About that bruise on my leg

So I have been sporting a pretty impressive bruise on one leg, just below and to the side of one knee. The kind where I have to wear capris or long pants or a dress that is at least mid-calf length so that I don’t have to constantly explain “what on earth happened” to cause that big bruise.  It was really a bizarre case of one little thing leading to another. And a certain future lawyer finds the explanation of the “incident” so entertaining that I have been instructed to post it here for all to enjoy.

So last week, I went to Girls’ Camp. As the cook. Cooking meals for 150 people. For 5 days. But that isn’t where I got the bruise.

You see, Girls’ Camp cooking requires lots of advanced planning, shopping, preparation, cooking, freezing, etc. And I spent lots of time doing all that planning, shopping, preparation, cooking, freezing, etc. But that isn’t how I got the bruise.

You see, because I was so busy doing all that stuff for Girls’ Camp, a lot of other things went undone around the house and yard. A lot. And most of it is still undone. But one thing did get done, early in the morning on the day before Girls’ Camp.

You see, there is this shrub bed in the back yard, up against the house. And in this bed there is a nice drip irrigation system. And two days before Girls’ Camp, I could here a noise in the shrub bed, early in the morning. The sound of water spraying out under high pressure. I went out to check it and saw that a distribution head for several drippers had cracked and water was blasting away the soil near the base of a little tree that I planted last year. Clearly, something needed to be done. But that isn’t how I got the bruise.

You see, I didn’t have time to fix it right then, so I hurried into the garage to the control box to turn off the drip system. The garage was full of piles and boxes and coolers of Girls’ Camp stuff that I had to navigate my way through to reach the controller. But that isn’t how I got the bruise.

You see, I had to hand-water the potted plants that would have been watered by drippers before I went to church and turn the controller back on after church to water the rest of the yard. And I knew that no one would want to do that little watering job while I was gone. And I knew that my new poinsettia plant, and my big old poinsettia tree, and my one little rosemary plant and my two very large rosemary shrubs would not survive Girls’ Camp unless I did something about the problem. But that isn’t when I got the bruise, because I didn’t take care of it then.

You see, I waited until the day before Girls’ Camp to fix it. I dug out the parts that I needed and went out to the shrub bed, early in the morning, and unhooked everything from the distribution head. And I took the cracked distribution head off of the riser. And worked and worked to get the connectors all plugged into the head so that I could screw the head onto the riser and hook on the drip lines. And I leaned over the edge of the porch to screw the new distribution head onto the riser. And that is when that particular circuit turned on. And a large, tidy column of water rose into the air. And I backed up a little to get out of the way. And I was out of the way of the tidy column of water. But I wasn’t out of the way of all the very untidy water that hit the underside of the eave of the house and came splashing and splattering and pouring back down on me. And so I got out of the way of all that water. Quickly. Actually, so quickly that I kind of lost my footing as I stood up and started to lose my balance at the top of the porch steps (only two steps high). And as I staggered down the steps with water showering down around me, trying to keep my balance and avoid the water, my leg hit the corner of one of my big pots of rosemary. And after two or three seconds of something that must have seemed like a clip from a slap-stick movie, the action came to a stop with me, still on my own two feet, my 4’ potted rosemary plant completely off the porch and on its side at the bottom of the steps and water still showering down around me at 6:00 in the morning.

And that's how I got that bruise on my leg.