One of the parts about working out in the martial arts that I haven’t missed a bit are the little incidental injuries. Karate-do was wonderful for mystery bruises appearing in places you had no recollection of having been hit. Jammed toes, especially on a competition matted floor were also common. The worst by far were the large blisters that would form working on a wooden floor. It seemed as if a large piece of callus would come off all at once, leaving tender and sometimes torn skin underneath.
Practicing kendo outside on grass adds a certain element to the potential foot dings and dents. No matter carefully the area is policed prior to a workout there always seems to be a rock or acorn in exactly the wrong spot. As I am still learning, and trying to transition the muscle memory of karate-do stances to the kendo stance, my feet are getting beat up. My left foot in particular is in a bad way.
Tonight’s blister is about the size of a quarter and a dime together. I know that it came from torquing my foot from a angled alignment to the straight one it is supposed to maintain. My bad. Also my major owie.
The forced hiatus following my eye surgery on Friday will hopefully give this monster time to heal before I return to the mats, er, lawn.
Today marks the two year anniversary of my employment here in Kansas City. Saying that the past two years have been tumultuous would be a massive understatement. If, as Nietzsche said, “That which does not kill you will only make you stronger”, then I am stronger today than I’ve ever been in my life.
In the last two years I have moved, survived two major staffing reductions on my project, sold a house I loved for a loss, incurred debt that will take me another three years to pay off, lost my mother to lung cancer, and lost my wife to depression. I’ve been battered and beaten down again and again by the vagaries of life, and yet I’m still standing. There is a core of strength in me that hasn’t been tapped out. I’ve heard it said that God never gives you more than you can handle. If that is true, I’d wish he’d stop trusting me so much.
I have no clue what the next two years will bring my way. Heck, I don’t know what this afternoon will bring. I’m still here, and I’m still moving forward, so I guess my journey through this lifetime isn’t over.
A sparkly new and clean windshield was installed today. Unfortunately, it’ll only be new until the first bug impact on the way home.
That is unless I back all the way home.
Several weeks ago I had a followup visit with the optometrist at LasikPlus and he cleared me for the enhancement to my right eye any time I wanted after June 23rd. Since I’ll be unable to drive myself home I needed to coordinate a ride prior to setting the date, so rather than schedule it that day I called in a day or two later and scheduled the corrective surgery for June 29th.
Remembering that I needed some prescription eye drops following the first surgery, I called LasikPlus first thing this morning to have them call the drug store so I’d be all set Thursday. Just a few minutes ago I got call from the vision center informing me that I in fact do not have a surgery scheduled for this Thursday. It seems that when I called to set the appointment back in May, I got their national call center and the idiot there didn’t inform me that I couldn’t schedule a surgery through him. All I had setup was a checkup.
Fortunately there was a hole in the schedule on Friday, the 30th, so my eye will be fixed this week anyway. While the eye care there is top notch, the coordination amongst the staff and the schedules seems to be a bit lacking. Hopefully this correction will bring my right eye into the proper focal range and I’ll be able to rid myself of the temporary glasses and stop having procedures done and redone.
So yesterday, after successfully traveling to Illinois and back (over 750 miles round trip), I went to Border’s around 5:00 to kill some time. When I came out and started home I noticed a 4 - 6 inch long crack in the windshield starting in the lower left corner (as seen from the driver’s seat). Once I got home and could really look at it I could see the tiniest of chips in the glass where the crack started. I must have picked up a rock impact along the way.
This morning the crack had grown to over a foot in length. I called Lexus to get their recommendation on replacement glass installers and about had kittens at the price – $1700. Turns out the fancy-dancy rain sensing windshield is wired and without those wires the automatic wipers don’t work.
My insurance deductible is $500, which is roughly the price the aftermarket installers want for just the windshield. Might as well use the insurance, pay the deductible and get a fully functioning windshield.
Un-freaking-believable… $1700 for a windshield.
The back story here is that for years (since getting the car actually) I have complained about the numerous tiny imperfections in the glass from its first life in Denver. They sand their streets and highways in the wintertime, so spring turns the roads into one large sandblasting experience. Under most driving conditions you can’t see the hundreds of tiny chips, but when the sun is directly in front of the glass all you can see are those chips. Michele got tired of my grousing about how I wished I’d get a rock chip or crack so I could justify having it replaced. If I had known it would be $500 to me I’d have kept my big mouth shut.
Sigh.
It has been almost nine months since my wife died and I am finding my thoughts turning more and more towards the future. What’s next? Who will I become in the next year? Five years? Decade? It is hard to contemplate, and even harder to visualize as real.
For some time now I have found my thoughts straying towards the future. At first I resisted such thoughts as they felt like a betrayal of Michele. Over time, however, I have come to understand that not pursuing these thoughts is a betrayal of myself. Michele would be sorely upset were I to betray myself in any fashion. So I sit and think about what’s next.
The odd part is that I imagine having a conversation with Michele about my future. She was the consummate listener and was able to hear what I wasn’t saying just as loudly as she could hear what I was saying. Her counsel was full of wisdom and humor and in my imaginary conversations with her I hear faint echos of her sage advice.
Rejoining a martial arts dojo is a step forward, and one that brings me into contact with other people. Allowing myself to participate in social activities with co-workers and friends is also a step forward. Initiating some of those activities is a huge step forward. Perhaps the most powerful and self-validating thing I have done is to allow myself permission to rejoin the mainstream of life. Tentatively, cautiously, but still back in the flow. I know I’ll revisit the eddies of grief and sorrow for some time to come, but only by letting go of the rocks can I float free in life’s stream once again.
