the kickball blues

Another kickball game last night, another loss. It wasn't a terrible loss, at 3-6. The other team just had some powerful kickers. A typical strategy is to keep them low to the ground, to prevent them from getting caught. It's unbelievably easy to get out in kickball if you kick the ball up in the air, because it's so big and slow. This team said "screw you!" to that strategy. Their guys demolished the ball almost every time, getting it up in the air into the outfield. They either got lucky, or placed them well, because they generally went in between our people so that they couldn't get caught.

At one point, a ball was kicked up and fast toward me, like a line drive. I had a pretty good chance of catching it, but it got up just high enough to be in front of the field lights. The field lights are right behind the kicker, meaning anytime the ball goes up, you are being blinded by them. So, on its trajectory toward me, I lost track of the ball and barely missed catching it as it slipped awkwardly out of my hands. Even worse, the ball drove into the knuckle of my thumb, which immediately hurt. I was fairly certain it was jammed then, and this morning I am all but positive. My thumb is swollen, and I can't really use it much because applying any pressure to the joint causes sharp pain.

This comes as bad news for several reasons. First, you really don't appreciate how much you use your opposable thumb on your dominant hand until you have to avoid using it. Since it's only jammed and not completely incapacitated, I can still use it for some things. Overall, though, I have to avoid using it. Second, jammed fingers can heal as quickly as a week, or as long as a month if you're really unlucky. Hopefully I'm lucky. Third, we have a softball game tonight which I'm not confident I can play in anymore. Gripping a bat involves placing it in between your index finger and your thumb, and that is the location of my inflamed joint. I'm pretty sure that batting would hurt. Then I thought that I could skip batting and only go out in the field. However, I realized that throwing a softball involves gripping it in your hand and also using your thumb. So I might not be able to play after all. Finally, if my thumb continues to hurt for the next week or so, that will really put a damper on my motorcycle maintenance. For obvious reasons, I'm going to need to use both my hands fully. I might just have to sit on that one for a little while longer. [Update: This just in! As if my hand-writing wasn't bad enough, it is now worse!]

There is a very slight chance that it's a fracture instead of a jammed joint, but I highly doubt it. Nevertheless, I took this as an opportunity to finally schedule a doctor's appointment. I haven't been in about 3 or 4 years, so I figured it'd be a good idea to get a checkup/physical. I'll have him take a look at my thumb, too, but I don't anticipate it being fractured, nor do I believe he'll be able to help much since it just needs time to heal.

Oh well, shit happens.