Better

I have to admit it's getting better
Getting better all the time. . . .

-Lennon, McCartney

We had some Queen Anne's Lace bordering the cornfield and the wind was really tossing it.

First you move more. There are a lot of small motions you don't even think about. In the short term, you learn lots of little tricks to avoid using any of your insulted tissue. Now the task is to begin to move more naturally. Who wants to heal up in a goofy position? I'm sleeping like a fiend. I have an extra little nappy in the afternoon, and I've noticed that when my back really ache, a little power nap works wonders.

Second, you think more. Social worky people will tell you about Abraham Maslow and his famous "hierarchy of need." Envisioning a big triangle, at the broad base, are activities such as breathing and eating and pooping, without which many of our more eloquent inclinations are for naught. Between the Loritab, the snoozing, and ow, ow, ow, there wasn't a lot of time for reflection. Increasingly I'm finding comfortable places to perch and I'm not needing to be snowed on Loritab. This leaves a little more time for reflection.

This situation is absolutely dripping with irony. I'm not entirely sure what to make of it. I do not think God hangs out and molds nearby life into lessons for middle aged men to learn. There is a lesson here, though, however it got there. I might have to get the guitar out.

I haven't changed my thinking except that it's pretty obvious that I didn't factor in helplessness. Helplessness, and who stands by you. (My boss, the retired Air Force Officer, says "I've got your six." Six o'clock. Right behind you in the blind spot.)

My judgement that I could slow down and make a tight left hand curve turned out to be erroneous. The cavalcade of resulting consequences, for everyone has included cancelled vacation plans and all kinds of inconvenience. My family has been amazingly understanding about this. Robyn defends my decision to ride road bikes on trips and supports the idea I might get back on one. I might ride a hair slower.

Credit where it's due

Okay, in the interest of fairness and equity, any good lyrics you find on this page may have actually been written by Dan Brown, unless they are laden with sexual innuendo, in which case he did NOT write them. Lying naked in a garden? That's Dan. Because he's just lying there, naked, minding his own business. Putting the bleach in re-e-e-e-al slow? That'd be me.

Here's a photo of my Dad trying to read me a bicycle safety manual when I was two. I clearly wasn't paying attention. But who reads a book outside in February?

My update: not much to report. My infection is much better, responding to antibiotics and the excellent unnecessary tour of the UW Madison ER. I've been doing a lot of napping and reading. I think once I'm a little better healed, I'll be able to be more mobile and get out and do things. It feels like my pain is pretty well managed and if I could be just a little more healed I could push it to the next step, which might mean trips to Iowa City, Barnes and Noble. I'd actually give my left nut to climb into a kayak right now, but that's beside the point. I'd like to fast forward this process, but I'd probably miss a meaningful part, right?

I looked at my bike yesterday. It is truly not damaged. I felt a little resenful.

Woods?

Look at that long county road, the way it stretches out ahead, calling to us! What's that around the corner? The winning lotto ticket, or certain DOOM? My good friend's well meaning comment (well meaning - the Northern version of "oh, bless her heart.") that I may not be out of the woods yet just triggers all kinds of remarks, some of which were inappropriate and I passed those on right away.

But seriously, the prospect of denial, of saying "no, this time I'm really fine," when I'm really NOT, raises the possibility that the process of feeling good may, itself, be a symptom. It's not that you're feeling good, it's that you're in denial about the loss of capacity you've experienced as the result of your trauma. Yikes! Or maybe it's about when, and how we count our losses.

Sometimes you're the windshield, sometimes you're the bug. We can always count on life to diminish us somehow, to turn our experiences into symptoms, to take from us our sense of "power" over the inevitable. Sometimes it just rains shit. Nothing to do about it.

Those of us who have experienced a good deal of chaos (and we know who we are), are likely to hedge, to plan, to arrange, to coordinate, as a way to feel like the mojo is back in pocket. Truth is, that mojo is coming back when it damned well feels like it.

