Book Entry 205: 1996 Falling Machinery

         

        The kids and I were in the house.  I was in the kitchen when the phone rang.  Larry was calling me from his shop just outside.  He said very quietly, “Can you come, hurry, I’m hurt.”  My heart leaped into my throat.  I remember running towards the back door of the house.  I stopped at the bottom of the stairway and called for Adam. 

          Of course I got the familiar, “Why, what’s up?” which slowed my stride, I yelled back to him what his dad had said on the phone.  He raced down the stairs so fast he nearly knocked me down and together we ran through the hallway toward the back door.  Adam threw open the door and pushed in front of me, rather than let me go first which he usually does, hurrying to his dad.  I was just behind him when we ran through the shop door.  We had to cross the first room to get to the bigger room in back to find Larry. 

There he was lying on the floor, blood dripping from between his fingers as he held his hand on the back of his head.  He had been working on a cylinder boring bar crane which fell on him as he was pulling on it and wham…he was knocked out.  He’d called us right away when he woke up.  There was a gash in the back of his head the size of a half-dollar and probably did need stitches.  As usual, he refused a trip to the doctor, but healed nicely.  As I recall he had one lulu of a headache for the rest of the day.

Adam and I were relieved.  Of course, it soon became a good story for Adam to tell on dad and how he’d look sprawled out on the cement floor.