What a Canker

Every once in a while my body goes through a lapse of motor skill, and my mouth forgets the well tread boundaries of my teeth.  I'll be happily chomping away at some tasty morsel, and my lip will just fly with reckless abandon into the path of my oncoming incisors. 

The pain is horrendous, but what's worse is the frustration at the lack of coordination and common sense exhibited by my body.  I've been chewing stuff for over 26 years, one would THINK that my lips would know to stay out of the way of my teeth.  But no.  They apparently don't.

The following hours are wrought with residual sting from the bite, and swelling of the pulpy flesh into which I've ripped.  I don't bleed that often, I save that for the worst bites, but I do try to keep all foods and liquids from touching the bruised area.  Within the next couple of days, the wound begins to heal; but in most cases, I will almost certainly bite the area again due to its swollenness, and will not only perpetuate the healing process, but cause the wound to take more drastic measures to repair itself. 

Enter the Canker Sore.  These beauties are like those blisters you get on your hand that fill with puss so they look like little, white water balloons.  Wikipedia says that Cankers and "Cold Sores" aren't the same thing; that Cold Sores are caused by Herpes, which I DON'T have.  So these Canker sores just sorta go away on their own, if you can manage not to bite into them and puncture the little puss-jewel.

Amidst all the annoying and painful qualities of these babies, I do kinda start to enjoy the feeling of running my tongue over the small alien texture on the inside of my lower lip (where the current one happens to be, and come to think of it, where most of them show up).  It's like a little ramp for my tongue who gets to pretend he's a skateboard or BMX bike just for a second as he leaps off the sore's squishy surface.

Jess remarked to me the other day something about our bodies being "the ultimate luxury transportation device" like it's a BMW or something.  I understand the sentiment; that God created our bodies with such an amazing technical aspect, and we should utilize that more often; as in exercise.  But my Canker sore is definitely more characteristic of a Kia than a Rolls Royce.

NOTE: These are not MY canker sores! They are random images I found through Google.