Safety
I had a dream last night that I was swallowed a safety pin. I don’t really know why. I was just following the crowd.

We were eating some kind of food, and there were safety pins in it. I swallowed a first by accident and thought to myself, "This could be very dangerous." Then I swallowed a second. The third opened in my throat.

It was a small safety pin and it opened upright, the clasp above the elbow, the pin stabbing into the wall of my pharynx, just above my epiglottis. I felt a pain through my shoulder, an odd pain, like a muscle cramp, only sharper, more concentrated. It felt odd, but not unbearable.

I could still breathe, but I obviously needed to do something about the situation. So I panicked.

I never thought about getting the pin out the way it came in. My fingers were too short to reach down that far. Any movement my throat made helped the pin to dig a deeper, longer scar in my esophagus. The pin would only dig itself in deeper if I tried to expel it out that way.

I attempted to grab the pin by manipulating my Adam’s apple, trying to pinch the tip of the pin and pull it out through my neck. I thought of giving myself a tracheotomy with my fingers, but knew that I may render myself unconscious. I needed to get to a hospital.

I stunned myself into inaction. It could take minutes for an ambulance to arrive and something clearly needed to be done before then. But all I could do was wait for death.

I woke up.

The safety pin is aptly named. Although the design varies, it’s basic purpose it to fasten things that must be close to human skin. Sometimes, it is hard enough to open one with a finger and opposing thumb. Therefore, it is perfectly unlikely to be opened by an epiglottis. More likely, if it made it past my trachea, given the right amount of saliva, my stomach would digest parts of it. The rest of it would form a bezoar on the floor of my stomach.

I know this dream I had is true. I am eating safety pins, as are we all. And even though I know the risk to be minimal, I still can’t help being scared occasionally. What I’m doing is dangerous. And during those moments, I have to somehow keep myself going, to remember not to injure myself in panic.

I hope this helps.

John Gluck -- Editor-in-Chief