Icy Steps of Doom

I stepped onto the first and topmost step out of my estate and in a split second between the firing of the controlling neurons and my foot contacting the step I realized that it was not free of ice. A thin, molecular thin, sheet of deadly, deadly ice. The sort that creates and utterly frictionless zone under a lumbering hulk like myself.

With bumping and thumping I ended up in a heap at the foot of the ten or so stairs fronting my home. I knew my head was safe but my back felt broken. i had also winded myself a thing I'd never done before and instantly thought I was paralyzed and would die of asphyxiation at the foot of my home.

I did, though, quickly regain my breath and dragged myself, moaning like a gut shot eland the whole way, up the steps to the front door. I quickly set about terrifying the luminous Mrs. V. by ringing the bell like a mad man.

She came down and called an ambulance. Holding off a bout of nausea, she quickly set about trying to take care of the steps in anticipation of the EMT's arrival. They came, saw they would have to remove me through the back of the home and set about making it so. One of them, though warned, didn't hold onto the railing while returning to his truck and he took a tumble breaking a finger in the process.

All this drama, once I was deposited at the St. Vincent's ER, was followed by several hours of waiting, excruciating pain, a few pills finally, then some X-Rays and eventually a seal of bruised but ok health and a release.

Now I rest, type, watch "Poirot" and contemplate that never again will our steps be icy.