt see but they wanted him to wait until it did whatever they were waiting for. then they did one and had to wait for the other.

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  11. i am neither. i have no problem with gore and can watch or even cut flesh. i am a little freaked out when my kids get messed up but if i dont handle it they are in trouble. i was in the room when ware did his leg breaking but not paying attention and then my sone came in with the repaly on his cell phone showing it to everyone. it was hard to see on the 4inch screen but my little family unit was all squinting and trying to see the leg bend before it broke. i asked what they were looking at and when he told me i was of the never mind train of thought. i dont need to see it dont want to see it but am ok if thats what is in front of me. i have the ability to respond squeamishly but i as have the power to get past that. i dont seek out gory but i am a little curious
    and will not crain my neck to view gore but will handle it if it is there, particularly if it needs attending to. i am kind of a take charge in the trauma moment guy which neccessitates the ability to deal with that crap on that level. like it no, deal with it yeah

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  13. Squeamish in my mind, but more of a shrugger in the real world. I don’t like to hear about injuries (have not watched the video and will not), don’t like to see them in movies or tv. But the reality is that when faced with these things in real life, I don’t seem to have a problem. Seems a little weird to me now that I think about it.

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    1. Seems to me to be a healthy way to be squeamish, not seeking out blood and gore but being able to deal with it when it presents itself in reality.

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      1. I have to admit that although I didn’t freak out, I still remember the shock of seeing The Child with her hand over her eye and blood seeping between her fingers. She had the dandelion digger in her other hand and in the less-than-a-second that it took me to pull her hand away, I can’t tell you how many horrible scenarios I had imagined. Turned out to be five stitches right at the edge of her eyebrow. Can’t even see it these days.

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  14. Squeamish all the way here. Talking or reading about certain things is okay, but to actually see it whether in real life or a movie is somethin’ else. When delivering my first daughter, midwife asked if I wanted a mirror set up so I could see the baby coming out. I said no, thank you, but was thinking, Are you NUTS? WHO would want to SEE that while they’re going through it?

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  15. While I know I am squeamish in certain situations, I don’t see why talking about or describing things that might make one squeamish if one saw them should be a problem. However, I do realize that there are people who don’t like to hear about topics that can produce a squeamish reaction. I hope I haven’t offended anyone by any thing I have written today, aithough I think I might have done that. We live in a world where a lot of terrible things happen all the time, so I don’t think anything written here today is too scary even if it is a little offensive to some of us.

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    1. I can’t explain it, Jim, but it’s not that it’s offensive. it isn’t. Nothing on the blog today has offended me, but there have been some descriptions that I had to quit reading because I imagine the scene too vividly. I literally feel the blood draining from my head and get the sensation of being dizzy, and feel faint if a description of anything involving blood and gore is graphic. But, don’t mind me, go ahead and tell your stories, I do have the ability to quit reading when it gets to be too much.

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        1. Perhaps you’re right, mig. I’m not squeamish about myself if I’m injured, maybe because I don’t have to imagine, but know, how much it hurts. I haven’t seen the video with Ken Ware’s injury, nor do I intend to, but I can tell you if it’s anything like what’s playing in my head, he was in excruciating pain.

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  16. If you have just done yourself a serious mischief, you had best come to me expecting me to do something about it. Then I am just fine. Please don’t tell me about it or make me remember it after the fact, I am likely to go a bit pale.

    As a bio major, I was always quick to put my hand up to be the “surgeon” so I did not have to sit there and take notes.

    Am I the only Baboon who has dissected a cadaver? Just wondering-been mostly vegetarian ever since.

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    1. You may be, mig, or perhaps you’re the only one willing to admit it. I know I never have, although I once helped transport two cadavers in the back of a pick-up truck from Chicago to Carbondale. Probably my most interesting assignment as a student worker.

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    2. I know this song is long, over six minutes, but it’s a masterclass in songwriting, well worth the time to listen.

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