My son get's to pick his nose!

He get's to pick out a new one anyway.

I'm going to crawl into bed and stay there. I will pull the covers up. WAY up over my head. I will stay there for the next 570 days. Please take turns poking cheetos and glasses of wine under the blankets for me to find.

I used to work with a guy who had this black cloud hanging over him. If something was going to happen.. it was going to happen to HIM. I would tsk tsk his direction and wonder what fate and kharma had against him. It's horrible to think it's my turn.

Late Tuesday morning my son called me from Redding, California. In a muffled, slurred voice he said to me.. "uh.. Mom. I've been in an accident."

I, of course, pretended not to understand him. (It was my brief moment of denial..). But it was useless and the truth prevailed. Kyle said his car was a bit bashed up - but drivable, his nose was broken and he had split his lip. It didn't sound so bad. He was 6 hours away, his girlfriend, Mary, was already there as he had called HER hours earlier. I decided not to go. Then I decided to go. Then I decided not to go. Then I decided to go. Then I decided not to go. Ultimately I grabbed Jill and off we went.

On the way there Mary called and said he was going into surgery that would take about and hour and a half. Surgery?? I was quite puzzled as it hadn't sound so bad as to require surgery. Apparently Kyle wasn't really paying attention to reality when he called me (the pain meds were talking I'm sure). His nose wasn't just broken.. it was well.. mostly gone. The outside was there - but whatever is inside a nose was gone. His lip was split - but it was split from lip up into his sinus cavity. He had a big steering wheel shaped dent on his forehead. It took hundreds of little tiny stitches to put things mostly back together. The surgeons reported that they had a very hard time telling what went where. The boy is messed up and his face is swollen almost unrecognizable. His truck is totaled. Want to see a picture? I have one I'm saving to torture him with when he recovers and even THINKS about driving dangerously. My beautiful son isn't so beautiful at the moment. However - he was glad to see his mommy despite his tough guy attitude and I got to bring him home last night. He is my baby after all.

We have an appointment next week at OHSU to see how he's healing and to get hooked up with a plastic surgeon to finish rebuilding his nose.

On a funny note - We also had to buy him some clothes because the paramedics had cut his off of him. Jill said to me..."it seems the only time Kyle get's new clothes is when his old ones get cut off!" It's true. The last time was early last year when he was on his bike and got hit by a car. They cut off his clothes then too!