Waterboys Have Their Troubles, Too (Cont)
Screen 3 of 4While all this was going on back at the construction site, I was frantically looking for Goofus. After several hours I found him moaning and whimpering in a thicket close to our house. In a few days all the hair on the rear part of his back came out and for several weeks the skin in that area was bare, raw and of course very sore. Most of the hair eventually grew back, but of an entirely different color from that of the remainder of his light gray coat. The ugly brown spot at the rear of his back continued to remind me of the cruel mistreatment he had received.
Goofus, too, did not forget the incident. For never again would he follow me to work.
Later on that same summer I had an accident while getting ice out of the big, heavy storage box.
In a hurry one hot afternoon to get cold water to the working men, I propped up the heavy top with a stick so that I could lean farther down to pick up a big piece of ice from the box. While straightening up, my arm accidentally knocked the stick away from the box, causing the top to come down suddenly. The counterbalancing weight did help to slow the descent some, giving me enough time to get all my body out of the way, except the right hand which was caught on the edge of the box by the falling top.
Oh, what pain! I can remember even now as I recount the story fifty-six years later how much that hlow hurt. I literally saw stars and almost fainted. My initial cry for help brought one of the workmen who lifted the top and helped me remove my hand, which suddenly became numb. In less than an hour, the hand and lower part of the right arm had become terribly swollen and were turning purple.
Someone took me to the doctor's office in a Model T Ford pickup truck, while I held my injured hand above my head to relieve the pain. The old doctor--he had been brought out of retirement recently to substitute for a younger one who was on vacation--not only asked me all the details about the accident but also lectured me about how unsafe that ice box was, even before he examined the injured hand. He had no X-ray to help him, but he assured me no bones were broken. He added, however, that the whole hand was badly bruised and must not be used in any way for at least one week and perhaps two. "If you don't take good care of it," he cautioned me after completing the bandage, "it might get infected. If that happens," he concluded, "we've got big troubles."
When I went back to the construction job later that day with a heavily bandaged hand, the boss said he was sorry about the accident, and he told me he would try to keep the job open for me.
"But," I replied almost in tears, "I will make no money for at least two weeks, and I need the money badly to help buy books and clothes for school this fall," which was to open in less than three weeks.
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