Random Thoughts

I've been watching the professional basketball playoffs with the same lack of enthusiasm I brought to the regular season.  The last 2 minutes of the 4th quarter are about all I can stand.  The finals are no better than most of the previous games; neither team seems to be bringing its A game for more than a brief moment or two.  It's sloppy and that makes it hard to follow if you're not a total b-ball geek.  And I am not.


If you need water-cooler conversation, the series is tied, the Mav's are the comeback kids, and where was LeBron in the 4th quarter?  
*****
I am a computer genius, it seems.  Blogger was not allowing me to access my site.  I tried it on Nellie the Netbook and everything was just peachy so it was this damn Dell again.  I managed my anxiety fairly well and only felt one or two tears welling up.  


Problems with electronics put me over the edge with alarming regularity.  Since I got shot, I've been able to let go of the sense of control I needed to feel regarding these inanimate yet prickly items.  I no longer default to screaming at the heavens.  I (relatively) calmly read through the discussion boards on Blogger's un-helpful help-site and managed to delete my cookies and clear my cache and when doing that to the last day didn't work I moved to the last week and then 4 weeks and before I had to hit time immemorial (yes it is an option) Blogger recognized me and let me in.


I am a computer genius and don't let anybody tell you otherwise.
*****
Went over to take G'ma for an adventure yesterday, but she was still a-bed though it was mid-morning.  I offered companionship and travel and she smiled, thanked me, and rolled over.


This, too, used to drive me nuts.  Yesterday, I smiled, gave myself credit for taking her out even though we didn't go anywhere, and drove to Target alone.
*****
Those electric carts in the big box stores could be my favorite piece of recovering.  When I'm upright, pushing the regular wagon, my cane stowed in the basket, I am unrecognizable.  Sitting on the moving cart, I attract attention.


Yesterday I was, once again, hugged by a total stranger.  This time it was in the potato chip aisle.  She admires me and is inspired by me and then we shared stories about how wonderful nurses and therapists can be.


I'm not enjoying the attention as much as I am enjoying the connection.  Healing gets lonely sometimes.  It's nice to be reminded that I am not in this alone.
*****
TBG finished his James Patterson novel, the one he took from Little Cuter in April. He may be the only person in recorded history to have taken more than two sittings to finish a JP book.  He's not happy that he spent his time wallowing in the nether world of Kyle Craig and Alex Cross.   "It just wasn't that good."


The man is too serious for trash fiction.  I'm going back to suggesting biographies and histories.  
*****
The quail eggs have hatched and Mom and Dad Gambel are escorting their brood across the street.  There are 6 or 8 little ones between them; they won't stay still long enough for me to get a clear count.


Mamma Mourning Dove is still on top of her next in the baby arms of the saguaro.  Her due date must be later this spring.

*****
I wonder where the road runner was before he started zipping through my front yard last week?  We've lived here 5 years and he's only the second of his species I've spied out this window.  He seems to have something going across the street under their Englemann's prickly pear cacti, but I am too lumbering to follow him apace.


Soon.  Soon.  Soon I will uncover his secret.  For now, he remains quick and mysterious.
*****

San Francisco, part deux

We had tried to go to the Academy of Sciences on Monday.  Using the handicapped parking placard I'd cleverly remembered to bring along this time, we secured a spot and followed Big Cuter's directions on the pathways and there we were at the Bandshell, looking out at a plaza that had been a parking lot before the renovations began as we were leaving the state in 2006.  

You may remember the Bandshell from J'Lo and Matthew McConaughey's Wedding Planner, one of our favorite San Francisco love stories.  It was the setting for the bride-gets-into-the-taxi scene toward the end.

But we didn't want music.  We wanted Natural History right up until we hit the ticket booth and saw that it would be nearly $60 for us to enter.  That wouldn't get us into the special beastie exhibit.  That required its own admission fee.  We grimaced.  We groaned.  We turned away.  My heart was just a little bit broken.  Taking Big Cuter to a museum was one of my favorite ways to spend a Monday morning back when he was in kindergarten.  I'd been looking to reprise the experience.  Alas, $60 was just more than we could bear to spend for an hour's entertainment.  I wonder what families with kids do nowadays; our museums were free back then.