Several times in recent weeks I’ve found myself thinking about the future. Not the gloomy I’m-alone-in-a-cave-forever future, but the I’m actually-living-and-maybe-have-a-meaningful-relationship future. Shocking, but true. Don’t tell anyone, it’ll ruin the brooding, melancholy thing I’ve got going.
What if, and it’s a big IF, I meet someone? What if they are intelligent, smart, funny, active, stylish, opinionated, attractive and not afraid of nerds? What if they find me intelligent, smart, funny, active, stylish, opinionated, attractive and nerdly? What if I win the Powerball Lottery? What if JFK, Elvis, and Jimmy Hoffa are all living on a super secret government island in the middle Pacific? But I digress…
Everyone warns you about the “what if” questions in reference to dredging up the past and beating yourself with it; but no one says anything about the future “what if” questions. I looked in the grieving widow/ers manual and there’s nothing there about this at all. I’d like my money back now, please.
Of course, were she here physically I could bounce all these questions and thoughts off Michele. But then, if she were still here, having these thoughts and questions might result in my needing a cot and sleeping bag for the garage.
I guess there is life after death. Furthermore, I guess it’s going to happen whether I participate in choosing the direction or not.
Man. Is it ever bright outside of this cave.
Last night’s kendo workout was good; more and more of the basics are starting to feel normal to me, my focus is returning, and I am less wiped out by the exercise itself. The soles of my feet are taking a beating; hopefully they will toughen up sooner rather than later. I did manage to generate a blister on the ball of my left foot. As the proper stance has the left heel in the air all the time, a lot of pressure is focus on the ball of that foot. Since I’ll be out of town this weekend I’ll miss Saturday’s workout so it should heal before Wednesday.
I’ve ordered a keiko-gi and hakama, the jacket and pants that are traditionally worn. Since the gi is heavy cotton it’ll add some difficulty to the workout in the form of retained body heat. Last evening the temperature at 6:30 was 93, and it was still 90 at 8:15 when we broke up for the night. My plan is to get a large Rubbermaid tub and use that to wash my gi and hakama. Since both are dyed with indigo I expect them to run quite a bit the first several washings. I’ve heard from more than one source that you can actually stain your tub permanently with the dye runoff if you aren’t careful. The Rubbermaid tub will isolate the dye; and the water can be dumped outside.
The real trick will be getting the dye off of me before coming into work the next day. My friend E in Chicago says I’ll look “smurfy” after the first few workouts. Papa Smurf, Girl Smurf, and Kendo Smurf.
City of Bones is another in Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch series. Bosch continues to be among my favorite literary characters, and this book is no exception.
Rating: Once you pick it up it’s hard to put down.
Of Flutterbys and Bedspreads The day of Michele’s memorial, as P and I stood at the table holding the flowers and her pictures, a Monarch butterfly suddenly appeared from nowhere, did a lap around the arrangement and a figure-eight around the two of us. We both remarked about not having seen a Monarch in years. It felt like a sign then and still feels that way today.
In the first several weeks after her death I would come home from work only to find her side of the bed turned down. Intellectually I know that it was only Taz burrowing under the covers to sleep, but it only ever happened on Michele’s side of the bed, and it had never happened before. I could just see Michele standing there egging on Taz. She was leaving me another sign that she was okay.
Just this week, for the first time in months I came home to find Michele’s side of the bed turned down. My first thought was she’s back. It felt good to think that I have my own angel now, and that she stops by to make sure I’m okay. Tonight, as I was leaving my favorite pizza parlor another Monarch fluttered by and disappeared, bringing a smile to my face.
I have been struggling with how to move forward in my life, and while I’m not sure of the details yet, I do feel like I am moving ahead. To me the bed being turned down and the Monarch are signs of approval from Michele. I know she’d come back and kick my ass if all I did with the rest of my life was sit around and mope, so it feels good to think that she would approve of my moving on with my life.
Oh Sh*t, Not Again The second year I worked at summer camp the permanent staff there was on a “wellness” kick. They had all read the wellness handbook and were full of excitement about eating healthier and taking proactive steps to be well instead of just merely not ill. Unfortunately they tried to alter the lifestyle of everyone at camp that summer too, largely through the menu in the dining hall. Compounding the parade of sprouts, salads, and carob bars were two fraternity row cooks from nearby Purdue University who were cooks only in the mechanical sense of mixing things together and serving them. The food that year was quite simply, awful.
One late summer evening, dinner was a particularly odious tuna salad, something I have never, ever liked, and so I passed on the main course and filled up instead on oatmeal raisin cookies. Seventeen oatmeal raisin cookies. This was my night off and so myself and two other counselors headed for the nearby mall and some real food. By the time we reached the mall parking lot I was in a bad way. I knew it was going to be a close call getting to the men’s room in time. As it turned out I was all the way in the stall before I lost the race.
After twenty minutes or so waiting one of my companions finally came looking for me to see if I was okay. After explaining what had occurred I tossed him my wallet and sent him off to by me a set of underwear and some new shorts.
I haven’t had an oatmeal raisin cookie since.
On the spur of the moment this evening I decided to go root around in the boxes I have in storage looking for a chain necklace Michele had given me some years ago. No sooner did I have a dozen or so boxes out of the locker and in the hallway (it’s indoor storage - climate controlled) than a series of cramps hit me. I had just one large box, empty save for some large sheets of heavy packing paper, to go when the final set of cramps struck.
Fortunately, Thursday evening at the local indoor storage mart is quiet. I had the place to myself as I as I cleaned up as best I could with sheets of packing paper and some Kleenex. And the length of my oversized tee-shirt was advantageous as I hurriedly ducked out to my car to come home and shower. After donning fresh clothes I returned to the scene of the, ah, spill, with Oxy-Clean, clorox and a supply of paper towels.
Twenty-six years later and those damn raisin cookies are still after me.
Please keep your scatological jokes to yourself.