It was a typical Sunday morning.
I was watering the house plants in the loft.
My sweet Sven was laying a new floor down in the room that I am planning to spend the rest of my days living out my lifelong dream as a full-time-unemployed-writer.
"Hey, Millie," he says, nonchalantly.
"Yeah?"
"Will you come down here and help me out with this Band-Aid?"
"What Band-Aid?" I answered, moving over to the accident in front of the window that looks like a spider plant that is stuck on the end of a bonsaied palm tree.
"The Band-Aid for my thumb."
"What happened to your thumb?"
"I cut it."
"On what?"
"The table saw."
"Oh my God. How bad is it?"
"Well," he said. "I still have my thumb."
I flew down the steps, three at a time.
It was true.
He did still have his thumb.
"No," he said in a, "Do you feel lucky today, punk? Well, do ya?" voice.
In other words, we would not be taking a trip to urgent care.
"But Sven, you need stitches."
"They can stitch it up tomorrow. This is my day off from all doctors."
Well.
You know.
And I know.
And everybody knows.
That you have to get stitches the day you get cut.
But I wasn't about to argue with the man who was spraying blood all over the kitchen like he was in a Monty Python show.
Instead, I helped him over to the couch so we both wouldn't faint.
And then I patched him up as best as I could with what I found.
Which meant, he wore a triple decker Band-Aid wrap. Followed with a couple more for insurance. And then a few more on top of that.
I went back upstairs to finish watering.
And then I heard the saw.
"What in the hell are you doing?" I yelled down. "Step away from the saw, Sven."
"I only have two pieces left, Millie" he answered in a, "Go ahead, make my day," kind of voice.
But at least he promised to have it looked at the next day.
That is why his thumb resembled a forty-watt light bulb when he walked in the door the following afternoon.
"Wow," I said. "That's quite the bandage you've got there."
"Isn't it?"
"How many stitches?"
"They said it's too wide to stitch."
For the rest of the week while Sven was busy grossing out anyone who dared to look under his lightbulb, I was busy practicing being retired.
"The technician," he announced. "The really pregnant one. Wouldn't even look at my thumb."
"No?"
"She said she doesn't like the sight of blood. That's why she works in radiology."
"Makes sense."
"But Doctor McCooley wanted to see it."
"Yeah?"
"He was impressed."
"Well, I am very happy for you."
He said I should rob a bank or something."
"Huh?"
"Since my thumbprint is gone."
"Sven," I said. "If you ask me."
"Millie," he says. "I didn't."
"I don't care how many ways you try to disguise that thumb."
"It is definitely yours. As a matter of fact, there isn't a sole on earth who couldn't recognize it now."
So.
If you bump into an old man on the street.
A guy who looks a bit like Clint Eastwood.
Be sure to check out his thumbprint before you go all ga-ga.
Perhaps it is just my sweet Sven.