As an alternative, since the sun was shining and there was barely a breeze, we parked ourselves on a bench and watched San Francisco go by. 

Bicyclists were everywhere, including this one who looked like an ad for living in San Francisco.  Is this hipster cool or what?

Big Cuter spent the weekend trying to show me the difference between hipster and yuppie and I guess nobody is preppy anymore.  Who knew?  Are there still jocks and greasers?  Do I care?  Such was our conversation that long and lovely afternoon.

There were frisbees and skateboards 

and dogs and babies and hawks floating on thermals.  We stared in fascination as one and then two little birds swooped and pecked and annoyed the hawk who was hovering over their tree.  They were tiny in comparison to his bulk, but they were undeterred.  He'd glide over the tree and there they were, slamming their little selves into his body and his wing span.  Protection was their game and they were not giving up without a fight. They drove him away, only to turn whirl around and find a sea gull diving in where the hawk had dared to try.  They undercut his approach and he took off squawking.  The good guys had won the battle, and retired to the nest to check on the chicks.  It was high drama.

We helped a tourist locate the restrooms and admired fancy socks and well-behaved children and mocked poor sartorial choices and tonsorial disasters and then we Zip Car'ed back to Big Cuter's apartment and fell asleep.  

Sight-seeing is exhausting

The Conservatory of Flowers

http://www.hoteltravelcheck.com/sfo/san-francisco-conservatory.html

It was built from a kit.  Seriously.  The original purchaser died before he could put it together but a consortium bought the kit from his estate and erected this confection in Golden Gate Park.  The flooring must have come with it.

The grates are good for drainage but interesting terrain to navigate as a tri-ped.

It didn't matter to the boys that it was rainy nor that it would be humid inside.  Big Cuter had picnicked and run by the building often enough to be intrigued, and TBG was so impressed with my stamina and mobility that I do believe he would have walked around Stow Lake with me had I asked.  Luckily for all concerned, all I wanted to do was go inside that white birdcage and walk around.  

The special exhibit was on poisonous plants.  Did you know that Abraham Lincoln's mother died after ingesting a poisonous plant?  I'm sure you have no idea how many murders were concocted out of the sap or the husk or the leaves of a euphorbia 

or foxglove

or oleander

This plant is not an oleander.  The sign behind it is terrifying.

Ever wonder why you can't buy raw cashews in the grocery store?  Shelling them exposes the worker to all manner of toxins; they are steamed open to get to the nut inside.  Although the sign assured me that cashews sold in the USofA are not dangerous, I'm going to look askance at their appearance in Spicy Cashew Chicken next time I'm at Beijing Restaurant.

No exhibit advertising Assassins could avoid the carnivorous plants.  

I kept looking for the sacrificial flies.  I was in the mood for some action.  I was disappointed.

Many of the displays were beautifully color coordinated.

There were many fantastic orchids I'd never seen before.

The conservatory was steamy and drippy and filled with green and there was no extra charge for the special exhibit.  Feeding my soul apparently costs only $7. 


I'm a cheap date.

Working Out

I'm pushing myself once again.  It's a struggle not unlike those I watch on Biggest Loser or listen to from the mouths of my friends and my mother.  It hurts.  It's not fun.  I want to do that but my body does this.  And I'm not making any progress at all.


Or so it seems.  Those who see me infrequently are amazed at my speed and my posture and my attitude, but day to day it's often hard to focus on the little gains which are really quite remarkable I know but.... 


There's always a but, isn't there.  But I'm not balanced.  But I'm teetering from side to side. But it hurts.  But what if I fall? And, perhaps the worst one of all, but what difference will it make if I take today off?


A roadrunner just zipped across the front yard and has settled into the shade under the mesquite tree across the street.  My camera is right here.  The weather is fine.  It's a picture ready to be taken and yet I sit here, stuck by the notion that by the time I got there, lumbering with my cane and the camera swinging wildly as I try to stay focused on looking up and not down, well, the bird will have moved on to other pursuits and I'll be standing there having accomplished nothing but aggravating myself.


Really and truly, Baskin Robbins sounds better to me right now than lifting weights ever has.  


