That’s my goal, always, to do less traction. I’m still at my schedule of three times a week and I’m sitting here wondering how to get it to two times a week. Not sure how to make that happen but I can wish. If I don’t do this I’m a bull in a fine china shop. You need it dropped and in a million pieces on the floor, I’m your girl! Ok, slow day, just hanging, wanted you to know I’m still here.
Thanks for reading.
You’ve heard of pet therapy, well as I sit here in traction I think it might be nice to have something fluffy to hold onto, perhaps a furry little kitten or a cuddly puppy. For me though I actually think that’s a dream or maybe a nightmare. When we moved out of my childhood home I found a dog collar in the garage, let’s just say, I don’t ever remember having a dog. The days of having a Rover around the house were part of an unspeakable pet past.
A friend once asked me to keep an eye on her cat while she was out-of-town, to stop in each day and put out some food. I asked her if I’d have to bathe the kitty and she responded with a sigh and then said, “you weren’t kidding when you said you knew NOTHING about pets!” Why would I lie about such a thing?
My pet stories are all tragic and true. I had a canary named Simon, after the 10th time my Mom had asked me to clean out his cage she placed him on the back porch and told me that’s where I’d find him until his home was clean. So hours later I stroll my 12-year-old self out there and pick up his cage to say hello and out he flies from the bottom of his living quarters that I suddenly realized was now missing its’ tray. As he flew to the woods behind our house I screamed and my Mom came running. She consoled me with the reassuring words that we lived close to an interstate and before I knew it he’d be far south and living in sunny Florida. (You gotta love the stuff that Mothers come up with on the fly) Although it was trickier for her to smooth over the next year when the wolf dog next door tried to make Simon II into the blue plate special, Simon the sequel headed to birdie heaven within 24 hours.
I had so many fish swim to aquatic heaven I lost count, even a stray cat we named Tigger gave up on us. But the story that lives forever in my SPCA hit list life is my little turtle. He was about ten days old, didn’t even have a name yet, we returned home and couldn’t find him in his terrarium. Wasn’t hard to immediately notice turtle was not in his glass home and nowhere to be found. When one of my brothers offered to help find him I desperately accepted. Within minutes the sound of the crunch shook the room…….yep, big bro accidentally squished turtle under his Chuck Taylors into a little pile of oozing turtle guts and simultaneously burned the desire for further pets forever from my heart.
My Mom quickly announced her term as pet grandmother was over. She was retiring the role and I believe still recovering from the dog incident from ten years earlier. Apparently an elderly neighbor had said our dog “snapped” at him and my brothers were told their doggie was going to a “beautiful farm to run free”…when my eldest brother figured it out sometime later he never let them forget Buck’s euthanasia.
It’s kind of like God sent our family a memo that said, “Look, but please don’t touch.” So as I sit here today I’m thinking about my first Simon who flew south, picturing his little yellow self flying in and out of his time share in Boca Rotan. Soaring high over an ocean filled with all my guppies and goldfish. Not being a “pet person” is one thing but to be a danger to them is an unsettling other matter. I think once you realize you aren’t good at pet care there’s no coming back. Don’t get me wrong I’m the first girl to appreciate nature, but it has to be from a safe distance for all involved. So instead of trying pet therapy I’ll just squeeze this fluffy pillow as my neck hangs in traction and know by doing so I’m actually saving a Spot or Sprinkles life.
Yep, I forgot to do this. When my niece was a child she had a dance teacher that used to tell her students to take “a cool sip in and laser beam it out.” I thought it was one of the funniest things I’d ever heard and have shared it often with others. Nobody quite ever knows what it means but it always creates a laugh. I even suggested it at a work meeting once when things were getting out of hand. Ok everybody, lets take a cool sip in and laser beam it out for a second…..and yes, I got some crazy looks but it achieved it’s purpose of cutting the tension and getting some folks to “cool it” as my Mom used to say.
So I’ve forgotten to do this lately, to just take a moment, hence my melt down on my last post. I’m doing better today, maybe it’s narcotics or maybe it’s when I saw a bus of children with severe disabilities getting unloaded to go into PT that I was reminded how I have nothing, nothing at all to be complaining about.
So, when in doubt I’m taking a cool sip in and laser beaming it out and just trying to be grateful for all that I do have that works and dealing with stuff that doesn’t.
