Pinkies Are Expensive
A true story about how I lost my left pinky.
I remember it was morning, but late morning. It was a hot June day in Pensacola, Florida back in 1988. I was just eight years old and it was a perfect day to ride my bike. I lived in a small cul-de-sac neighborhood at the time; it literally had only two of them. I didn’t have any goals in mind, just to ride my bike. Even when I was young I was very much a go-with-the-flow type. It didn’t take me long to want to see if one of my friends was home. He was a neighborhood friend, and lived diagonally from my house. As I left my cul-de-sac and entered the other, his house was right there on the corner, mine was the second house in on our street. I saw that, Surfman — my friend’s Chesapeake Bay Retriever — was tied up to the garage. I parked my bike at the end of the driveway. I could hear the lawnmowers mowing our lawn, one of the reasons I wanted to go outside and play.
As I walked up the driveway, Surfman came up to greet me. He didn’t seem aggressive, nor did he ever before, but as I went to pet him, he bit and somehow only bit my left pinky all the way up to the knuckle. I instinctively pulled back, and I remember crying out. He opened his jaw and my finger came free. He had bitten through all but one vein. I immediately turned around and ran back to my bike. He was able to paw at me, and later they found bruising from his claws on my backside. As I grabbed the handlebars, blood squirted onto the pad on the crossbar between them. I had a Huffy, and they always had those pads on the bars of their bikes. I mention this because later I saw that the bloodstain turned into what looked like a cigarette burn.
Luckily, he was chained to the garage door, but as I began to walk my bike back to my house, an older lady called out to me. She had apparently seen everything and came to my aid. She asked me for my phone number before running back inside. Several moments passed as I cried my eyes out, but she came running out with a large punch bowl full of ice and water. She had called the paramedics and my parents.
“Put your hand in there,” she said, kindly but firmly.
I was afraid. Up until this point, I don’t remember any pain. The bite occurred so quickly, and I think the shock was keeping me from experiencing further pain. That was, until I stuck my hand in that iced water. I can only compare the pain to something I’ve experienced more recently, and that would be the pang you get from an abscessed tooth. Only this didn’t throb, but remained constant for a good minute until the cold numbed it.
I know her and I talked for that moment, but I honestly can’t remember what was said. It was then that my stepmother showed up. She seemed agitated that I had been involved in something, but soon came around as she noticed the severity of the situation. You must understand, though, she is bipolar with OCD, and my seven years of living with her would have to be another, much longer story. Moments later, the crew that had been mowing our lawn came to investigate, having heard me crying and screaming when the dog had bitten me. The one guy asked to see my injury, as the large bowl of ice and water had become blood red at this point. I pulled my hand out to show him the dangling finger.
“Aww, that’s not that bad,” he said encouragingly.
However much he thought that would help, it really didn’t. I think, in my head I was appreciative of his efforts, but it just made me have to look at my hand again, and, well, it seemed really bad to me. I remember crying a bit harder at that point, and wishing my dad would have been there. I think he showed up a bit later, but the ambulance had arrived, and as they carted me onto it, I passed out from loss of blood.
Interestingly enough, if I had been in England, or somewhere else that practices this, they would’ve put leeches on my finger to induce blood flow, and could’ve possibly saved my finger. I’m not mad that they couldn’t save it, but it was something I learned later.
Not too long after, my parents sued them. We had a mock trial since I was so young, but I remember there being a stenographer. I don’t remember it, but during the trial, we discovered that the dog had bitten seven other people before me over its lifetime, and so we won the case and the dog was put down. I was awarded an annuity that was slowly paid out to me starting at age eighteen. I’ve long since used that money, but I discovered that, to insurance, the pinky is worth more than even the thumb. You lose a lot of dexterity in your hand apparently, and pays more when it comes to lawsuits or compensation.
I’ve never really allowed this to affect me. I type around 80–90 wpm. I play guitar with that hand as my chord hand. I used to pitch with that hand when I played baseball in school. The only thing that sucks about it, is hitting it against things. The slightest bump feels like stubbing your toe times ten.
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Thank you so much for reading. Please consider recommending my substack. I hope you imagine having a wonderful day....[[|:-)