How I became the Metallic me.

It was not a wonderful morning by any standards. It was an okay okay one nonetheless. I woke up in time and got ready. I was really looking forward to going to my office that day. After all, I was, for the first time, given a whole huge Bluetooth module to work on, independently. And the best of all? I had finally figured out a solution to a problem that had not let me proceed with the module. I was really looking forward to flaunting about it with my colleagues and impressing my ma'am (my boss).

After my mom made sure I had gulped down enough idlis to last a lifetime, I did my namaskar to her and took my vehicle keys and left my flat. I usually take the vehicle out of the parking area, ride close to my balcony, and wave a 'tata' to my mom before I ride off to work. That day too, I did the same. Only, today the mami in the flat above ours was squeezing some piece of dripping wet cloth before she hung it to dry and unfortunately did not notice me standing below, looking up, waving at my mom. She was probably putting to test, the elasticity of the cloth that a good half a bucket water wrung out of it splashing onto my head. I looked up at her in bewilderment and thought she might at least apologize. I mean, I was already half way into shouting out, 'Its okay aunty'. In a certain south Indian slang, acquiring a bulb is meant to represent having encountered something very humiliating. That morning I got a 'Tsunami-Bulb' - Bulb of the highest order. Cos the aunty didn't even bother looking down at the artificial soapy rain she had drenched me with. And there I was, standing down, wet, flat faced, looking at her empty balcony with all generosity to accept her apologies. My mom was mouthing *beeps* for that imbecile of a lady. She insisted that I change and then go. I was running a wee bit late and so decided otherwise. It didn't feel so bad, what with the sun beating down upon me. It might've as well swung a gadha (once owned by Bheema, may be) on my head. Except for a mild aroma of the Tide detergent powder, I was alright in a matter of minutes.

I rode, snaking my way through the ridiculous Guindy road traffic, and occasionally, when the traffic cleared for a pico second or lesser, was as usual, petrified by vehicles zooming so close to me that I thought they were gonna ride over my feet. Probably like one of those goofy stunts they show on AXN where people lie flat on the roads and let cars n trucks ride over their limbs and when done, smile at the camera most often with a thumbs-up signaling that their limbs were still functional. Dolt - is also a word they can happen to be addressed by; both, the AXN people and the people who rode the vehicles brushing the ones they happen to ride past.
The worst part of the ride is when you reach the Sardar Patel Road. It is definitely longish and connects some really important places like Saidapet, Guindy, CEG, Adayar, CLRI, IITM, OMR etc and so calls for some bulky traffic during all parts of a day. My office at IIT Madras research park, demanded that I take that road. And I did, as always. The signal at Madhyakailash cleared and I got stuck to the right end of the traffic. I entered the OMR with a million others tugging close behind me.

One fellow being, 'the- Dolt-of-the-decade' riding a Santro, right beside me decided he would brush up against me. It would be make more sense if I put it this way; his car was blatantly trying to flirt with my vehicle; like what happens on a city bus when a guy decides to stand right beside you and keeps rubbing his shoulders with yours. His santro rubbed shoulders with my Scooty pep. I was already only an inch away from the huge cement median of the road. I never understood why they purposefully made certain walls coarse and scabby. U have seen one of those, haven’t u? I mean, it doesn't even appeal your eyes, let alone your palm, when you rub it. This median was built exactly like that, at least 3 feet and a half tall.

The result of the automobiles amorous episode ended calamitous. The scooty was shoved onto the median. The Santro still wouldn't give up. It decided to go for a full on contact with the pretty Scooty whose right half was being overwhelmingly rubbed and bruised by the median wall. If you might remember, I was the one that happened to be riding her. And hence the shove beleaguered me as well, no surprises there. I must've ridden her in the stance for about a minute when the Santro gave up, turned his nose down upon my Scooty and moved away into the rest of the traffic; probably to harass more girls.
Skipping all the parts that might welcome an 'OMG!' or 'WTH' or 'Oh god, please stop Aishu' comments, and digressing from all the grotesque details, I had hurt myself really really bad. Before I could realize where I was, I was on the road, hard on breath. In addition to my right knee and a lot more of my right leg, I had also hurt my ribs. I couldn't breath. People stopped riding, traffic piling behind me. One Christian couple - God bless them - helped me, be transported into a car.
In the car, I sat gasping and sweating like a pig that had just finished an hour long work out. I took my phone and started calling people and informing that I had met with an accident - yet again. The car had by then taken me to the hospital nearest - the VHS hospital. I still couldn't breath, was bleeding all of what my bone marrow had produced over the past one decade.

