Another blogger (WhimsyChick) was talking about her bad back the other day, and I too suffer rather in that department. I feel sure that (even though she can’t remember it) she hurt her back doing something heroic and/or poetic, like saving her children from a burning house. Mine is something to be slightly less proud of…

It was about three and a half years ago, after a party, and I was walking with friends to the station to catch a train home. Now, it may not suprise you to hear that I was not entirely compus mentus, and somehow, (we will never know exactly how), I became separated from the group. (One story goes that, with a whoop of joy, I careered off down a sideroad, running headlong toward the horizon. In fact, that’s their story. My story is that they brutally, callously and maliciously lost me on purpose. The jury is still out.) After a brief, but fruitless, attempt to find me, they proceeded on to the station without me. I can’t entirely blame them.

I was enjoying myself immensely however, and after a brief, but thorough, tour of the Harpenden suburbs, I stumbled into the bright lights of the station. By this point the train was coming round the final corner, pulling into the station, and I was on the wrong platform. With lightning fast reactions, I looked at the train, looked at my friends on the other platform, looked at the train again and looked at my friends again. Eventually the penny dropped and I registered their yelled instructions.

I sprinted up the steps and onto the bridge, cheers of encouragement and sneers of derision from my peers ringing in my ears. I made quick time, and was soon clattering down the steps onto the correct platform. However, it was at this point that I managed to hit the very edge of a step as I ran. You know those old Road Runner cartoons? Remember how Wiley Coyote would react when he ran onto banana skins? Well, I can exclusively reveal to you that it really can look like that.

I swear my ankles were actually higher than my head for a significant portion of the flight. This graceful, almost beautiful, spectacle did not end well however. The first part of me to make re-entry was my back, or more specifically a very localised region of my spine. As a result of this (now almost amusing) episode, I am the proud owner of a wedge shaped vertebra. (That’s the only relevance of the title. It’s how the injury was decsribed to me. Nicely vivid image, don’t you think? Pleasant to ponder on…)

PS I caught the train. With a quite stunning grasp of First Aid and the treatment of spinal injuries, my friends executed a quick ‘grab and drag’, hauling me down the steps and onto the train. Er, cheers guys…