So which do you prefer? “The action of drawing a body, vehicle, train or the like, along a surface, as a road, track, railroad or waterway” or how about, “the act of drawing or pulling” but let’s not leave out “the deliberate and prolonged pulling of a muscle, organ, or the like, as by weights, to correct dislocation, relieve pressure, etc.”
BINGO, I think we have a winner!
It made me feel better to read the definition and cringe a little. When you read something that has the power to make you wince you figure it must be creepy for real and yeah, it is. I’m moaning and complaining, I’ve been trying not to do either but have I mentioned lately I’M SO SICK AND TIRED OF TRACTION and if I don’t do it I can’t feel my hands and I’m sick of that too!
Ok, moving on.
Nope, I haven’t been sniffing the Martha Stewart glue stick, nothing like that, rather I almost fell asleep in traction today! This is a first and I think “a good thing.” It means I was relaxed and yes, comfortable enough and obviously tired enough to fall asleep. I caught myself just as my head was about to fall off my neck, rather the sling around my head caught me and suddenly I’m back sitting as I should be, but it was a thrill while it lasted. Not to whine, but I can’t describe the discomfort I have felt while sitting here most of the time and to know that I actually was ok enough with sitting here today that I could fall asleep, this is HUGE.
Yeah, I think I’m kind of exhausted with my sleep issues to allow it to more easily happen but I’m focusing on the being comfortable enough to let it happen part.
Gotta find some nugget of good here cause I’ve been losing my psych of late. I mean if it wasn’t for this crazy blog I’d be really struggling with motivation. It’s just hard to find a way to make your self sit in traction when your damaged spinal column hates you for it. If you know of a way to make that a happy place, please share. But for today I’m hanging and almost falling asleep and taking it a day at a time.
Could it be? I mean they’re already cramming Halloween down our throats and we know what’s next. The minute a leaf turns a faint color of anything besides green it’s somehow officially fall and then here comes Santa.
I’m tired. I’ve been tired lately and I thought at first it was because I switched a bunch of my medications, but now I just think I’m tired of a lot of things. I don’t want to be rushed. I really, really dislike being rushed. I walk with a limp and I can’t tell you the number of folks that hit the back of my shoes because they are literally at my heels. So I move over and let them pass, this happens almost every time I shop and oddly enough often as I exit church. Not sure where the fire is on Sundays but get out-of-the-way. So I walk slow because I have to now but I’m used to it, I’m okay with it, but the world is not. Have I mentioned I hate feeling rushed?
Yeah, and I saw a guy with the biggest Santa beard driving a Buick really fast. He looked perfect for the part and I wondered if he was growing it out for the role or if it’s his usual look. Yet I’m sure there are some dudes packing on the pounds claiming it’s all for art and soon will be applying for work at malls across the land, but I just want it to be September for now. Then comes the gorgeous, crisp fall with all the special things included in it. That’s as far ahead as I’m willing to go. Please, enough rushing. Being a slow poke I now embrace being pokey, you make do when you can’t feel your foot inside your shoe. Sometimes I walk with a cane, when I take a stroll I belong in the emergency lane with my blinkers on but so far I can’t find that path. Instead I hear some sighing, an occasional “excuse me” but mostly just feel my hair blowing as folks pass me by.
Really, unless it’s life or death or you really are Santa having confused a Buick for Rudolph, then what’s the hurry?
I think I might have a sink hole in my back yard. If I put on my glasses I’d be able to give you details about that, let’s just say I need to put my glasses on more often. I’ve been blessed my entire life with excellent vision, but lately my eyes have been a little blurry and it’s amazing if you put those glasses on you can see so nicely. But I’m not going to wear my glasses in traction, that’s like wearing your glasses on a ride at an amusement park, it’s just asking for trouble. So I don’t put them on when I get up because I’m not accustomed to wearing them and then I do traction and the next thing I know I’m looking out the back window and I think I have a growing sink hole and I can’t find my glasses! This could be the most exciting thing to happen in my backyard EVER.
As for keeping up with my glasses I’m tempted to get one of those strings but I knew a person once who wore one around their neck and they were a combination of kind of mean and a little too pretentious for my taste and I’m concerned about cross contamination. Plus the thought of putting anything around my neck EXCEPT a scarf with a built-in heating pad really isn’t appealing. Visualize the Pillsbury Dough Boy wearing a scarf, something that would match his gentle doughy neck, that would work perfectly for me. When it comes to what I want to touch my neck I’m “light and fluffy” all the way. The oxygen it seems is officially being restricted since I’ve now compared part of my body to a crescent roll and it feels like a fairly accurate description.