At the hospital I sat gasping (yes, I was still gasping) and holding my right leg together. My rescuer stood by my bed holding my shoulders from shaking. A couple of lazy nurses came into the room I was deposited in. They looked down at me, bored and one of them yawned at my massively bleeding wound and took a huge bundle of cotton and dipped it into a horrifyingly brownish liquidy liquid. In the meantime, one doctor came by, adjusted his spectacles up and down his stubby nose and looked down at my knee and told that I had fractured my Patella into a few tens of pieces and that I would have to undergo a surgery to stick it all up – I was praying I still had all of them somewhere in my leg. He said that and left. The nurses were talking about how much of urad dal has to be added to the Idli batter to make it as soft as malligai poo (malligai poo = tamil equivalent of the flower Jasmin; Yeah we do compare a soft idli to the flower despite the mismatch in the temperature or the aroma or for that matter, the size. Since I am not aware of the sapid traits of the latter, I choose not to comment on that. For all I know, someone probably did approve of the analogy after finding striking similarities in the taste). The nurses then took to a very painful process of cleaning and dressing up my wound (the pain was all mine by the way).
By then, my brother, dad, mom and my neighbor had arrived. Two of my really close friends from college also had come. I was in the lime light; a bloody one though. Since the hospital was not really hygienic and all those, I was, in an ambulance, taken to the nearest 'insanely costly' hospital with all those flashy receptions and flowery corridors nonetheless reeking of medicines.
I was taken into the ICU after a hundred different scan procedures in one of which I was diagnosed of suffering from an internal hemorrhage in my liver and blah blah and bull’s claw (that was a phrase I just invented. I really had to use that here though it makes as much sense as differential calculus in a history class) I was strapped onto a cushy cushy bed, which I would've otherwise enjoyed sleeping on, if not for the hundred little needles poking into all of my wrists. I don't remember much after that. I slept for most of the time. And after a few hours in observation, the liver was found to have stopped bleeding and the doctors then decided I would have to be operated on, the coming day. I was asleep all the while by the way.

Morning, noon, night, I didn't know one from the other. I was not to eat or drink anything till I was done with my surgery. Before I knew it, it was time for me to be operated on. They wheeled my bed to the operation theater. I saw a very grief stricken version of my mom and bro on the way. I waved them a hi and wished someone would shoot a video of me showing a victory sign from the bed, so that I could brag about it later. Since they all seemed apparently shaken, clumsy and fidgety cos of the melancholy they were faced with, I decided otherwise. Anyway, I was taken into the theater and transferred to another bed. Beside me someone was cluck-clucking the scissors, someone was trying to find out if the drilling machine was still working alright and someone accidentally dropped a huge hammer onto the floor. I was at Dr. Jekyll’s. One pleasant looking fat doctor came and told me that he was my anesthetist and that they would be administering a complete anesthesia before the surgery. I didn't really mind. I only wanted to be left alone and let to sleep.

I slept through the surgery and woke up after what seemed like a couple of minutes, but which was in actual about 5 hours or so, heavily dreary and pained. I finally got to go home after 5 excruciating days at the hospital of which most of my time I spent either singing or retching and puking. I had my right leg bundled  heavily with a couple of metal screws drilled into my knee bone and a coil winding my Patella (wow I was metallic now! :-P ) and had a very pained respiration that had resulted from the rib fracture. It took me 4 whole months before I could walk on my own without the assistance of this one squarish walker. Then there were these really painful sessions of physiotherapies and some wonderful times I got to spend with a couple of my friends and my family, after which I am decently cured now, but only for another surgery requiring the removal of the implants. 
Even for someone as accident prone as I am, I would call these a teeny weeny bit overwhelming. And ta daa! The ugly frog turned into a handsome prince, married the princess, and they lived happily ever after..
Err.. Wrong ending. Please reread as : That is how I ended up becoming metallic :-D