"It's ONLY a flesh wound!" Do you remember the Black Knight of Monty Python and the Holy Grail saying that? OK, well there's bravery and there is sheer lunacy, and the silly Black Knight and my son Reuben have something in common now. No, he (Reuben) didn't get his arms chopped off, but he did stab himself in the hand with his own knife! If I were a betting woman (lottery twice a week) I would say he's trying his hardest NOT to go to war, but then again, I know my son...he's bored from NOT going to war, so he's playing too hard and doing some really stupid things up there in the land of the midnight sun! "I can close my knife faster than you can SGT!" (The beginning of the end.)
I got the call. It was something like 2:00 a.m. Los Angeles time because that's where I was when I got the call. The Call is code for "Hey Mom, I'm in the hospital again." This time he wasn't laughing quite as much as he was when he broke his ankle in December, but he wasn't crying much either...like I would be. I'd have freaked probably after I realized my hand was gashed through and through. I declined to upload the photo that Reuben sent me, it was pre-op and I didn't think you wanted to see a grown man with a 4 inch blade sticking out of his left hand. (His right hand giving me the thumbs up.) When he arrived at the hospital he called me to let me know he was being admitted to the E.R. He asked if he should remove the blade. NOOOOOOO! I screamed into the phone. That's when he started laughing.
"Mom, I'm not stupid. I was kidding. I'm at the freakin' hospital, the nurse already told me to stop playing with it. I've washed it out on the sides and everything, they even stopped the bleeding for the most part, damn Mom, you're high-strung." I wanted to kill him. YOU THINK! YOU THINK I'm high strung? I'm over here thinking to myself the Army is going to call me and ask me to come pick him up! They couldn't possibly use a kid that damages himself this much. I was wrong. The next day I got a call from the SGT that was with Ruby at the time of the accident. He told me that anyone that could stab himself with a knife and drive himself to the hospital with it sticking out of his hand and dripping on his pants so it didn't get the car seat messy has a place in a real man's Army. His words, not mine.
I asked Reuben if they could bust him in rank or dock his pay since he keeps hurting himself. He paused for a second and he said "Well, they said they were going to make me a Texan if I do it again. I guess that's bad." (Please Uncle Sam, anything but that!)
OK...he's not the brightest bulb in the basket, but he's mine. He's the most wonderful, giving, caring, upstanding, uplifting, courageous, and protective man I have ever known; perhaps he'll stick around the military long enough to figure out when it's appropriate to stab someone and that the someone shouldn't be himself. Then again, I've always got the option of putting him in English classic film. He's got the part memorized.
Funny story: I was in L.A. filming for a Japanese TV show with my dog this weekend. A First Sgt in the Army came up to me in Starbucks off Ventura Blvd and Alcove, just across the street from the famous Sportsmen's Lodge where we stayed. The First Sgt came right up to me and said "Hey, is that Faith?" (pointing to my dog) I said yes, yes, it is. He then asked "How's Reuben?" Seems he and his wife drink their morning coffee and read my blog as well as a few others every day. How's Reuben? Awesome! "Have a seat First Sgt, this is gonna take a while!"
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