Ok, this is where my head is today, as for my glasses, on second thought maybe they’re in the sink hole.
I’ll keep you posted.
So I was thinking, who the H E double L is snooki? Why do we care who she is or is it just people of a certain millenium that do. I’m officially drawing the line at snooki, (by the way, am I spelling that correctly, I hope not.) Ok, Paris, Lindsey, Brittany, we’ve put up with a lot and now, Snooki! Please, please, someone make it STOP!!
I mean I’m not solving world peace here with this get up strapped to my head but at least I think about it once in a while. Jeez……Snooki, really, is she the best we can do?
Please, please, please, someone make it stop. Make us know how to spell, be able to pick out countries on a map and name our state representatives BEFORE we know who the H E double hockey sticks Snooki is! Heck, I’d even settle for knowing how to properly open a bag of chips to prevent them from flying thru the room, anything, anything is better.
Ok, taking off this harness from around my head and jumping off the soap box, well, not really, I don’t jump anymore, maybe Snooki does though.
Now granted, in the name of full disclosure I’m currently wearing a fuchsia colored polo with “Barbados” embroidered in the left corner, khaki pants and blue Vans, hardly a fashion plate. Perfect combination of laziness, comfort and bad taste. So in the last couple of days I’ve noticed others too are struggling with what to wear on transitional weather days. I saw a middle-aged man wearing a backpack over his shirtless tattooed torso, saw a young woman in a sequined black tank top pushing a stroller, saw a 40 something woman in hot pink shorts with “BEACH BUM” across her behind. But my favorite look was what appeared to be five-year old twins, one still hanging onto the last glimpse of summer in a floral sun dress with matching flip-flops as her sister chose jeans and a XXL gray hooded sweatshirt falling fashionably over her eyes.
So the most I know about what might be fashionable this upcoming season comes from the Today Show, borrow dark lipstick from a vampire and dress like you’re in an episode of Mad Men and you should be all set. I was thinking about a child I saw in Port-au-Prince, he had a shirt on that said, “my grandparents went to Ontario and all I got was this lousy T-shirt” or some catchy phrase like that. I remember thinking that shirt was a long way from Ontario or anyplace folks read English. What one person thinks is cute another finds essential. What one finds chic another finds a waste of time and money. I wish I had a better fashion sense, I know folks that do, you know who you are, but it’s not me. I’ll never wear something that was last seen on the runway in Milan, more like the back corner of Target.
Well, enough rambles for today, this sling around my head seems to match everything!
A woman came up to a clerk that had just waited on me and asked for someone by name. The clerk responded, “I’m sorry, she’s off today.” Then the woman said, “I know, I talked to her yesterday and she said she was going to be off today.” The clerk looked puzzled but she was polite as can be and went on to offer her assistance. When I walked away I thought about how some folks seem to have more patience than humanly possible while I on the other hand could use a little more.
I try to practice patience while I sit here. I try to put it all in perspective. This certainly isn’t the worse thing ever, not even the worst thing I’ve done but it does require some more patience than I feel I have. If I can just get myself in a good place while I sit here I have more patience, better attitude about everything, it’s all a mind game. Just like when I’m in traffic, if I think I will be late for an appointment then I’m stressed and then I lose patience. That’s when I really need to give myself a pep talk and try to disarm myself, talk myself off any cliff I’ve created in my head that the world will somehow end if I don’t make it someplace exactly when I agreed to be there. I mostly get up tight if I think I’m careless with someone else’s time. That really bugs me, if feels beyond rude, it’s either a serious case of cluelessness or arrogance, I hope I’m neither but I have been both. I find I can’t look my doctor in the eye if I’ve kept them waiting and goodness knows they’ve kept me waiting but it’s not right if I do.
It’s amazing how much of life is in our head. If I make an adjustment in my head I can usually make myself feel better about whatever it is. I wonder since I can’t count on my body, it’s just not dependable, I can’t predict one day to the next how I will feel, so maybe I’m working on having more control over something else and that pretty much leaves my mind. I can’t control anything else, don’t want to, the beauty of getting older, control just doesn’t have the same appeal, just doesn’t seem that important anymore. So if I give up control I have more patience, maybe, not sure. Yet, if I adjust my attitude I know I can sit here more patiently than if I don’t, so,…………….. here’s to mind control.
Thoughts In Traction.... 