Growing old - ingrowing? There just ain't no glamour in the thing

You know you are getting old when you feel the Occupational Health and Safety geezers have a point about the risks associated with open toe sandals. In one quick stumble, I managed to leave half a toe nail hanging by a thread, resulting in a number of choice phrases crossing my lips as I hopped up the front path clasping the afflicted foot in a move reminiscent of yoga devotee stung by a bee.

As previously mentioned I’m a vain type, and fond of my toes, so I nursed the doomed nail on for a bit, even though it was obvious that a parting of the ways was imminent. The only upside of an absolutely hopeless Sydney summer was that my feet were more likely to be shoved into my fetching leopard skin wellies than called upon to make an appearance in public, so once the toe nail and I called it quits, after attempts to keep it wedged in place with sticking plaster failed miserably, I breathed a sigh of relief, kept feet firmly placed in wellies and waited for time to restore me to my former ten-toed glory.

Then began a nagging kind of pain, similar to the dental type ache that generally heralds a sucking in noise from both dentist and credit card, only this time, the pain was in my foot. Ingrowing toenail is not a phrase I ever wanted to have flashing across my brain. So far as I am concerned it belongs firmly in the ‘piles’ section of unfashionable ailments. There are after all limited instances of heroines reclining on sofas suffering from ingrowing toenails or of heroes nobly hobbling on.

Faced with this latest manifestation of body falling apart, I made the almost fatal mistake of consulting the Internet. I should point out that if my toenail reaches the point of surgical intervention, that despite being the most appalling publicity hound, I will not be recording the operation and posting the results on YouTube, but rest assured people do. The mere sight of surgical instruments being waved around defenceless tootsies was quite enough to make my bottom hurt, not to mention toes curl. In the meantime I’m googling the number for the man no girl wants to admit to having on speed dial, the podiatrist.