What A Dick

It’s not often my father surprises me, but last night he managed to.

My parents and I were walking to the car after a rather pleasant night on my balcony having a BBQ with Tracey’s family and chatting about how lucky we all are to still have my wife in our lives.

“You know that time in Papua New Guinea when I had that accident?” Dad asked me as we arrived at the fence.

I mumbled I did, even though I only know about it from his telling me. At eighteen or thereabouts he was on the back of an Army Reserve truck in Goroka when it went around a corner and threw him off, crushing him between the truck and the embankment. I knew from his telling of the incident that he’d damaged his bladder. What I didn’t know was there were other complications as well.

“After my operations I had a lot of the Reserve blokes come to see me in hospital,” Dad told me. “They were only allowed in two at a time, and with all the tubes and shit coming out of my middle section they all wanted to know the same thing – what have you done to yourself?”

It was around this point I realised I hadn’t heard this exact version of this story before.

“As in your injuries? Your bladder?” I asked.

“My bladder wasn’t worrying me so much so I didn’t mention that,” Dad told me. “Trouble was I was drugged up on pain killers and I didn’t now much about anatomy and doctor speak. One word is just like the rest with those blokes.”

I understand what he means. I think universities could cut a year off medical degrees if they just stuck to smaller words. Maybe a three syllable limit or something sensible like that.

“So every couple of blokes that came in,” Dad continued, “I told the same story – I’d broken my pelvis in three places.” He snorted a laugh at this point. “Only I didn’t call it a pelvis. What I told everyone in my platoon was I’d broken my penis in three places.”

Which Dad thought was a hell of a punchline.

“Jeez, they must have been small fractures,” I heard my Mum chuckle as her head disappeared down into the driver’s seat on the other side of the car.

A great story to end a good night on. As wrong as it sounds, the only thing which could have made it better was if Tracey was there to chuckle at my Dad’s doodle as well.

If you enjoyed this post please share, like or comment

“Raising a family on little more than laughs.”