Dressed for the Part

I was going to say that, in my present condition, I walk a fine line. . . .

The fact is that, in my present condition, I do not walk fine lines. I have had hip surgery. I walk a stuttered line.

The hospital apparently chain-sawed a delicate incision up my right hip, did unspeakable things to my framework, stapled the incision, sold me a cane, and sent me home. They advised that I rent a walker, unless I thought I might have long-term plans, in which case I should buy one.

Owning an adjustable cane, and renting a walker, does something dreadful to one's psyche. Prescribing modest pain killers does more than modestly restructure the pain: it obscures all the sharp edges of perception, sands down the details. Somewhere, some time ago, I got a pair of what might be called "trousers", or probably--better--pajama bottoms. They are made of paper, just like the academic gowns graduates now rent and throw away after the rain. They are no so much something to wear as they are a way an identification. Were they orange, instead of light green or blue, or whatever they are, people would assume I had escaped from the crew that is picking up trash along the freeway, and that I ought to be returned to incarceration.

Somebody, probably a lot of somebodies, have designed a generic aluminum cane, with little snap buttons and rubber tips; even a little twisty "lock it right there" ring. It is the ultimately personalized badge of incapacity. "Ahh, poor lame thing! Here, let me get that door for you!"

Today I have put on my blue jeans and a button-up shirt, not because I am about to play softball, again--because I did not play softball before, either--but because something inside me protested that I was wearing the wrong costume; the wrong uniform. My psyche was protesting that--stuttering though I step--I wanted to reclaim my place as a somewhat normal human being.

I am glad, now, two weeks after my structural overhaul, to be up more than down, to be moving better, and to be dressed for the part.

Nice to see you, again!

Comments

Caliche Busters and Government Work

When I was young and both stronger and smarter than I am now, I put my might and brain to work doing nothing useful, unless it might be thought that hand/foot/eye coordination might come in handy. Those were skills to be learned and practiced. I found an iron bar our grandfather had shaped in his blacksmith shop. He took old car, truck, or wagon axles, and made tools from them for digging post holes. He sharpened one end to a tip, and the other to a blade. Washington State, like many places, had a hard layer of soil, probably created by water and limestone, or some such materials, that made digging holes a miserable chore. The bar chipped through the natural concrete so that a shovel could take it up. I found Grandpa's iron bar, and since I was young and dumb and strong--or so I thought--decided to punch a hole down to hardpan and ultimate truth. I knew how to do that. Raise the bar vertically with both hands, and then slam in straight down. On the second try, aimi

The Sea is Rising

Let us just step back: two hundred and fifty years ago, or so, the ships of England and Spain had drifted onto a whole new continent, as they saw it, from far north to a savagely cold south; pole to pole, as if there were such things. Millions of people already lived here, some of them still hunters and gatherers; some of them very wealthy, indeed! Gold and silver stolen from the southern Americas funded Spanish and English dreams. There was land, lots of land, under starry skies above, rich land, and oil and coal and iron ore. The whole western world learned how to build industries not on simple muscle power, but on steam and oil. We farmed, too, of course. All we needed was cheap labor--slave labor from Africa, mostly, so the ships came with slave labor. Chinese labor built railroad beds where there had been rock cliffs. Europeans, long used to killing each other for good, religious reasons, brought their religious savagery with them. Even when all they wanted to do w

SmokeSound

Search This Blog