Posture

Sometimes, when I catch a reflection or a mirror's evidence of my uneven gait, it stops me in my tracks.

Why is my right hip up at an angle.  There's no way that helps propel me forward.

Why is my entire torso angled to the left?  My hips are going forward, and my head is aimed that way too.  But my thoracic spine decided a while ago to turn away from my injured acetablulum, trying to escape the inescapable.

In response to a talking head on tv,  TBG wondered if I would ever get over being shot.   No, and I don't want to.

Certainly the physical pieces are constant reminders, so hoping that I'll be able to relegate it to the Oh, yeah, what about that? bin in my brain would be a fool's errand.  And why would I want to get over something which at its core is evil but whose effects have been quite special?

I'll never get over the murder of my little friend, or the hole she's left in the lives of those who loved her.  But I look at the good that's been done in her name, and I can smile.  I'd love to see Gabby on the Democrat's debate stage this year, but the work that she's done with Giffords on the state and  local level has been nothing short of miraculous.  And then there's Grandma's Garden......

So today, when I stood in front of the mirror at Pilates, I thought about loving the injured area, about admiring it for the work it's done over nearly a decade, about being proud of it for all it's been through and how it has endured. 

It's still hard work.  The Pilates Diva had to readjust me more than once.  There are so many moving parts to organize - my spine and my head on the very top, my femurs in their sockets on one smooth, horizontal plane, both my feet feeling equally planted on the ground, toes facing forward. 

Most of that list has been a goal rather than a fact for a long, long time.  It's only in the past two or three years that I've felt confident enough to walk up the middle of a staircase, without holding on to a railing or a cane. I have to work on my endurance and strengthening my right quad would help in so many, many ways, but if new challenges didn't present themselves, how would I know that I am changing? 

As long as the pain keeps moving around, I think I'm on the right track.