Monday, April 17, 2006

Contrary to popular belief...

drama teachers do not defy gravity. And the curse of the "Scottish Play" is alive and well (if you know the name don't say it, if you don't too bad because I won't tell ya. My English students said it today with doing the counter-curse!).

...see the tree...see the ladder...that is where the disaster begins.



I was painting said tree for over an hour with no problems. Nice students standing at the base of said ladder to dip the paint brush for me, so I didn't have to climb to the bottom each time.

The tree was just about done, most of the kids had left, just a couple working on Snoopy's house and I decided that I would finish the tree without them.

While standing on the ladder, with paint can in one hand and brush in the other, the ladder decides it no longer wants to stand at the wall, but rather lie down at the bottom. Hence my 2 second ride to the floor. Now, if you have ever seen people go down an extention ladder in the movies it looks like a lot of fun... let me tell you IT'S NOT! It's pretty damn scarey.

So in a manner of seconds I am falling to the ground, the drumline coach, a drummer and two drama students are standing over me asking if I'm okay. I thought I was, I got up slowly, kind of took a few tentative steps, checked for blood from the nose that hit something (turns out it was probably my own hand), bended the elbows because they hit as the ladder hit the ground. All seemed to be okay, I didn't even shed a tear.

The problems started when I started to help clean up the 1/2 can of spilled green paint...my shin felt a little funny, I pulled up my pant leg and there it was in all it's glory, a cut. I retreated to my classroom to bandage myself, when I discovered this wasn't an ordinary cut, this was a gash, this had that (if you're squeemish skip to the next paragraph) fatty stuff that lives under your skin poking out. I checked with the drumline coach and it was deamed that I should go to Urgent Care.

Three stiches and a tetnis shot later I am finally home. Showered and ready to crash. By the way showering with a plastic trash bag rubber banded to your let, not fun either. I am just really glad that it wasn't a student, I am also really glad it wasn't worse. I could have broken more then the skin. The guys in urgent care said they have never had a teacher come in having fallen off a ladder...I told them they needed to spend more time with drama teachers.

So, what have we learned...
1. "Scottish Play" curse - real!
2. Drama teachers do not fly!

2 comments:

Diane Viere said...

Oh--I'm so sorry! Hope you are feeling better and can enjoy a real shower/or bath again real soon.

You may not be able to fly--but this drama teacher has a real flare for writing! Great post.

Diane

Lucas said...

oh NO! oh my word, that's terrible! But the mental image of someone standing on a ladder as it shoots to the ground is somewhat humorous :)