One of my biggest childhood irrational fears came true last night

I work at a pizza place, we have to put those glowing sign magnets on top of our cars to deliver. I was going to remove my coworker’s car-topper from his car. I couldn’t reach it from the driver’s side, so I went to the passenger side. The curb was covered in snow. I tried to reach it and still couldn’t. I took another step forward and…

My leg sank into the ground. The snow plows on the road had covered a storm water drain in snow, hiding the opening in the ground. It’s one of those ones that has a vertical opening in the curb but also a horizontal one that extends a bit into the street. Maybe at some point, there was a small grate covering the street portion, but there isn’t one now.

As a kid, the thought of accidentally getting your leg stuck in one scared me. I imagined someone running from the sidewalk into the street, not aware of a drain’s opening in the curb. They unknowingly align their stride with that opening, jamming their leg in place as their body continues with that forward momentum. The pain and injury that could cause was terrifying to me.

Luckily, my childhood fears of my shinbone becoming L-shaped didn’t come true. I braced myself against my coworker’s car and the snowbank, preventing a further drop. The drain got up around my mid-shin, it hurt a bit but the pain went away fairly quickly. I just thought that was a dumb kid concern, but nope it’s entirely possible, it can happen.