October 17th, 2008

My autopsy will show

Every time I do myself yet another moronic small injury, I wonder if this will be the day I die under mysterious circumstances. Because, as we all know from hearing episodes of CSI recounted to us at parties*, when people die under mysterious circumstances an autopsy must be performed to unmystify them. And the county coroner, when autopsying (verb?), does not just investigate the subdural hematoma or gunshot wound or whatever the ostensible cause of death is. Oh, no, they examine all flaws and injuries of the entire body and somehow, in 49 minutes, knit these together into a brilliant recreation of the poor dead person’s last moments.

I worry about this. I worry that everyone who ever falls into the lake and drowns because his or her shoulder bag is too heavy and gets caught on his or her coat also has myriad other small injuries the originis of which can never be parsed by objective medical science. Examples off the top of my head:

–large round bruise in centre of back? Standing behind door when roommate burst in, euphoric due to larger-than-usual GST cheque. Caught doorknob in spine.
–small, slightly infected puncture wound on upper thigh? Stabbed with pen by toddler furious over denied banana. Ink and fabric fibres from jeans caused infection.
–shallow thick gash on back of wrist? Too fast, too vertical, too enthusiastic attempt to remove soda from soda machine.

And then there are the ever-present burn marks on the tops of my ears.

I wanna be the one to walk in the sun
RR

*I would be ok if no one ever told me about CSI ever again. The one time I tried to watch it, they found a severed head in a newspaper box in the first 90 seconds and then I had to go home.