Your pain is the breaking of the shell of your understanding." These are the great words of Kahlil Gibran, a famous philosopher from the 1800's. This is the story of great pain and horror. I broke something once. It wasn't a shell as I recall, it was more along the lines of bone, leg bone.
             One sunny May 15, in fourth grade, I was playing tag with some of my friends. I was corned on the slide. At the top there was a person who was it, and at the bottom there was another. So I did the most obvious thing. I took a leap to the rocky ground (the playground was made of rocks). I had done this many times before. This time was different. This time I broke my leg.
             I was lying on the ground in pain. I couldn't move my leg. Everyone at the playground was gathered around me. The principal came out at that time. I don't really remember what happened then. All else I remember was my mother was already at the school so I didn't get to ride the ambulance.
             My uncle was at the hospital waiting. He has broken many bones and done lots more stupid things than I when he was my age. I got my leg x-rayed. I had a wide fracture in my right leg. It was also kind of a twisted fracture. It took like three months to heal. I'm getting ahead of myself. They slapped a red cast on and told me all this stuff to do and not to do.
             When I first started on crutches I hardly moved. When I did I went very slowly. Soon, though, I was crutching faster than I could walk. Then I got the bright idea to go to my room. This also used to be up stairs. I got about three from the top and I rolled backwards down the stairs. My mom was asleep through most of this. The good news is I hardly got a scratch. Inevitably I slept downstairs again.
             I soon got good at going up and down the house stairs. Then my mom set up an appointment at the school so I could try there stairs. When I got up those stairs my ...