Blood on the Champs-Élysées: How I Lost a Knife Fight in Paris

Sometimes the smallest mistakes leave the deepest marks.

“Mishaps are like knives, that either serve us or cut us, as we grasp them by the blade or the handle.”

― James Russell Lowell

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“The reason of my life is not to be the most beautiful woman in the world.”

― Isabella Rossellini

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“I look in the mirror and see a few scars, but I like myself.”

― Steven Adler

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Stuffed in an old shoebox in the corner of a closet sits a grainy photograph of a 17-year-old man-child, mugging for the camera.

Awkward, deeply insecure, with no idea how to navigate the uncertain life that lies ahead, he sits on the kitchen floor—crafted from the finest linoleum—of a modest Neutral Bay home.

Next to him sits his best friend, Brad.

Straddling both their laps is the one thing that can bring relief, however temporary, to an awkward, deeply insecure, 17-year-old man-child with no idea how to navigate an uncertain future:

A case of crisp, cold Australian lager.

This photograph was taken moments before what seemed like an inconsequential act at the time, but one that would mark the man-child for life.

And I’ve got the scar to prove it.

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“Well,” he purred, “It looks like I’ve got these two handsome young men all to myself for the next 12 hours.”

Flash forward 13 years and I’m not so much living the dream as the cliche’, the one in which my best friend and I—a new best friend, Chris—take a 30th birthday trip to Europe for one last hurrah before marriages, mortgages, and children snuff out the dying embers of our youth.

The steward who had just claimed us for the next half day was Phillipe’.

And as you might have guessed, Phillipe’ was gay.

Old-school gay.

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy gay.

Tailored clothes, impeccably groomed, smart, sassy, with a wicked sense of humor gay.

I liked him right away.

“Gentlemen,” he said, with a playful glint in his eye, “we will be arriving around 6:00pm local time, and between now and then I’ll be taking good care of you. If there’s anything you need, just let me know.”

It was a great way to start our trip, and truth be told, we lucked out, because we’d hoped to really “do it up” by flying to the continent First Class.

But after calling in the few meager favors we had and scrounging through the corners of our credit card statements for frequent flyer points, the best we could do was upgrade to Executive Business Class.

Not quite First Class. More like First Class adjacent.

But Phillipe’ was First Class all the way, and that’s how he made us feel, showering us with enough food, booze, and attention to make us feel special.

To cap off his kindness, Phillipe’ presented us with a gift as we deplaned.

“Now you two tigers have a good time in Paris,” he said, and with a wink slipped us each a bottle of wine.

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Unfortunately, our adventure on the Continent got off to a rough start owing to a missing bag, which delayed our airport exit for over two hours. Add another hour on the train and another traversing the streets of Paris looking for our hotel in a pre-Google Maps world, and by the time we settled into our rooms it was late night, and we were dead tired.

Definitely too tired to go to a bar, but not too tired to drink, especially if it was convenience drinking, Chris suggested we crack open one of the bottles Phillipe’ gave us.

I concurred, but we had a small problem—no corkscrew.

Fortunately—though soon to be unfortunately—I had packed an all-purpose tool in my backpack, which, despite its name, lacked a corkscrew, but included a substantial blade.

Fun fact: In a pre-9/11 world you could bring a knife or cutting instrument on a plane as long as the blade was less than 4-inches long.

Double fun fact: You could also bring liquids on board, including alcohol.

Booze, blades, and a cabin full of people stuck smelling each other’s breath for hours on end—it’s a wonder airline safety videos didn’t include tips for dodging a drunken shiv fight at 30,000 feet.

But I digress…

So here was my genius idea to de-cork the wine.

While sitting on the bed, I would put the bottle on the ground and grab the top half of the neck with my right hand. With my left hand, I would plunge the blade of the all-purpose tool into the cork, then, while twisting the handle, rapidly pull it back out.

And so I did.

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Have you ever had one of those moments where, logically, you know you were fucked? Like, beyond fucked, yet a tiny, desperate part of your brain starts grasping for any shred of optimism?

That’s how I felt the moment after I withdrew the blade—cork still fully intact and in place—and saw the thin red line that trailed its tip as it sliced across my palm.

Immediately and instinctively, I dropped the tool and clasped my hands together tight. But just as I was about to lose it, the voice of my mother, or perhaps it was my grandmother, some pollyannaish figure from my youth, elbowed its way ahead of my growing fear and said, “don’t panic, it’s probably not that bad.”

“What happened?” said Chris.

“I think I may have cut my hand,” I said—a line that easily won the understatement of the decade.

“How bad is it?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” I replied. “It’s probably not that bad.”

And with that, I unclasped my hands.

To my surprise and relief, despite finding a fine line of severed skin running the full length of my palm, the thin red line had grown no larger.

“Whew!” I said to no one in particular.

Three, two, one…

And then a gusher of blood came pouring out of my hand.

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Panic, fear, disorientation in a foreign land, and the passage of time have all conspired to blur the details of how we were able to find our way to the Emergency Room of a Parisian hospital.

I do remember quite a few hotel towels soaked through with blood, a desperate attempt to explain to the front desk clerk what happened, and a rough car ride with a cabbie who, it turned out, could achieve previously unimagined levels of disdain for an American passenger.

I remember sitting in the waiting room feeling like a fool.