I'm okay with some crap happening somewhere else for a while, but even that isn't a dodge. Nothing like sitting in an ER in triage to remind us how the lives of strangers effect our own. Around that bend ahead is "somewhere else" and I might be there soon.

By the way, the New Glarus EMS service, who arrived in time to drive me uphill for the helicopter, managed to get the first bill to us. If they drove as fast as they billed it would have been more impressive.

perspective

It's all about triage. Who's got it worse right now? Well, not me, I can tell you. I'm sitting in my favorite morning chair, drinking coffee, enjoying my meager dose of Loritab (5 ml less than allowed) and feeling pretty self-congratulatory about my "walk" to the corner and back).

When I came off the life flight copter and was admitted to UW Madison Trauma I was a pretty important guy. I got lots of quality attention and evaluation. It looked like surgery was imminent. Then a bunch of Wisconsinites got into auto accidents. Soon I was "competing" for attention with (literally) two SUVs full of wounded boy scouts returning from an outing. Okay, I have three broken vertebrae and a collapsed face, but these fellas are earnestly working on their "trying to die" merit badges and I'm "stable." Meaning I'm working on my "trying to breathe through a collapsed face" merit badge, and my "hold still and we'll get to you" badge. If that were my boy scout lying there, I would certainly agree with this reasoning. I agreed then, but bitchily.

Yesterday, I went to see a neurosurgeon, not mine, because he's in Madison, on referral from our GP, who was concerned about infection in my wound. The neurosurgeon was uneasy about even beginning to treat me when he wasn't sure what had been done. The more he thought about it, the more he wanted the folks in Madison to take responsibility. He had his folks, whom I had met for a total of 10 minutes, arrange an appointment in Madison and we got a call that made it sound like UW really wanted us there. This was all from his office, mind you, not UW.

When we got to Madison, I realized that this was exactly what I had been trying to avoid: an "admission" via the Emergency Room. Got there at about 3 p.m. The place was swamped (apparently more errant Wisconsinites trying to die). I had to admit that I was in almost no pain and that this was a wound check. This is the triage version of a "hangnail." The on call neurosurgeon from my actual department at UW was not PAGED until after 7 p.m. (Faithful readers know that this turned out to be a non-event, no admission, a change in antibiotics and then a release.) This means I occupied very expensive treatment space after travleing 3 hours by car, for a glorified clinic appointment. While I waiting a long time, someone else, inevitably, waited on me. And I should not have been there. I am not trying to die here. Not today.

Robyn, who is the only person I'm close to who did NOT have any interest in being a nurse, nurse's aide, etc., got to drive me home and put me to bed. There is a very funny story here about her frustration with me, the whole situation and a very rapid deterioration in personal care (the absolute first, I might add). "I'm sorry honey, but the urinal won' t fit there." I'll tell it later. Robyn has been more patient than I would probably have been, so we'll let the dust settle while I chuckle.

While I'm no longer a triage poster boy, every time I tell a new health person about my accident, my wounds, and my relative in-tact-ness, they all shake their heads and say "you could've died." For about an hour and a half, I had every wounded boy scout in Wisconsin trumped. I have managed to avoid any loss of neurological function. I'm looking at a full recovery, although I may not stand quite as straight as before. I am a certifiable NON-EVENT at emergency rooms across the mid-west. This, I believe is not so much an accomplishment as a lucky and safe place to be.

I took a walk this morning down to the corner and back. It felt pretty good. I used all my toes. They're homely but they work. Kind of like the rest of me.

Next up: Wired jaw weight loss plan. How does Sam cope with relative mute-ness? Beer through a straw? What will Robyn do for a project once Jeff finishes the deck?

Area 51

The MRI came back for my back, so I thought I'd share. I like the patriotic motif.

Feeling okay here right now thank you very much. I'm not sure what sort of utility a "birthday" designation for this day can really have. Will it grant me the ability to travel forward in time until I can get my wires out? Bad Jim Carey plot warning!

I'm really glad that everything I have hurt will heal. In a lot of rather particular ways I am specifically lucky. "If he'd hit here rather than there. . ." Trauma people love a little tension in the story.