That's what happens when I focus on what I can't instead of what I can.  Those buts stand up and push their way into the forefront of my consciousness and all of a sudden I'm wallowing instead of working.  Lying still for 12 weeks trained me well to look for the positives when I'm immobile.  I watched the sun march across the sky in a northward arc as the months went by and I healed at that pace; slow and steady won that race.


I need a new frame of reference right now.  My old routine involved dripping sweat on the treadmill or the elliptical with the moving arms and lifting weights with precision and good form.  Pilates mat classes and all kinds of yoga (except Bikram because really what's the point when you live in a place where the temperatures outdoors regularly hit 104 anyway?  I don't need to go inside and exercise to feel the heat.) were in the mix, too.  


I started back simply using the recumbent bike for 10 minutes and doing the exercises Marcus the Master Manipulator created to stretch and strengthen me back into shape.  People were glad to see me in the gym, but I didn't like being on the Nautilis side of things.  I'm a free weight girl.  Always have been.  Always will be.  But the fear of dropping one or being unable to get up and the absence of Amster as a spotter and buddy was just the excuse I needed to keep me from trying.

chikung-unlimited.com

Then, I moved on to yoga.  Getting down onto the mat was really really hard, but my yogi tailored the class to what I could do and no one seemed to notice.  That's one of the wonderful things about yoga; it is your practice.  I couldn't do all that I could before, couldn't even sit with my legs akimbo let alone all the way into half lotus, my usual posture.  

labayoga.com

BUT, I was still the plank queen and that felt pretty good.  The second week was easier than the first, and I was less fearful.  There's a high probability that those two are related, don't you think?  

My biggest but is that I'll hurt myself.  Doctors and therapists and nurses have all assured me that as long as I don't jump I'll be fine.  Fine is an interesting word, and worthy of a post all its own (note to self) but I'm not going there right now.  I have chosen to be skeptical because it was in service of my ego, it gave me permission to slack.  

ucmeta.org

No longer.  Not any more.  After an hour of massage and manipulation, Marcus has managed to get my legs almost entirely into butterfly or cobbler's pose.  I know it is possible.  I was there, after all.  Yes, it hurts.  Yes, it's not as easy as it was before my injuries.  




But, I'm not letting that stop me any more.  I want my life back and the only way to get it is to earn it.  I have to remember that I love going to the gym.  I have to remember the rush, the pump, the deep deep breaths that fed more than just my oxygen depleted muscles.  It centered me, focused me, healed me from over-exertion and strain.  I need it for just a little bit more right now, but that's okay.


It didn't need italics there.  It's not getting in my way any more.  I'm just going to do it and breathe.

Possibly the Best Ever

I found a video to embed here. The 10 year girl who sang the National Anthem today before the Mavs/Heat game was just amazing.  Did anybody else out there hear her?

G'ma and Me

She's sucking on her dentures. 


I'm breaking one of my cardinal rules of blogging by typing that sentence.  I try very hard to protect the personal space of those about whom I write.  But my relationship with G'ma is part and parcel of The Burrow, and as she changes so do those inter-connections.  I've been sharing these stories with my friends and family, and you fit nicely into one or the other of those categories, I've decided.  Besides, it helps to share and I need some help.


In any event, my concerns are irrelevant. If you came to visit us you would notice it soon enough.  If you loved me you wouldn't say anything, unless you were so grossed out that you couldn't stay in the same room.  I get that.  I'm not crazy about it, either.  You might raise an eyebrow or look from me to she, but really, what would you say?  


I've always been orally fixated.  I sucked my thumb til I was 12.  It took a spring vacation where I had to share a room with my older and much admired cousin to cure me of the habit; I could not allow myself to be humiliated in front of her so I stopped.  Cold turkey.  


I replaced the thumb with a straw; for a while I was found chewing and cogitating whenever I wasn't eating.  I find myself doing it still.  Big Cuter is always mouthing something,too.  A paperclip, a bottle cap, the ring around a bottle cap (they do no damage when swallowed.... trust us on this one....), Red Vines licorice - it doesn't matter as long as it's there.



My point is, perhaps it's a genetic trait.  


