Health and Safety in the Writing Room

I should come with a health warning. I contemplate this as I look out of the office window and consider my predicament while trying to focus. Taking in the ramifications of such an innocent manoeuvre, I’m astounded at the damage that I've caused. All I did was pivot on my seat while trying to roll closer to the bin and lean; that was the fatal error, I leant between the spokes at the bottom of my office chair.

The fall was in slow motion but the ‘shit, shit, bugger, bugger’ was in rapid fire. I bumped my head on the way down on the corner of the small metal filing cabinet. One arm is now in the broken plastic wastepaper bin, where I had thrown the troublesome short story. I had fallen on a stacked pile of box files that had crumpled under my weight. The irksome chair spindle with its rotating wheel had trapped itself on the desk I was sitting at and the angle of the seat made it impossible for me to move. The arm of the chair dug deep into my rib cadge and the only thing I could think of was how ugly my legs were! They’re like ham hocks, I thought.

With every move I tried to make, came more pain and clearly I’m in shock as silly thoughts whizzed around my dizzy head. It had been a long-long time since I had a fall. Now I understand why old people get so anxious about being unsteady, it is undignified, painful and as you get older and less agile, slower to recover. My husband and I share the office space and his desk was trapping me by the draw I had opened to take the paper out to load in the printer. So I turned to the left and even though my face was being squashed into the box files and my ribcage complained, I wriggled to try to get a grip of anything. My head was down my bum was taking flight and my little legs were scrabbling to get a grip but to no avail, they spluttered and I collapsed.  A quick round of expletive fire shot from my mouth, muffled by the paper debris spread underneath me on the floor.

I now found that the chair was wedging me against the velux window on the sloping ceiling and as looked out the blackbird looked in, with bemusement or pity I couldn’t really tell. But enough resolve surged through me and like the Hulk I emerged from the fragments of my novels.  Triumphant I went to have a coffee, nursing my several bruises, scrapes and aches.

I do suffer for my art!

My husband's reaction to this was 'Oh you fell of the chair then! Why didn't you just put that.'

Perhaps I should've, who really wants to know about my antics?