WEDNESDAY 18 MAY     PUNGALINA

I went up at the house, to do our washing in the machine that was kept on the verandah.

There was a long ironwood bench there, upended on top of another one. It had been that way ever since we’d been there. Because the support struts between its six legs were barbed wire that caught on the washing sometimes, and because there was no handy place to put the clothes basket, I decided to get John to help me lift it off and turn it right way up. As we were doing this, I lost the grip on my end and it fell on my foot – with the very sharp wooden edge across the front of the foot. Ironwood is bloody well named!

My foot hurt, hugely, for ages. I wasn’t game  to take off my sneaker and inspect the damage, because it felt like there was blood squishing around in there!

I finished the washing, limped out and hung it on the line, then drove back to our camp, where I eventually got up the nerve to take off my shoe and look at the foot. There wasn’t blood, which was good, but the foot was swollen and turning black. I suspected there might be some small bones broken. It would have to be thong only on that foot, for a while – no way would it fit in the sneaker again.

There wasn’t much I could do for the rest of the day, except feel sorry for myself, and drive back up to the house later in the day, where John helped me pick in the washing.

Rather ironically, O had commenced making a second table for the camp dining tent – using some rather rough ironwood for the top, and a metal frame for the base. The roughness didn’t matter, because it would be covered by a tablecloth. The new table, butted up against the one already in there, would enable comfortable seating for up to sixteen  diners.