It's not a rude question, or one people shouldn't ask. In fact, it's the logical question really: So, what did you do to your knee?
The problem? I have absolutely no freaking idea what I did to trigger this round of fun. I simply woke up and my knee was swelling and painful. But how do you convey this to people?
See, I've run into this in the past. If I say I don't know, people think I'm lying to them because the story is just too juicy to share, or they think I was too drunk to remember what I did. I don't like either connotation, and saying I don't know is always followed by them pressing you to tell them what really happened.
If I tell them the truth- that years ago I had two arthroscopic surgeries on that knee, and that periodically it just decides it hates me, and that I woke up three weeks ago with my knee swollen, unstable, and painful- then they sort of zone out halfway through and I feel like I'm boring them silly, or that I'm going into entirely too much detail. Clearly that option is out of the question.
So why not come up with a great lie to describe what happened? I have a huge problem with that because I hate lying to people. Even little white lies make me uncomfortable, so I'd prefer to just not do it, even if it would make my life easier.
So I think I've found the answer tonight. My husband took me to WalMart because I've been stuck in the house for three weeks, other than the trip to the ER and a horrible trip to the post office to mail off a package. After the fourth or fifth person asked what happened to my knee, I simply shrugged and said, "I'm clumsy, what can I say?"
And what do you know? They accepted that answer as explanation enough, and let me get back to what I was doing. Who knew it'd be that simple?
I certainly didn't!
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