The Great Ankle-Spraining of ‘97

In the prologue to last Monday’s post, I mentioned that Linguist-in-Chief A.M. Tessier and I first bonded over my historic ankle-spraining in first-year university. It was strange to realize I don’t really tell that story much anymore. It used to come up often, both because it’s pretty funny and because the sprain healed improperly and I had all kinds of trouble with that ankle for ages and was often limping, leading to questions and good story-telling opportunities. But 27 years later, it has kind of faded and, indeed, the anecdote below is missing a bunch of detail. Memory is a strange thing—you expect everything to be right there, as if in a locked chest, but when you open it, a lot has crumbled to dust. Here is what remains…

So I had a study date with a guy from…I think it was my French class. But I had a quite good friend in that class, so it seems odd that she wouldn’t have come for the studying (hi, Wren!) but perhaps she was sponsoring the idea that it was an official date by leaving us à deux. Or it could have been another class, but I remember it as French. Anyway, I do recall he and I tried to go to Ben’s, which was a wonderful deli in Montreal that has since closed, but I think it was too noisy, so we were leaving and crossing Maisonneuve going north, going I’m not sure where, and I, foolishly, hopped off the curb, and into a slush puddle, which was actually a large and deep slush-filled pothole. My foot landed half-in, half-out of the pothole, bent 90 degrees (inward) and I fell over.

(A pause for climate change musings—this would have been just before first-semester exams so—beginning of December. And there was snow and slush on the ground and it had already had time to get dirty—I got covered in grey and brown filthy slush when I fell. December is for the most part a bright dry month in the 2020s. Huh.)

He was a half-step ahead of me and didn’t see any of this happen but somewhere in the middle of the crosswalk, mid-monologue, he sensed I was not beside him anymore and turned back to see me on the ground. His look, I recall distinctly, was one of distaste—as if I had intentionally opted out of the conversation to lie in grime in the street instead. But he did come and help me up and, seeing that walking was not going as well for me it once had, back into Ben’s.

Now, in the early tellings and retellings of this story, the guy faired pretty badly, but looking back at an age where I could be the parent of those 19-year-old idiots, I think he did mainly ok. One does not really know how to go on a normal date at 19, much less one where the girl is covered in slush and has torn all the ligaments in her left ankle and is trying not to weep. He tried hard to get me to let him take me to the emergency room but I knew it would be a long adventure and I did not want to go on that with him. I wanted to struggle through a weird, agonized simulacrum of the date we had planned, until enough minutes had elapsed that I could go home, call an actual friend, and go to the ER with them.

The real problem was that at some point in the afternoon he had told me that his somewhat unusual last name was one his family had made up, and that the original family name was Hitler. I don’t know if that was true or he said it to freak me out or what was going on there. I assume that at one time there were multiple families by that name and he was not necessarily related to That Hitler. I really should have asked more questions, and he should have either volunteered way more or way less but anyway, I didn’t want to get into a taxi alone with him. I can’t remember if I had ever had any romantic feelings for him or I was just pleased anyone had asked me anywhere, but that avenue was officially closed after the Hitler thing.

So back at Ben’s we were immersed in a three-way argument—my escort wanted to get me some ice for my ankle; I was scared of what I would see if I took my boot off and didn’t want to get involved with the ice, so I said I would just like a cherry coke please (those were rare in those days, and at Ben’s they made them with fountain coke plus cherry syrup, so it was a good treat); and the waiter, when he showed up and got wind of what had happened, said I needed neither ice nor coke but oregano. The waiter was extremely elderly and Francophone, so he was having trouble getting the message across a) why oregano and b) what I was to do with it. I would have been ok with somehow eating the oregano but I was suspicious he wanted me to rub it on my ankle, which would have still involved taking the boot off so I remained firmly team Cherry Coke. My escort was QUITE annoyed about all this (he was right, it would have gone better for me had I iced the ankle immediately) but he sat and watched me drink my soda and then helped me painfully hop home. He did call the minimum for human decency one (1) time a few days after that to make sure I was ok, but I never saw him again. And I still don’t know if he was really related to Adolf Hitler.

After saying to my date, the waiter, random passersby over and over again that I was totally fine, and no one needed to be concerned, as soon as I got home, I collapsed on my bed, picked up the phone and shrieked to my friend Laurk that I had sprained or possibly broken my ankle and she had to take me to the emergency room immediately. Despite the fact that it was exams and coming on dusk, Laurk bravely gathered her study materials and somehow got us to the ER at Royal Victoria Hospital (I think in a cab).

We were there about 8 hours and I was really really glad I hadn’t gone with a strange (very strange) boy I barely knew, but instead with a trusted friend, albeit one who was mainly focused on studying financial accounting. Although after a while they wouldn’t let us wait together anymore and they took me to an exam room where I was alone and unexamined for a very long time, long enough to notice that the room contained both an enormous biohazardous waste bin and a hoist. I had a lot of questions (and no book because I had left it with Laurk, assuming my time in the exam would be action-packed). Eventually someone came back and took my pants…and then I was alone again for another long period. I’m pretty sure I’m remembering this correctly.

While all this was—or mainly wasn’t—going on, Laurk was faithfully waiting and studying in the waiting area. At one point, a down-at-heel gentleman came in and asked every single person for a cigarette EXCEPT for her. Laurk, who did at 18 have the face of an unusually sweet cherub, and pretty much still does, was ferociously insulted by this, which I think is the funniest past of the whole story.

I, pantless, was unable to escape and ask anyone for a status report, reading material, or freedom, and was starting to lose my mind. Finally, close to midnight, I was seen by a doctor, who explained about the torn ligaments, and that there’s “not much you can do for a sprain.” He didn’t even give me a wrap, which I think IS something you can do for a sprain. I did get crutches, which I never really learned how to walk on, which resulted in my declaring myself “healed” too soon, and a host of later problems, but we finally left the hospital and I counted that a win. And I got my pants back. They were, I recall distinctly, brown jeans. On a date! Oh, the 90s!

There’s very little one can learn from this story, although to this day I look down every time I step off a curb, and I am grateful for my friends. And I love a fountain soda. Any other takeaways, do you think? Well, thanks for letting me tell this story—it’s an old fave and I haven’t dusted it off in ages.