I noticed her floating teeth sometime after I got shot.  To say that I was startled would be an understatement of the first order.  My mother went out of her way to be unobtrusive, to stay under the radar, to be certain not to offend.  I don't remember hearing her burp or hiccup.  Passing gas was an embarrassing laugh, and it didn't happen that often.  Dadooooo called her "a blue nose" and accused her of having no sense of humor when it came to those things.  He wasn't far from the truth.  Sucking on her dentures is not something my mother does.


Did.


I think back to the OT G'ma worked with for a while.  Holding me as I cried and mourned the loss of the woman I'd known as my Mommy she offered me this perspective:

Yes, that mom is gone.  That is sad.  But take some time to get to know this new woman.  I think you'll really like her.

How right she was, and how helpful that advice has turned out to be.  It's gotten me over the need to involve her in the world going on around her.  Activities in her pod-castle look like this:

G'ma: What are you carrying there? 

Activities Director:  Balls and other fun stuff for exercise.  Want to join us?

G'ma: (snorting) Why?  That sounds like work.

They laughed and G'ma returned to her couch and her remote control tv component device.  


I don't judge her for the fact that The 700 Club is on when I stop by in the afternoon.  I don't tell her that she's not really interested in evangelical Christianity.  I don't change the channel. I nod as she tells me that "these people are very interesting, although I don't get why Jesus is so involved in the conversation."   


I revel in the fact that she's following it enough to be intrigued.  Conversations which are emotionally laden seem to make an impression on her brain.  She remembers that I got shot "in the ass" and that I was protecting a child and that the child died.  She remembers that SIR and Little Cuter "aren't married yet" and that she lives in Tucson and that I live down the road from her pod-castle.  She doesn't want to garden or tend to a houseplant or watch me tend to mine, she's not doing crewel work or reading a fat novel.  I'm okay with all of that now.


If this is the next stage, though, I'm in deep trouble.  


I made two promises to the woman who raised me: that I would always treat her with respect for her wishes and that I would be sure that she lived with dignity.  That is a conversation I am glad we had; it's governed my behavior since she came to live near me.  It's her life and she lives it according to her own rules and that's just fine.  She tries to stay out of my way and I to stay out of hers.  Our intersections are filled with joy, the bills are paid automatically by the bank every month, and every once in a while we go to Facebook or Picasa and look at archival pictues and smile.  

The boys really wanted her to look at the camera, didn't they?

And now she's sucking on her dentures while we marvel at the fact that two of our favorite young women once fit inside that home made garden cart.  


I've already made sure she is well-supplied with adhesive cream.  She has no interest in having any help in the bathroom, not for showering or dressing or toileting so I can only imagine the conversation if someone were to offer to help her put in her teeth.  I'm actually laughing out loud thinking about it.  And I imagine her children and grandchildren are giggling at work right now as they read this and paint the mental picture of this most private of women dismissing the very notion that she would need help with this most basic, most personal of tasks.


What am I to do?  When I ask if the dentures and the bridge fit well, she looks surprised as she denies any discomfort.  It's obviously a new thought so I believe her.  She remembers her recurring pains, even if she doesn't remember their origins.  Yes, the dentist is the first step.  I hate the fact that I don't trust my mother's judgment, but I don't trust my mother's judgment.  


I am tempted to put a post-it on her bathroom mirror.  She likes notes, memos on the calendar, reminders on her bedroom door.  Making sense of the world around her is a full time job these days; explanations help her stay focused.  Maybe You Have Fixodent - Use It!
in bold, day-glo lettering will do the trick.


For now, I'm reduced to scrunching my face up and smiling through my glare as I whine 

Please put your teeth in. It's gross.

Some things never change, I guess.  Daughters will always find something in their mothers' behavior which pushes the Oh, Mommy, please stop it button.  But what do I do when I know she'd agree with me.  Or who she was would agree with me.  Or something.  


Like I said, I need help. 

Beeps

There is a lot of beeping going on in the waiting area I'm occupying.  No one seems to be concerned about it.  Half the people don't even seem to be aware of it.  It stops for a moment and then there it is again, loud and annoying and piercing my heart.


The time lapse between the screeching is variable.  Sometimes I get more than a minute of peace.  Sometimes I don't.  The tone is just painful enough that I have to cover my ears.  Typing to you is impeded.  Another reason to be annoyed.


