There I stood, with a tearstained face and glass of vodka in my hand.
No, it’s not what you think.
The vodka wasn’t there to wash away my sorrows, but to wash my ugly, purple, infected wound. Appetizing, I know. I thought that I had surely sucked out all possible drama from my misadventure on the ice, but I was wrong.
My wound was healing fine. After five days, it looked as beautiful as a gash on the chin can. After five days, an excellent surgeon I know was convinced that the stitches needed to come out. After five days, the dentist at my favorite dilapidated Russian clinic assured me that it was much too early to rid me of my blue beard.
And on the seventh day, I did not rest.
The Friday morning I went to the Dostoevsky Museum marked my week anniversary of waking up with stubble on my chin. In the morning, I noticed that my stiches and the wound around it looked slightly different. I went to a pharmacy, bought what I thought was antibiotic ointment, and thought everything was fine. But later in the day, my friend Shelby noticed that my wound had turned purple and was swelling. I went to another pharmacy, explained my symptoms to a pharmacist, and she gave me bacitracin. At dinner, I showed my friend Cody, who, after looking at it, was pretty sure I needed to get right on antibiotics. So I went to another pharmacy and tried to get antibiotics, but she assured me I didn’t need them. (All this was great language practice!) As the night went on, the creepy purple swelling got worse, and I began to worry. I Skyped my parents with a picture of my chin and upon seeing it, they thought I might be in danger. The stitches need to come out, they said. Even if had to call a friend to take them out. Even if I had to do it myself. Every tragic ending to my story went through my head. What if the infection spreads and I die? What if? What if?
“Try to pull the thread and see if you can see the knot.” My Mom instructed me from the other side of the globe. At this point it was almost one in the morning and I was sitting on the bathroom floor, with the computer at my feet, a pitiful mess.
“Okay, I’ll try!” I stood up, looked in the mirror, and pulled on one of the threads protruding like hair from a witch’s wart. As I pulled, the wound started to bleed and I saw the skin pulling away. Squamish shivers washed over me like a score of spiders and I lost it. “I can’t do it!” I wailed. I sat on the floor and started breathing hard, crying, and hyperventilating. At this point my poor roommate Shelby was trying to give me privacy while reading a book outside the hotel room. When she came back in and saw me in my disheveled state, my parents talked with her and she went to get help. Before I knew it, four Americans and a Russian were standing around me, trying to comfort me. One was so nice she handed me a glass of water to calm me down. I wondered why she gave me so little as I brought the cup to my lips.
“Don’t drink it! It’s vodka!” She hadn’t brought me water to calm my nerves, but vodka to sterilize the wound. Long story short, I ended up traveling through St. Petersburg at three in the morning with Shelby and my R.D. in a valiant attempt to get my stitches the heck out! This clinic was much nicer than the one in Vladimir, and the doctors spoke English, albeit a very bookish, not quite-actually-spoken-English. I was sure they would take the stitches out. But no! The doc gave me amoxicillin and called it good. And that meant I had to return to my beloved Konstantine…
Upon returning from Petersburg, I dreaded my meeting with Konstantine, the dentist who I remembered as an overbearing, intimidating caricature of Russian male chauvinism. But Tuesday night I gathered my strength and returned to that lovely hovel that housed so many memories. And I received the surprise of my life.
“Nadyushka, come in!” Konstantine smiled at me as if we were old friends, using the diminutive form of my Russian name that is the equivalent of “Hopie.” The tension in my body relaxed as I leaned back and bared my chin. “It looks beautiful! You’ll hardly have a scar!” After five minutes of pulling, snipping, and calling me solnishka (sunshine), I was finished. “If you need anything, here’s my number.” He gave his number to my Resident Director. “I’ll be waiting for you next year,” he said, smiling. “I hope not,” I answered. “Just as a guest, don’t fall again.” I left the clinic in awe at the doctor’s transformed mood and euphoric that my fiasco with the Russian medical system was finally over. As I took the bus home, I was sure I was the happiest girl in the world. The wound is healing wonderfully, but nonetheless, I’ll have a souvenir scar that will tattoo this experience forever on my face. And I’m actually kind of excited about it.
Hope Unyielding 