Bruising from a cruising

by RAF KATIGBAK

Show of hands: who wants this sun-forsaken city to warm up? I have both my hands in the air right now. Actually, that’s kind of a lie, since I’m using both hands to type this. Hold on. There. I just put both my hands up for like 30 seconds (pinky swear).

Anyway, this is all to say this schizo weather-warm-cold-sun-rain thing is starting to get to me, and I cannot wait for real shorts weather to begin. Yes, I know, there is a certain surprisingly large percentage of people in this city that, for some unfathomable reason, like to don their cut-off shorts, flip flops, muscle tees and rollerblades as soon as the snow melts, even if it’s still witch’s-teat freezing out. These guys are easily spotted by their tribal armband tattoos, single hoop earrings and Euro haircuts that are totally Laurie-Anderson-circa-“O Superman.” Sure it’s frightening to even imagine getting mowed down by a middle-aged Euro-trash fruit-booter speeding down the street, but c’mon, can you really blame anyone for flying their pasty skin-coloured flag around town, even a little prematurely? We’ve all just spent months wrapped up like little spring rolls trying to survive one of the longest winters in a long time. Damn right some people need to show some skin, no matter how sickeningly translucent it might be.

But I want shorts weather to come not for the warmer temperatures or because, as you might also think, I want to impress the world at large with the genetic inheritance known as the Katigbak Thunder Thighs. Nor do I want to don short pants because I feel the need to show how oddly hairless I am on only one half of my legs. No, I want to start wearing shorts simply because I’m just plain tired of taking my pants off in public all the time.

Before you go thinking I’ve lost the plot and am so desperate for attention that I need to start exposing myself in public like some kind of fire-crotched pseudo-starlet (I’m about as scandalous as an Amish strip club), lemme ’splain.

About a week ago, I crashed a motorcycle. Don’t worry, it wasn’t mine. Luckily, after seeing my entire life flash before my eyes (including the moment when I cried at the animatronic bears at a Chuck-E-Cheese in New Jersey when I was eight, and the time I took a crap on the Peterson’s Family lawn er… last week), I realized nothing was broken, then felt a dull ache on my upper left thigh and thought, “Um, that’s probably gonna bruise.” Sure enough, the next day there appeared a huge deep-purple continent on my leg that curiously took the shape of Africa exactly where I hit the ground and subsequently slid for a few metres on the pavement. Now I am the proud owner of a bruise the size of a small paperback novel.

I say “proud owner” because I am compulsively showing it off like some people show off newly acquired puppies or newborn babies. Or perhaps since it’s taken the exact shape of Africa, it’s more like I’m showing it off like a lemon that has the face of the Virgin Mary or a potato that looks like Ernest Borgnine. Actually, I guess all potatoes look like Ernest Borgnine.

Did I tell you how much I love my bruise? I’ve decided to call it Ongeluk, after the Afrikaans word for “accident”. Cute eh? I can’t get enough of showing it off to people. “See! It’s just like Africa! Look! There’s even a little scabby atoll where Madagascar would be!”

I don’t know why I’m bonkers for bruises. Maybe it’s because I led a pretty sheltered life. It’s not that my parents were overprotective, like they would keep me on one of those weird springy neon harnesses that suburban parents seem to love to yank their kids around in these days (what is up with those things anyway?). Nor were they worrywarts like Steven Weiss’s parents, who made him wear an oversized helmet when he was playing in the yard. But I was a pretty sickly kid, and never really went for that outdoor boyhood adventure sports stuff. So this bruise is basically the coolest thing I’ve ever seen, and if shorts weather ever gets here, it’ll be the coolest thing you’ll ever see too.

The best thing about it is that if I ever get tired of telling the motorcycle crash story, I can just make up some other excuses. I could just look at it and chuckle absentmindedly, “Oh that was nothing, y’know just a little hate crime.” Or, “Oh that?” I’d say nonchalantly, “let’s just say never try to ride a cow while you’re tripping on mushrooms and crystal meth.”

Riff-Raff@sympatico.ca