Friday – 26, September 2025:

“I don’t think I will be able to have it for eight days. Can you go and ask him if he can remove the cast and just put a plaster around the toe?” I asked my wife while sitting on a metal chair in the waiting area of the ortho clinic.

“It’s not a good idea. You need to have it for the broken bone to heal,” my wife replied.

“I don’t think I will be able to have it. Can you please go and ask him?” I asked in a tone that combined both desperation and frustration.

Reluctantly my wife went into the doctor’s room to check with him.

It started raining heavily as I waited for my wife to come out. I could hardly think about anything apart from the multitude of sensations originating from beneath the wet cast on my left leg.

There were three other groups of people in the waiting area besides me. There was a college student who had come along with his mother. He had a pink-colored bandage wrapped around one of his feet.

There was an elderly woman who struggled very hard to even climb the two steps leading up to the clinic. A younger woman was with her.

There was a third group of several people. It was hard to tell who was the patient in that group. The group were very animated, talking among themselves as well as moving from one part of the waiting area to another.

After a few minutes a middle-aged woman and her adolescent son, who were completely drenched, came into the waiting area and sat in the chairs facing me.

The door to the doctor’s room opened, and my wife came out. She came and sat next to me and started, “He said that the crack is slightly deeper. If you don’t have the cast, the toe won’t heal. And then you might need two surgeries—one to keep the wire for the fracture to heal and one to remove the wire after it has healed. He has prescribed a tablet to reduce the itching sensation. I think you will have to retain the cast for eight days. It is for your good only.” My wife had the look of a Nazi general delivering the terrible news to Adolf Hitler.

A sense of defeat clouded over my mind. The rain was still in full swing. The college student was getting restless. He wanted to go home. His mom pointed out that it was still raining heavily and they could not go on their two-wheeler in that downpour.

In a few minutes, the downpour reduced to a slight drizzle. My wife and his mom went to the nearby pharmacy to buy medicines. He got lost with his phone.

‘What happened?” I asked him.

“I broke my foot while playing football in college,” he replied cooly.

“How long did you have your cast?”

“I had two casts for a total of thirty days,” he responded with a triumphant tone of an adolescent who had just completed his rites to passage into adulthood.

I looked at him but did not follow-up with another question. He continued to look at me briefly and then retreated into his digital world. I went back to languishing in mental agony.

After a few minutes his mom came back with the medicines. He started walking towards the gate. In a few minutes I heard the retreating sound of a scooter.

My wife came back in an auto. She came back and wrapped a carry bag around the cast. We got into the auto to go home.

That night I could not think of anything else other than the discomfort caused by the dampness from the cast seeping onto my skin. I watched stand-up comedy on YouTube for a long time. But none of the jokes were as effective as the dampness from the cast.

Sunday – 28, September 2025:

I asked my wife to check if the ortho clinic is open so that we can go and remove the cast. She called the three numbers printed on the prescription sheet multiple times. No answer.

I then asked her to call her former physiotherapist. She dialled and started, “Hello, Mam…” The conversation continued back and forth for nearly twenty minutes. The conversation sounded more like their catch-up call.

When my wife finally placed her mobile down, I looked at her.

“She said that she won’t come and remove the cast.”

“Did you ask her if I can remove the cast myself?”

“She mentioned that if you don’t plan to go to that doctor again, then you can remove it on your own.”

“So, what should we do now?”

“Why don’t you try and manage until tomorrow? We can go to the clinic tomorrow and get the cast removed.”

As we were talking, my mom walked into our room to inquire about the conversation with the physiotherapist. My wife went on repeat mode. She explained the situation to her.

“A small child had a cast for so many weeks. He can’t even manage for two days,” my mom commented with the disgusted tone of a math teacher reprimanding her student who can’t recall Pythagoras’ theorem.

My mind voice: “Thanks, Mom. That was so helpful.”

She was referring to my son. In January my son fell from his cycle and incurred a hairline fracture in his right elbow. He had a cast for SEVEN LONG WEEKS.

They both looked at me with the same disappointed look of Sanjay Manjrekar and Ravi Shastri reviewing the dismal performance of Indian batsmen in the fourth innings of a WACA test match.

As I did not respond, they decided to entertain themselves with their own mother-in-law versus daughter-in-law verbal volleys.

My mom lobbed first, “I took care of my son without any major injury for so many years. See what has happened under your able reign.”

My wife smashed a backhanded return, “My son had a cast on his hand for seven weeks without any complaints. Your son can’t handle the cast for two days. Your son is such a crybaby.”

They both argued with the same animosity of an elderly couple reluctantly working out a schedule of taking their pet dog for morning walks.

My mind voice: “Enna vachu comedy kemady pannalaye?” (Rough translation: Are you guys using me as a prop for your comedy show?)

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This essay is part 1 of the 5-part personal essay series – Agonizing over a cast

Part 2: https://yogesvr.xyz/2025/10/21/agonizing-over-a-cast-the-bad-news/

Part 3: https://yogesvr.xyz/2025/10/22/agonizing-over-a-cast-conjuring-up-scenarios/

Part 4: https://yogesvr.xyz/2025/10/23/agonizing-over-a-cast-the-zen-master-in-the-house/

Part 5:  https://yogesvr.xyz/2025/10/24/agonizing-over-a-cast-painting-our-own-rainbow/