It's the same sound that the monitors in my room in the ICU made.  Insistent.  Demanding attention.  Sounding the alert.  I'm wondering where the TSA or the LAPD or the Southwest maintenance people are hiding.  They are certainly not racing to the source of the noise.


I am no longer able to separate the sound from the emotions I feel.  Sirens bring me right back to the Safeway parking lot.  I'm cold and I'm lying on the ground and Christina's bright eyes are staring back into mine.  The sound may stop; my visions linger.


Big Cuter used to love to hear the ambulance sirens going by; I'd drive home the long way, past the row of hospitals and nursing homes, hoping to increase his chance to point and smile and laugh.  I'm not sure I'm going to be doing the same thing for my still-to-be-conceived grandchildren.  


Dropping cutlery sends sweat shooting out of my pores.  Flop-Sweat we used to call it.  I don't know why.  Big beads of perspiration trickling down my back and my forehead and my armpits for no real reason.  My self is anxious even as my conscious mind is at peace.  


Surviving a mass shooting is a noisy, chaotic business.  I'm able to watch tv and not flinch at the gunshots by now, and that is progress.  But the suffering victims put me over the edge.  I'm back to watching with my hands in front of my face.  


Crying babies, incensed parents, fuming customers, angry delayed travelers - their fury feeds the piece of me which is madder than I have ever been.  They stoke the fire and tend the flames and I am gritting my teeth and scrunching my cheeks and clenching my jaw and just try to ask me a question..... or perhaps you had just better wait for another time.


The real world is full of sounds which I can no longer ignore.  I don't know why I am surprised by the strength of my reactions, but I am.  It seems that the bullet holes were not the only manifestations of the injury which has been done to me.  


Damn.

Air Travel

Sitting at LAX, relaxing in the super-sized wheelchair which toted me from Gate 3 to Gate 5 in style, trying to stay calm as our connecting flight to San Francisco is delayed and delayed and delayed once again.  Sure, we could change to an earlier flight, but our bag is checked and we'd have to return to retrieve it or pay to have it delivered to our hotel.  Apparently, the contract between the airlines and the passengers is weighted in the carrier's favor.  Apparently, I am the only one on the planet who is surprised by this.


I love to fly.  I love taking off and watching the ground drop away.  I like holding TBG's hand and squeezing as we leave the earth.  I like the free drinks and the little bags of pretzels and I like the fact that sitting still brings me closer to those I love.  I'm not nervous about crashing and I'm little enough that I'm rarely uncomfortable in the much too small seats.   


My fellow travelers, however, are a different story.  The people I'm looking at obviously did not look in the mirror before leaving the house today.


Jack Spratt should've donned underpants if he was going to squat in front of his infant while feeding him.   His butt is flat and exposed and it's really more flesh than I'm interested in describing.  Earth Mother,  his fleshier wife, is also going commando - a fact verified by the tightness of her flowered cotton dirndl and the camisole she's passing off as a blouse.  A deep V-neck allows her breasts the freedom of movement they need to peek out, nipples begging to be exposed to the air.  There ought to be a law.  These people are obscene.


We're sitting in the corner, right near the door to the gangway.  It must look like a phone book; this is the second person who's taken the space and used it to make a phone call.  He's on his way to Omaha.  He'll be late.  He's as aggravated as we are.


The Spanish speaking lady in the wheelchair across the aisle from me is reading a tv fan magazine.  She had a hard time understanding the announcements, even when a volunteer translator appeared from the ranks of the passengers.  She's calmer now than she was before.  That's a good thing.  I don't need any more anxiety than I am creating myself.  


Why does the wait upset me so?  I've only got 3 days to spend with my boy, and the edges of the travel days are bonus times I had planned to treasure.  Late afternoon, checked in to the hotel and transported via ZipCar to his apartment, I'd planned to tackle his closet before dinner today.  Obviously, that is not going to happen.  


There is not a fit person in this waiting room, TBG and I excluded.  The high school kids reading tarot cards on the floor might be in shape.  It's hard to tell when their clothes are 15 sizes too big.  They certainly have no compunction about blocking the main aisle between  the corridor and our gate.  Splayed on the ground, backpacks open and contents in disarray,  underwear on display and uncovered yawns on their faces, they are our future and I am scared.


