Yesterday I stubbed a toe (#4 on the right foot, if you must know) on an object I walk past a dozen or so times per day, that was sitting right where it's been sitting for the past five or six years. I hadn't whacked a toe like this in quite some time, and I went through that old familiar lightning-fast progression of sensations, from shock and disbelief, to anger at both the object and myself, to thinking I'm lucky that this one isn't going to hurt, to the five-second delay and onrush of blinding pain, to hopping around screaming in tongues, to the waiting for the eventual dulling of the pain...
It's interesting that I did this a lot back in the day, and have somehow "mostly" avoided doing so in my current adult life (though I apparently will NEVER learn how to walk around my platform bed frame without leaving a little piece of shin or knee behind.) (And I did whack my left elbow's funny-bone passing through a doorway this week.) (Maybe I'd better just start watching where the HELL I'm going.)
I'm very fortunate that the toe did calm down, and I must not have cracked the bone or anything because there was no severe discomfort later, and no bruising. I have a very colorful picture I took in my twenties of my best black and blue toe; that one really must have had a broken bone in there somewhere, or maybe it just broke a bunch of blood vessels, but it was the kind of thing where you can hardly stand to pull the sheet up over your foot in bed.
Today I feel just the slightest hint of tenderness, but it's enough to make me want to stick my leg out and trip the first light fandango that waltzes through here, and then laugh and laugh as it flips around and tries to recover itself. So watch out.
