Greetings, all--
Talk about a fickle finger of fate...yesterday I was playing a casual game of basketball--had my hands up to receive a pass--and said pass slammed into the tip of the middle finger of my right hand. I look at my fingertip--the top joint is pointing down at a 45 degree angle from the rest of the finger. To the ER we go, where I learn that I have mallet finger, or as it is commonly referred to, baseball finger. Turns out this is a common injury in baseball, basketball, and football, and occurs when the force of a ball hitting the fingertip causes a tendon in the finger to either rupture completely or tear; the tendon in question basically operates and moves the fingertip joint. True to form, I could not straighten out the fingertip--I could straighten it out using my other hand to support it, but by itself it just droops. And the best part, as you guys have probably guessed--I'm strictly a fingerstyle bassist.
The treatment [Xray showed no broken,or fragmented bone,or dislocated finger] is 8 full weeks of splint on the finger, to give the tendon time to fuse back to its connecting point. While most people with this injury regain adequate fingertip function, there is no guarantee that full function and/or appearance will be restored. Surgery is usually not an option except in the case of broken bone [in addition to tendon damage] so severe that the finger would otherwise be deformed or totally unusable, which does not appear to be my case.
So...I'm still coming to the gathering on March 15--wouldn't miss it for the world, but I'll be the one with a very visible splint on my finger and not able to play. Yeah, yeah I know there's always flat picking, and a number of bassists use picks, including Phil Lesh, but unless I'm forced to go that way by future medical issues with this fingertip, I just don't want to go there. Plus, 2 weeks is not much time to learn a whole new style of playing.
One semi-cool benefit of all this--I'm right-handed--when I hold a fork now, my right thumb and all the fingers are wrapped around it, but by middle finger is sticking straight out in a classic flip-off position. It will be very useful at office lunches with all the bosses present--I've always wanted to flip most of them off, and now I can do so in all innocence!!
Seee you guys on the 15th--
Eric
