• This is yet another piece by my esteemed colleague and mother, Karen Cadenhead. Is it time for her own Medium account? I think so.

It had been a pretty funny story, Splinter in Sausalito, juxtaposing our flat tire, and my splintered foot. I was quite pleased with myself and had cleverly added my friends’ reactions as five star reviews at the conclusion of my little story. Lauren and I had a great laugh- Karen the storyteller.

A new day dawned however with a swollen foot. Off we rushed to Marin General ER where Dr. Duffy, X-rayed, “sonagramed” and cultured the drainage. I was given another antibiotic, which I learned increased the success of killing the probable staph in my foot, from 40% to 80%. I was especially tickled to get the Velcro sandal, in my exact shoe size, that wouldn’t put pressure on my now burgeoning foot.

We took a few pictures, felt very relieved and headed off to the Cohen’s open house in Oakland that, as an aside, we had accidentally gone to last month, a month early…

On the way, I elevated my “tender” foot on the dashboard, and watched a YouTube video of my niece at her swim meet in Edmond on my iPhone. It was a lazy, sunny,warm day and life was good. The stress of the long week without Lauren, splinters and flat tires, was over.We had stopped behind another car that had stopped behind an orange cone that for some reason was near a community gardening project within a median on the highway. We waited patiently, Lauren was humming.

KaBoom!! My head swung violently forwards, then backwards.

Yep, Mr. Perky, thick- necked- hardy, Walters, hops out of the car, ready to get insurance info, while I sit in a daze, trying to figure out if this could be related to my splinter from the houseboat dock?

Lauren loves Bluetooth, he always connects his phone to it. Even if he is ten feet away from the car calling 911, the car speaker seems to know he is there.

Suddenly a booming authoritative voice inside the car says,

“ The police are on the way, do you need emergency transport?”

As I am the only one in the car, and I can’t ask Lauren’s opinion, I tentatively lean towards the radio area and murmur…

“I’m not entirely sure yet.”

The dispatcher says, “That’s ok, the paramedics can just check you out, you don’t have to go to the hospital if you don’t want to.” That sounded reasonable to me, so I agreed.

I kept sitting there looking at my foot as police cars started to arrive.

A knock on the window: the first EMT has arrived and wants me to unroll the window, but the car is off. I shrug with the helpless smile of a simpleton.

He moves around to the drivers seat and begins a casual yet vigilant conversation with me. How do I feel, any pain, do I remember what happened? Meanwhile, I am wondering if he notices my foot with the large velcro’ed “shoe” and if he thinks he might have a chronic malingerer or ambulance chaser on his hands.

I wonder, hypothetically, if I went to the hospital, what might they do for the headache (add drug seeker).

He thought they would probably just keep an eye on me and give me some Tylenol (ER becomes much less appealing).

I glance away, as if in thought although I am now POSITIVE there is nothing to gain by an ambulance trip, only to see the fire truck and more police cars rounding the corner. They don’t even have enough room to park there are so many vehicles. I wondered out loud why there were so many police.

The paramedic shrugged, “Beats me, usually we don’t even show up for a fender bender. Maybe it’s because you said you might need transport? (did I hear a slight accusatory tone?)

Ugh….just shoot me here with my Velcro shoe for a grave marker.

We both wondered how Dr. Duffy would react if I ended up back in his ER a mere two hours after leaving, wrapped in a neck brace this time and complaining of headache.

Then there was the car’s own version of a hospital to face. It was one thing to replace a flat tire, quite another to replace the entire back end of the car!

Luckily only the car needed fixing this time. I will say, when we marched/limped to that party, a little late a little disheveled, dragging a tailpipe, unable to open the trunk containing our hostess gift, the hilarious story of the splinter had lost some of its luster. Still, it added a nice addendum to my story!

*For more of the saga, or to convince Karen to become a published author, you can email her at karencadenhead@gmail.com