Monkeying around leads to broken bones, 60 years apart

To borrow a phrase from New York Yankee catcher and philosopher Yogi Berra, it was déjà vu all over again.

My wife, Hedy, received an early evening telephone call the other night from our daughter, Jenn. Our 7-year-old granddaughter, Bella, a second-grader, had tumbled from the monkey bars at school that afternoon and broken her wrist.

“She’s OK,” her mother hastened to add, but she now bears a cast on her right arm (a lovely pink cast, as we discovered the following day).

After taking the phone call, Hedy and I cogitated about the accident.

“The poor darling,” Hedy groaned. “She must be in pain. This is going to be a long night for mother and daughter.”

I then reflected upon a repressed memory embedded deep in the parched folds of a particular borough of my brain that hasn’t entertained a thought in maybe a millennium.

Sometime in the spring of 1952 — during my second-grade year at Corona del Mar Elementary School — I broke my elbow in a fall from the monkey bars. Like Bella, I was 7.

That was 65 years ago.

When we received our daughter’s call the other evening, I was reminded of Yogi’s déjà vu quote.

Bella stayed home from school the next day, and Hedy and I visited bearing oma and opa “feel-better” gifts. We requested a special audience with Bella and a blow-by-blow account of the accident. She happily agreed.

I began a rambling dissertation of my broken-arm story from seven decades ago. Hedy rolled her eyes and delivered a razor-sharp elbow to my ribs, convincing me that my drama wouldn’t help Bella deal with hers.

I hastily drew my comments to a close with: “Wow, your pink cast is far better than the grungy white one I had that went from my wrist to my shoulder.”

In 1952, I was in the second grade at Corona del Mar Elementary School — a leafy campus long since bulldozed. I was there for 31/2 years. It’s a shame it had to close; it was a lovely school.

As best as I can recall, it was located a block west of today’s Sherman Gardens.

The day of my fateful plunge I was playing on the monkey bars during lunch recess. I swung for a bar, missed the handhold and fell to the dirt below. I landed awkwardly, with my left arm twisted beneath me.

I don’t think I cried, but I was in pain. Several classmates assisted me, and one ran from the dirt field to the main office to get the school nurse.

I remember that she tried to get me to bend my elbow. I couldn’t. Endeavoring to be a brave soldier, I said with certainty: “I’ll be able to bend it in a little while.” I didn’t want to make a big deal of it … a character flaw that’s plagued me ever since.

The nurse called my parents, and they drove from our Balboa Island home to pick me up. Mom and Dad took me to our family physician on Marine Avenue. One look and he referred me to St. Joseph Hospital in Orange (Hoag didn’t yet exist). My doctor thought I needed surgery.

My parents attempted to prep me for that eventuality. Mom offered soothing words en route. I remember sitting in the backseat of the car, cradling my elbow in my lap, and watching orange trees speed past the windows on both sides of the car.

Upon arrival, I was sent for X-rays. I was mentally and emotionally primed for surgery, but the doctor said I didn’t need it. He set my elbow and put the arm in a cast.

The next day I returned to school a hero. I ended up wearing that itchy plaster of Paris monstrosity for six weeks. It drove me nuts.

Sweet Bella became a hero at her school, too. She ended up with dozens of signatures on her cast.

For this grandpa and his granddaughter, monkey bars are an added bond in our relationship.

JIM CARNETT, who lives in Costa Mesa, worked for Orange Coast College for 37 years.