TBG bought us a snack after the second delay was announced.  I was too upset to eat more than a bite or two.  You know the PTSD Monster is on the prowl when my belly rejects Thai Chicken Pizza.   No worries.  The lovely lady whose left arm is wrapped in bandages was happy to take the last piece in the box.   She's also going to Oakland.  She's also going to be late for dinner.  Sigh.


The TV Guide lady found her way to our new gate, pushing her own wheelchair as she meandered down the hallway.  Obviously, she has more inner strength than I'd given her credit for.  She was very grateful that we had told her the flight was moved to Gate 14.  I was grateful that she'd understood my pidgin Spanish.  I had to count the numbers out in my head, but the information was transmitted and received since she's here waiting with the rest of us.


This must be teen travel week.  There are three groups of kids supervised by extremely harried grown-ups milling about the gate.  More of the boys have earrings than the girls.  There's not one of them who managed to comb hair and tie shoes before leaving for the airport.  All but one group is fully-ear-plugged.  How do they talk to one another with earbuds installed?  it's a mystery.  Good thing I have time to ponder.


We've just been informed that we'll be leaving 2 hours earlier than the prior announcement had reported.  It's funny how gaining two hours has lessened my angst over losing two hours. I'm still bitter, but it's a little better.  Not much.  Just a little.


There are several of us with blue TSA-approved plastic covers for our boarding passes.  This allows us to bypass the Southwest queue and enter the plane early.  I'm really hoping for a bulkhead seat.  Bending my leg is okay for a while, but I need the length to stretch it out and remind it not to go into spasm.  It should be interesting, watching me fly down the gangway past the aged and infirm.  The plane's on its way from Nashville; I hope everyone gets off here in LA so my seat is waiting for me.


In my next life I'm raising children who never want to live more than a block away from their parents.


That's the plan and I'm sticking to it.

Memorial Day

I think that recycling this Memorial Day post has officially become a tradition. Here it is, again, updated for 2013.

  Happy Three Day Weekend, denizens!!

*****

I used to march in the Memorial Day parade. I was dressed in my Brownie uniform, and then in my Girl Scout uniform - replete with those hated anklets. I wore them because they said you couldn't march without them and marching was too cool to pass up, but the shame............

All the school bands marched too, and Benjamin Road provided the materials and the labor to make the capes the high school kids wore. There must have been a military presence there, but I didn't pay enough attention to notice. I was marching and I knew that, all over America, other kids were being Americans and marching, too. It was great.

In Marin, the Memorial Day parade was always good for a controversy or two. Or three. Should the anti-war protesters walk alphabetically in the main march, or have their own march, or walk 50 yards behind the official march? I especially liked this discussion: Should weaponry be allowed? That was fairly disingenuous even for Marin.

There were bands at this parade, too, and with Bobby Weir as the Grand Marshal you know the music was worth hearing, especially at the picnic in the park afterwards. Not exactly your typical VFW-sponsored event, but no one was complaining. It was Memorial Day; there had to be a parade.

I've got the flag G'ma bought us for a housewarming present, which replaced the one Dadooooo got us in Chicago. There are white lilies in a glass vase, with some red and blue additions just for today.  I wore the tie-dyed tank top the Cuters and I made early one July to the gym this morning.  I've got the plastic flag on my bike handles - the same one I bought with the Cuters at the Five and Dime Store in New Buffalo in 1985. Maybe next year I'll be strong enough to pedal up the hill to the house.

And I am grateful to Lois and Kevin and Kyle and Amy and Cat and Sara, and to Courtney and her sister and the 41st Expeditionary Electronic Combat Squadron, and to Terry and Moose and Stroker and Uncles Chuck and Paul and Abby and to Aaron, clerking for a judge and carrying the memories of a convoy of trucks in the desert along with his diploma. 

The military gave me Dr. Rhee, who honed his craft on the battlefield and returned to create a system which saved my life.  It trained Dr. Bowman to triage in a crisis, and I am here to thank him in person.  

I'm watching jets fly overhead, aiming towards Davis-Monthan Air Force Base south of town.  There's a silent salute in my heart for those who are training to keep me safe, for those, like my youngest, bravest, nephew, who are awaiting their chance to serve.  

Life is good. Thanks to all those who've made it so.

