A 1958 Chris Craft and a Broken Baseball Bat

Life changing Trauma imposed by A Classic Wooden Boat.

Wednesday April 13, 2022 started out as most weekdays do. I had a few orders on my website: www.ezgolfcart.com. There were also invoices from my vendors to be processed. I got everything done by about 9:30 AM and realized I did not have another tasks that had to be done. I went to Meridian to look over the orchards that I have been doing some pest control in. It was early, cloudy, a bit windy, and the squirrels were not active at all. I went back to the shop and was thinking the would be a good opportunity to work on the Chris Craft.

There were a few damaged ribs in the boat that I was planning to glue and clamp. I got in the boat by using the trailer running board and putting one leg at a time into the hull. So far so Good. After a couple of more trips in and back out of the boat to get different clamps or tools, I had a good glue joint. When I got into the boat, I came in over the wing and the top of the wing lightly hit my junk. I remember thinking that I should come in and out a bit more forward where the wing was lower and it would not interfere. When it was time to get out, I moved forward on the wing and, facing backwards in the boat, I put my left leg over the gunwhale and landed it on the fender over the tires on the boat trailer. I then went out over the gunwale dragging my right leg over the wing (gunwhale) and planning on landing my right foot on the running board behind the fender. I had done it literally thousands of times. This time, while the right leg was going over the gunwale, my left foot slipped off of the top of the fender and lodged firmly into the gap between the boat hull and the back side of the fender. The right leg was still coming over the gunwhale and was not touching anything stable. The result was that my upper part of my body fell down onto the gunwhale and rolled off the side, onto the fender and running board, then onto the floor below. All the while, my left foot was firmly stuck and did not move. in effect, my body rotated around my foot almost 180 degrees. Somewhere in the fall I heard the leg snap just like a a baseball bat breaking.

As second or so after I hit the floor screaming, my socked foot came loose from my shoe and fell out. It then fell down to floor level, dangling from my leg.

I was conscious, so I took stock of my situation. I thought about screaming, but there were machines running in the body shop and I felt the effort would be wasted as I did not think I would be heard. The next thought was: where was my phone. Well, it was across the shop on the other Side of the boat on my desk. I was going to have to get to my phone.

I sat on the trailer for a minute or two and realized that I was going to have to get to my desk by hopping, as I could not put any weight on my left foot at all. It was basically just dangling from my leg. I stood up on my good let and hopped along the side of the boat using the boat for balance. I got to the front of the boat and realized I was going to have to get around the tongue of the trailer and then cross an open expanse of about 10 feet to reach the desk or counter. I knew that was not going to work. I could not put the left food down and there was nothing for me to balance on as I crossed the open expanse. I had to come up with another plan. At the end of the boat over against the wall, (away from where I had to go) was a tall trash can on castor rollers. I used a couple of saw horses to hop over to the trash can. Once there, I was able to use the rolling trash can as a walker and move in front of the boat tongue and across the open space to my desk. There was a rolling chair at my desk and I was able to land in it to catch my breath.

The first call I made was to Susan. She was at work, she had a key. If something went wrong with the door or lock, she knew I was down and in trouble and could be there with a key if need be. The next call was to 911. I gave them the address and they asked a lot of irrelevant questions while we waited for the ambulance and fire dept to arrive. My next call was up to Trish at the body shop. I needed her to direct the EMT guys to my doors which were closed.

The fire and ambulance arrived and put a very poor make-shift splint on my let and transported me to Rideout Adventist Health Hospital in Marysville.

The next chapter is the Emergency Room over the next 6 hours.