So I hit my hand with a hammer this past week ... I never did say that I was the smartest banana in the bunch. I had a hammer and a chisel working to remove some mortar that was on top of my brick wall as a cap. The mortar had been there for at least 15 years and so had ample opportunity to harden and it took swinging with almost all my might to chip away at it. After about an hour of this I got a little careless and missed the chisel and hit my hand in that fatty/muscle part between the thumb and forefinger. I can remember an initial flash of pain and then an ache all the way up to my elbow that seemed to flash with intensity with every heartbeat. I didn't yell, I didn't swear, I didn't even say a word ... I just calmly looked at my hand with kind of a disgusted, "that was a dumb thing to do," expression on my face.
When I was a kid and hurt myself I would run to mom for comfort, in between the sobs and screams I would wait for her to kiss it and make it better. As I got older I would yell and, yes, sometimes swear, when I hurt myself. Now I just get this disgusted at myself expression and in my mind I say: "that's gonna leave a mark!"
I find that in real life a lot. People who are used to pain and used to abuse don't even say a word about it anymore. At first they may have yelled and swore about it, then they may have cried to themselves or even others, but now they simply accept it as a dumb thing that was done. Sometimes others swing the hammer, these people will even blame you for holding your hand in the wrong place and after a while you just stay quiet. I can understand that now, I don't agree with it but I understand it. I think the Creator gave us an amazing coping mechanism in that we can shut out the pain and keep it from controlling our lives. But that doesn't mean we keep ourselves in harms way and allow the hammer to come down again and again.
With my bruised hand I rented an electric chisel for $10 and in less than fifteen minutes I had it done. Like a said, I'm not the smartest banana in the bunch, besides my wife wasn't too sympathetic when I tried to have her kiss it and make it better.