Laughter and Misfortunes

Fall is beautiful - romantic and peaceful. It feels good to be snuggled into my family at home (sore throats and all).
We helped my sister move today. She took a nose dive moving a coffee table down the front steps before we got there. We were sorry to have missed that... Would have given us something to laugh about. (She was fine, so it isn't like I'm completely heartless.)

But it made me think... Why do we laugh at others' misfortunes? Or, in my case, at our own?

I have this knack for trying to cut off my fingers. One Thanksgiving about 8 years ago, I was dicing an onion when the knife slipped and cut my ring and middle fingers. I got 6 stitches in my ring finger. We joked to everyone that if they happened to find a finger in the stuffing, it was mine. Three years ago when my husband and I moved into our first home (our 1st anniversary gift to each other), I was preparing lunch for everyone who helped us move (or at least those who were left). I was trying to open a jar of saurkraut, which by the way are the hardest jars to open in the world. They are so sealed that I usually lift an edge with a can opener to let some air in and release the seal. Of course, all my kitchen gadgets were packed, so I found a knife... (Yes, this is when the little voice in my head said, "Don't do that" but true to form, I ignored it.) I began to lift the edge when the knife slipped and stabbed me in the thumb of the hand holding down the jar, kind of up through the webbing of my thumb and index finger. I remember watching the blood and I thought, well that sucks. So I wrapped it in a papertowel and continued preparing lunch. Greg, one of my coworkers and friends who was helping us move, took a look at said, "Um... I'm pretty sure you should see a doctor. That's a pretty deep cut." I'm so tough, you know, so doctors were out of the question. That is, until about 3 hours later when the cut began to tear and spread open... That was gross. Oh, and it started to throb. That's an interesting feeling. You know, when a body part has it's own heartbeat. So, we decided to swing by the emergency room on the way back to our apartment for our last load of stuff. (This was when I learned the difference between a puncture wound and a laceration.) I got 5 stitches in my thumb, one of which tore out the next day.
I didn't have Aflac's accident plan then. But I do now for just such an occasion.

Oh, and I tend to listen to that little voice more now. Not all the time.

All this to say, I laughed at myself both times. I'm such an ass.

Scott and I were out looking for a new house about 5 months ago. We ended up in a new subdivision in a really nice area of town. I got out of the car to walk up the street a bit to grab a couple of those flyers realtors keep in the little boxes by the For Sale signs. This is when I discovered that the curb on the road wasn't done yet. How did I learn this? I fell off. And down I went. 7 months pregnant. I twisted my ankle on the way down. A car was driving towards us and slowed down to stare (those damn looky-loos). I laughed. Actually WE laughed.

That's actually how I found out I was pregnant. In October last year, I was serving on the Tech-team for my church when I was "walking" off stage to set up cameras (or something). I thought I was more towards the center of the stage where the stairs are, but... I wasn't. I took a step down when there wasn't a step (just a cliff, really) and fell off the stage, twisting my ankle and knee, and landing on my middle finger... face first. Scott saw the whole thing. We both cracked up over that. My knee hurt so bad that I didn't realize I had cracked my middle finger until the next day when it hurt really bad. And then later that evening Scott and I were wrestling around when I felt a SNAP and a pain shot into my hand, basically putting an end to all that ballyhoo. We left for vacation in November, which is when I realized that my finger was probably broken. When we returned from vacation, I went to see the doctor for an xray (cuz my finger still hurt REALLY bad), and that's when I saw the sign. "If you are pregnant or think you might be pregnant, please speak with the technician." Well... I didn't think I was pregnant (and I certainly didn't know I was pregnant), but I told the technician that we were trying (or, rather, had just tried like a week ago). So my doctor said, "Let's find out!" I peed in the cup.... That was the longest 5 minutes ever. My doctor says, "You knew it's positive, right?" Uh... NO, I didn't know that. I was about 8 days pregnant.

I never did get my finger xrayed.

Anyway... we laughed at that a lot.

I'm not even sure what my point is anymore.

Thank you and good night.