Whatever’s Left Unbroken
That may not exist.
Prompt: What is your favorite body part?
There are 206 bones in the human body. I’m pretty sure at this point, I’ve broken more of them than I haven’t. Several of them have been broken multiple times.
I currently have a cracked rib from coughing so much and as much as people flinch at the thought of that, to me it’s just sort of a thing that happened. It’s a rib that’s been broken before. It was broken in multiple places and I wasn’t allowed to move because there was a risk that it, or the one next to it — also broken in multiple places — could puncture my lung. So a crack? Not a big deal.
It hurts, I’m not saying it doesn’t. But there are levels of pain and when you’ve come to be as broken as I’ve been, those levels tend to be a bit skewed. My right ankle has been broken six times and each of those times I still danced on it. I danced en pointe with several broken toes. And a smile was stupidly plastered across my face the entire time.
At least no one is telling me and my cracked rib to hold a position and smile. And the good people of Ricola have made cough drops to save my body from itself. So I’m dealing.
Asking me my favorite body part at any time is a treacherous trap to fall into and the drop is laden with self-loathing and body…
