Pink Eye

 My sister used to say that I was the runt since I was the one who was always got sick or injured. The summer before fourth grade, I had ringworm and got my hair stuck in the mixing blender.   The ringworm rash marked my wrist for a couple of weeks. I thought it looked like I had a wristwatch beneath my skin. 

     It was far less painful than the blender accident. It happened like this: I was leaning over the bowl of fluffed eggs, sugar and cream cheese that my sister was mixing when I felt the skin pull away from my scalp, looked in the bowl and saw my hair wrapped around the beaters and tangled in the yellow mix. The blender was smoking, the switch jammed and I could smell my hair burning. My sister standing there like a legless zombie.     

     Mom was at the sink peeling potatoes, hearing my moan, she yanked the power cord from the outlet and untangled my hair from the grind of metal and gritty batter.  She went to a German herbalist and brought back a brown ointment made from horse chestnuts to heal my scalp. I couldn't wash it for three days and had to wear it in a ponytail that smelled like a chestnut cheesecake.

     Less than a month into the school year, both of my eyes were infected with pink eye.  I woke up with eyes swollen and full of yellow goo.  I thought it had to do with the suffocation game I played with my sister the night before. There was the spit game, steamroller and our psychological favorite, "How long can you wait?"

     As in, How long Can You Wait? With a pillow on your face, before you suffocate?"  One of us would lie down on the bed and the other would sit on top of the others stomach and place a feather pillow over the victims face.  Murderers must know their victims weaknesses, but saviors have to know weaknesses and have good timing too.  When I was on top and she'd start to squirm for air, her body underneath me, pushing me up, my equal body weight holding her down, I knew if I waited too long, her panic would turn to primal fury and shed try and buck me off of her much like a bull we saw once that jerked around after it had been stabbed by a bullfighter.  I understood that wave of primal instinct and fury when she held the pillow against my face too long and I couldnt breathe in any air.  But we never stayed mad at each other. Fear was part of the game. Part of the fun.  My sister had been pressing on my face with the pillow, suffocating me the night before and I thought maybe she had somehow ruined my eyes...