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    Thursday, September 13, 2007

    Is Clumsiness Inherited?

    I was going to post on how one of the aspects of parenthood no one mentions is the way you start to see the potential in every single thing on the planet to maim or kill your child in some freakish accident. In trying to put together these thoughts, something occurred to me. See, I've had more than my fair share of freakish accidents in which I found some way to main myself. I put a hand through a screen door once, cutting it up pretty badly. I jumped onto a picnic table, slipped, and hit a nail that punctured my cheek. Once, while recreating Mt. Rushmore on a pile of dirt in the front yard, I slipped and cut my knee on a piece of metal the street workers had left. Those, and more, all happened before I had reached high school.

    These incidents have carried on into adulthood. I've had cuts, bruises, burns, broken bones. I've had stitches and casts. I almost choked to death in a restaurant kitchen when I was refilling a water softener and my tie got in the way of the rush of softener salt. And let's not get started on things that could have proved dangerous but somehow didn't. Like the time in high school when a group of us tried to see who could get the best-looking stunt man roll of the hood of a (slowly) moving car. My oldest nephew actually broke some bones doing that.

    So maybe it isn't that those worries are an aspect of parenthood for anyone. Maybe I'm just worried that E will turn out to be as accident-prone as myself. Here's hoping he isn't.

    3 comments:

    Matt said...

    My oldest daughter seems to be always be bumping into things. Or at least she did over the summer. Now that I think on it, I haven't seen as much of that lately. But it certainly worried me. So far, no major injuries but lots and lots of bumps and bruises. I've been hoping it's just a matter of getting used to a rapidly growing body and she'll grow out of it.

    I never broke any bones (except the nose which isn't a bone) but I was bumping into a lot of things as a kid. Could be hereditary.

    Puffy said...

    My son had 3 sets of stiches on his forehead and chin.

    dragonflies said...

    The nose isn't a bone? It sure felt like a bone when I broke mine in 4 places playing football.

    My daughter's legs were a mass of bumps and bruises from age 2-5. Once in a 24 hour timeframe she gave herself 2 black eyes and a swollen lip. I swear it wasn't me. I had witnesses of her clumsiness.