Friday in the park with Lindsey

It all began with a phone call from Lindsey. She has a photo gig on Saturday, and a new lens, so she wanted to get in a little shooting practice and wondered if I’d like to come along. After she arrived at The Compound and admired my Runway Monday design (weep, fellow contestants, because I’m kicking ass this week), we compared the sizes of our lenses (heh), then Lynne called. When we sought her advice on good places to shoot children (heh, again), she suggested Hermann Park. Leaving Tim with Sugar, the girls, and Rex, we headed for the park.

Lindsey’s always aware of my back, so we kept a nice gentle pace as we explored Hermann Park. I took around seventy photos. Here’s a small sampling:

A pro at work.

I fell in love with the shadows on this rock. Then Lindsey cracked me up by going all Karate Kid.

LOVED this child with the BEST laugh who was running between jets from a group of fountains.

This is when things got weird. Lindsey did a damsel in distress shot for me on the train tracks (the little train that takes people to the zoo and around the zoo grounds).

“Woe is me!” she cried.

I gave her a hand up, then I walked to the right of the tracks, and I think she took a couple of shots before she stepped to the left. She heard a loud popping noise, then she was down on the ground. I turned at the sound of her falling, and she said, “I think I broke my ankle.”

We were both pretty calm, trying to figure out what to do, because at that point, there was no way she could stand. Lindsey, like me, has a high pain threshold, so when she says she hurts, you know she HURTS. I glanced around to see if there was any possible source of help, and she suggested I go to the little station where they sell train tickets. I hurried there, all the time berating myself because any of Lindsey’s other friends would have been able to run, and with my bum back, I felt like I was moving in slow motion.

But that was NOTHING compared to the slow motion of the woman at the ticket office. There was a couple in front of me buying tickets, and I convinced myself to take a few deep breaths rather than scream at them all to HURRY UP DAMMIT A WOMAN IS DOWN, DOWN! After what was probably only seconds, they were out of my way, and this conversation ensued:

Me: My friend fell about twenty-five yards directly behind here. She can’t walk, and I need help.
Ticket Woman: (Blank look.)
Me: So is there an employee with a golf cart or something who can move her from where she’s lying to our car?
Ticket Woman: No golf carts, no.
Me: Okay, then what do we do? She needs to be helped from the park.
Ticket Woman: We need the park ranger.

Me: Ooookay, so–

Phone rings and TICKET WOMAN ANSWERS IT! And instead of killing her, I just sent death rays into her brain while THIS conversation took place:

Ticket Woman: Yes….yes, we are open…yes, we are still open…Yes. Every day…Yes. Every day until 6:30….Yes, until 6:30. SIX THIRTY. Today….Yes. On Sunday, yes. In winter? Yes…

At that point, I was about to go through the window and choke her. She looked at my expression and hung up the phone.

Me: So you’ll call the park ranger, please? NOW?

Ticket Woman: No, I can’t.

THIS IS WHY I DON’T CARRY CONCEALED.

Me: Listen. I’m going to get in my car and drive it over your grounds to pick up my friend. Do you understand that?

Ticket Woman: You can do that?

Me: I CAN do that. Do you understand that I’m GOING to do that?

Ticket Woman: Yes. You can do that.

(I think she’s a Ticket Bot, actually.)

While hurrying to Lindsey’s car, I scoped out the area. The sidewalk was wide enough for a car. I saw where the curb had been cut to be handicapped accessible. I was figuring out where Lindsey had fallen and how to get there in the car. I could do this!

I jumped in the car, waited for the slowest driver in America to get the hell out of my way, and drove up on the sidewalk, where a woman with a baby in a stroller was coming toward me. I lowered my window so I could call out an explanation to her so she wouldn’t think I was some sidewalk-jumping, mother-and-child-killing freak, but then I spotted Lindsey hobbling away from Ticket Woman (Oh, man, I can’t believe she had to deal with Ticket Woman). She got in the car, trying to decide whether to laugh at my Bo and Luke Duke cross-country drive or whimper from pain. She swore her ankle was better to me and to Rhonda when Rhonda called. Rhonda gave us strict orders to come directly to The Compound and ice the ankle while she picked up a few things for Lindsey’s comfort.

Okay, the drive through Starbucks wasn’t DIRECTLY to The Compound, but it was on the way and only delayed us three minutes or so. And no one should be denied Starbucks when she’s possibly broken her ankle, right? We phoned ahead for Tim to open The Compound gates. Got inside, got Lindsey settled on the couch with her leg elevated and ice on it while we waited for Rhonda, who’d be taking her to the emergency care center. Recounted the adventure for Tim, at which point I said, “I’m not a true photographer, or I’d have documented Lindsey’s painful ordeal instead of waddling for help.” And Tim pointed out, “You’re not a true LiveJournaler, either, or you’d have done a voice post from the scene.”

DAMN.

ETA: The ankle is not broken. =) I’ll let Lindsey pick up the story when she has time.