For my 51st birthday find that I'm being totally taken care of by my old friend Robyn. However independent one may think one is, physical trauma applies the scientifically necessary perspective. "Mr. Independent, meet Mr. Pretty-Much-A-Sausage!" How you want them eggs done?
This is a pretty good shot of where they put my back together with the screws and bolts and silly putty.

Just hanging out here in Area 51, enjoying my easy chair and contemplating a smoothie.

A little decision here, litte one there. . . .

Here's a picture from my last day of BRMA. If you take a close look, you can see me straggling up this hill in Granny Gear. I could count on the guys to wait in the first available shade past the summit and on Chris to get yet another picture of me pulling up a hill. I had a lower gear added to what was a 12-speed. It gave me one low gear to work with. Man, my legs were getting tough! Everyone else on the trip was sporting a 28 speed road bike. I was working on convincing Chris that his biker superiority was due to better gear, rather than better conditioning.

Here's one of our conditioning stops right now. See how svelte? Here we watch Carroll change his tire again. Take care of that valve. Get down on your knees and face me. There, isn't that better? Sure was for the rest of us. I was thinking "boy am I glad my tires aren't bothering me!" That would suck. Now I'm looking at the photo and thinking "where's your fucking brace?"








Today it's about finding the space between "pain management" and "total zonedness" and tiptoe-ing in between them. I am learning that if the Vicodin knocks me right out it means I need more naps and it also means I can use less Vicodin. Ibuprophen is a good pal takes the edge off everything without those Michael Jackson-esque chilly naro-wierd vibes. Robyn's gone off to get a cortisone shot in her back so that she can continue to take excellent care of me, oh, and of herself and, um, . . . the kids. I am trying to read a little, write something, and in general to inject some more life into this routine.

I believe that this may be the fated "last curve" right here. Ride those breaks, boys. I was probably already in the grass by the time this picture was taken.













Where's that back brace? Life flight? UW Madison nurses? Perhaps more of a pike position would have helped.

Being 21 instead of 51 probably would have helped.

Will I do it next year? Quite possibly, but without the drama.

Thriller

Michael Jackson and I were born on the same day. When we'd play "I Want You Back," I used to joke that MJ and I have both changed remarkably during our lives, and that my metamorphosis was considerably cheaper, all in all. I just had to get fatter and lose my hair. I skipped all that time canoodling with plastic surgeons (until recently), plotting to make my skin lighter, my lips puffier. It was strange to find myself in recovery from this double-surgery listening to endless CNN updates on Michael's last few days, plans for his funeral, endless comments by fans.

I have been mostly working on moving from pain management back into "life insertion." (How the hell am I going to insert my life back into this?). The Vicodin they gave me is very effective for periods of time but is decidedly NOT benign. It makes the serious pain go away, but what is left is a strange buzz with "insects crawling around the edges." Seriously, I was relaxing in bed the other day and the little dust motes that float around in the sun turned into little flies and skirmished with each other at the periphery of my vision. Not butterflies, either. Flies. Is this Iowa? No, it's Mordor.

Every 12 minutes, CNN gives an update on how Michael Jackson needed an anaesthesiologist to administer drugs that make my Vicodin look like party favors just so the poor sucker could sleep! He wanted to be knocked out. Out. With flies. From Mordor.

I'm an old buzz hound. I like that vodka martini and maybe a little something buzz in the afternoon after work. I like that feel good all over warm me up and give the world a hippie hug sort of buzz. I cannot relate to this narcotic buzz that somehow makes you colder, more distant, isolated from your pain but also from most else.

I'm happy to feeling well enough to walk, to talk a little, to type badly and to connect again across less distance. I'm pleased that when my friends think I'm messing up they just tell me, rather than suggest a different anaesthesiologist or something.

Thanks to Jeff and Kevin and Yvonne for helping get our beds set up so Robyn can sleep too. We've really been enjoying going to bed early. Robyn's been enjoying just going to bed at all.