Like I’d ruined our trip before it had even started.

“Using a knife to pull out a cork?” I thought to myself. “What was I thinking?

The irony of course is that we were in Paris, France, the land of wine.

Had I mustered the energy to go to the lobby, I’m sure the front desk had a drawer full of corkscrews. And even if I was too beat to hit the lobby, I could have simply leaned out the window and hollered, "le corkscrew?" and probably been showered with wine-opening sticks.

Side bar:

People who know this story often ask why I didn’t place my whole hand on the neck of the bottle?

Well, the hallmark of a stupid idea is that the stupidity doesn’t end with the idea, it also carries over to the execution. Which is just another way of me saying, “I have no idea.”

And it has occurred to me that if I did have my whole hand around the neck of the bottle, the twisting knife blade would likely have sliced right across my wrist instead of my palm, which would have been another story altogether, or potentially no story at all depending on how quickly we got to the hospital.

At any rate, I sat there, sad, depressed, and bleeding, until an orderly emerged from behind the double doors and called out, "Monsieur Lund?"

I was led to an examination room where the orderly motioned for me to hop up onto the gurney. I complied, he sniffed at me, then left without a word, pulling the curtain behind him.

About five minutes later that same curtain was suddenly pulled aside, and two beautiful French doctors appeared.

Today I would describe them as gorgeous, stunning even, but back then, constrained by the vernacular of the era, all I remember was thinking how hot they were.

Not just hot. Smoking hot.

High speed heaters dripping rocket fuel hot.

Bridget Bardot and Catherine Deneuve in their prime hot.

"Qu'est-ce que c'est?"

“What?” I said,

"Qu'est-ce que c'est?"one of them said, pointing to my hand.

“I was trying to open a bottle of wine with a knife and I cut my hand,” I said.

The blank look on their exquisite faces let me know they had no idea what I was saying.

“Not a problem,” I thought, “I know what to do.”

So I employed the tried-and-true move that monologuists—also known as Americans—use when dealing with a person who doesn’t have the courtesy to understand English. I simply repeated my explanation, louder, and with a French accent.

"Ah, I was trying to open le bottle of wine with, how you say, ze pocket knife, and I cut ma 'and.”

Nothing.

So I went into my best Marcel Marceau act, miming my way through the events of the night until one of them exclaimed, "Ah, je comprends!"

As they discussed my case with each other in French, a thought occurred to me.

“I should probably take a shot here.”

I mean, even though I had (have) no game with women, the odds that I would ever be in a room again with two smart, hot, French women were astronomical. And I would have, if it weren’t for two things:

I was already dating the woman who would one day become my wife.

And though I don’t speak French, I’m pretty sure I heard one of them refer to me as, Le dork.

So I passed, and 30 minutes and 18 stitches later, I was on my way.

I was told that if everything went okay I could get the stiches removed in about 10 days, which found me in Barcelona, where I visited a small hospital at the end of La Rambla.

"¡Hola Señor Lund! ¿Cómo está usted hoy?"

And with that, I turned around to see the most stunningly beautiful Spanish doctor enter the examination room.

Think Penélope Cruz in the first half of Blow, before she got all coked out.

“What’s going on with these European doctors?” I thought to myself.

"¿Qué pasó aquí?" she asked, pointing to my hand.

Drawing heavily on my three years of high school Spanish, I stumbled through an explanation, after which she said, "Perdóneme un momento," and left briefly, before returning with an assistant bearing a small pair of surgical scissors and forceps.

The doctor worked quickly and efficiently. After about five minutes, she finished up and gave me a gentle smile.

Calculating the odds of ever being in a room with a smart, beautiful, and kind Spanish doctor again, I once more contemplated taking a shot, but my love for my future wife had not dimmed in the past 10 days—and I’m pretty sure that under her breath I heard her refer to me as El dork.

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Though I’m a lefty, over the years, between the two, my right hand has had the lion’s share of the injuries.

When I was in 6th grade an errant softball broke my pinky finger. When I was 16, I ripped off most of the nail on my middle finger while trying to change a fan belt on my VW Bus. And two years ago, I almost sliced the tip of my index finger off while carving the Christmas roast.

The pinky healed, the nail grew back, and even the tip of my finger looks no worse for wear.

And when I gaze down at the palm of my right hand, I see the heart line, the head line, the life line, and the fate line. I see the palmar creases, the lines that naturally form where the skin folds as the hand flexes.

But what I don’t see is a scar.

There’s no trace of the knife that sliced my hand, nor remnants of the stitches put in and taken out.

What there is, however, on that hand, is a small, crescent-shaped scar that starts about an inch above the first knuckle of my thumb and ends just past the second.

It’s been there for about 40 years now.

“Dude, let’s crack a couple open,” said Brad, pointing to the case of beer across our laps.

“Totally,” I said, grabbing a cold one out from amongst its friends and lifting the pop top.

“Dammit!”

“What happened?” said Brad.

“It broke off, and the tab isn’t open,” I replied.

“Well, check one the drawers for a can opener or a corkscrew or something to push it in.”

“Nah,” I said. “I’ll just use my thumb.”

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The average person can read 250 words per minute.

If you made it this far, you took a ten minute break from an increasingly chaotic and unhinged world.

Come back here next week and we’ll do it again—or stay on break and check out The Best of ‘The Anecdote.’