Pain

If one more person asks me how I am doing I think that I will scream.


Loudly.  For a prolonged period of time.  With gusto.


There won't be any rage attached to my shrieking.  The questioner always has love in her heart and compassion in his tone.  There's a sense of trying to bridge the gap between us, between those who wonder and those to whom it was done.  Whatever it is.  Establishing the connection helps to explain the inexplicable, I think.  If I can tell you how it feels, then you'll know and you won't have to worry because the social conventions dictate that I tell you that I am doing fine.


Little Cuter calls this the teflon answer.


When it was only my physical condition which aroused curiosity I had a set piece to pull out when the question was raised.  Healing took time.  My pain was lessening.  I looked forward to a complete recovery.


I was delusional.  There is no doubt about it.  Despite having no evidence to substantiate my conclusion, I convinced myself that I would be fully ambulatory soon after I was able to put weight on my shattered hip.  I was fit going into this and I would be fit coming out of it.  The awful, excruciating, unrelenting pain of the hospital and the first month or so of being at home was long in the past.  I was able to get by without medication.  I would be fine.


Somehow, I forgot how easy it is to lose strength and flexibility.  I used to notice it after a week away from the gym.  It never dawned on me that 4 months away from anything resembling exercise would have a much more potent effect.  It's probably a good thing that was the case.  Lying still would have been unbearable had i given real thought to the consequences.  


I was happy in my delusional state and no one seemed to notice that I was digging myself into a hole from which extrication would be necessary.  


Dr. Boaz said walk and I walked - one weak step and two hands grasping for the walker.  There was no there there.  My femur was stuck in one position and it rebelled - quite actively- at being moved.  I talked such a good game that the doctor said I didn't need physical therapy.  That lasted two weeks until my knee and my ankle and my back told me that what I was doing might be locomoting but certainly could not be called walking.  Hence, Marcus the Master Manipulator.


I've been using my hip flexors and my quads instead of my glutes.  The exercises require strengthening those deep, big muscles while relaxing the hamstrings and quadriceps.  Clenching my glutes requires stability in the back and abs and a conscious decision on my part to use my tush and leave my leg at rest.  


Want to try it?  Sit up straight and tighten a butt cheek.  Either one.  Don't clench your jaw or your thigh - neither the front nor the back.  Use that squeeze to raise your thigh off the seat.  Don't incorporate your leg muscles.  Don't lean back and use momentum.  Just lift your foot off the floor by clenching your glutes.


Feel that sensation in the front of your groin?  That's your soaz telling you that it is displeased with you.  Very very displeased with you.  Now, imagine that underneath that soaz you have gazillions of staples and wires and plates creating the socket into which that leg resides.  Those are new staples and there are a lot of them and they are still swollen and sensitive even 5 months after they were installed.  


Believe me, everything is talking to me as I do what I've just described to you.  Sitting here typing and clenching and aching.  I dangled in the pool.  I had a massage.  I'm going to PT this afternoon.  I've taken Aleve.  I have a hydrocodone waiting for later.  


How am I doing?  I'm making myself hurt and I have to do it and I don't want to but I am so tired of being slow and bent and an object of pity that I don't know how I am doing any more. The pain is a limiting factor and I feel justified in giving in to it but I know that if I do I will just be limping and aching for longer.  


So, I am doing my exercises.  I am doing my blog.  I am doing a book.  I am doing good deeds.  


Would you like to know how I am feeling?  Sorry.... saying it out loud just reminds me that there is still work to be done, that this will not go away because I will it to be gone, that my recovery depends on inner strength and fortitude and that I am not doing as well as my fantasies had predicted but from the outside I'm doing.  


That there is new and more interesting pain attached to my doing is an unpleasant surprise, a limiting factor, and totally irrelevant if I want my old self back.  Pain is my companion, my reminder, my annoyer.  I consider it before I move and if I don't it announces its presence with authority.  Will it disappear?  Will it reach a steady state and ask me to adjust?  I wish I knew.


For now, though, pain and I will be together, getting this old carcass back in fighting trim.  I'm digging deep inside and finding that there is a growing kernel of discontent pushing at my soul, encouraging me to ignore the tingling nerve endings and to get going.  


I think it's time to listen.