It's not just about walking

I'm not as clever as you all give me credit for. I appreciate it, but as an English teacher, I need to give credit where it is due. "Decreasing world suck" is not a term I came up with: www.fightworldsuck.org has been around for a while and each year the Project for Awesome raises money and a worldwide community votes to give the resources to causes that they vote for. My sincerest thanks for the benefit of the doubt you all gave me, but the odds are that my clever phrases are allusions to the Nerdfighter community or some obscure literary icon. 

I do admire people who are genuinely creative and come up with things like this clever video of my first Indian food experience: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_YH_XEqtI8&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Side note - you know you've found wonderful new friends when they good naturedly tease you about your choice of an email address from when you were thirteen.

My creative skills are limited, but I try to be thoughtful in my presentation of material which sometimes leads to thinly veiled allusions. Fair warning, there might be some below, but hopefully they are creatively woven in to an interesting and readable account.

I woke up Thursday morning ready for nothing - it was a national holiday, and therefore I had no scheduled therapy. Eager to do nothing alone, I got myself out of bed, did my difficult bathroom tasks, showered, and only asked for help when I needed to be sure all the moisture was removed from between my stiff and stubborn toes. Once that was done, I dried and dressed myself without help. I leisurely made my way up to the recreation room where I removed the German translation of Calvin and Hobbes to pretend I knew what I was reading for half an hour. As I made my way back to the station, I found Heather climbing the stairs to visit me for lunch. I enjoyed the chance to stand up and have a conversation with her for the first time in over four months. I also got a chance after lunch to take a short walk with her which again was a first in over four months; we slowly made our way around the half loop in my station as I took full advantage of my new privilege of walking without a nurse. Once Heather left, my day had the potential for bland and boring or weird and wonderful. Ever one for the unexpected, I embraced the boring and wonderful. I didn't do much, but I did it all by myself, and I was so proud of the little things - getting in and out of bed on my own, taking care of my bathroom business with the door closed and no one else around, even choosing my own bedtime was a choice I savored. 

Friday was similar as I only had a half day of therapy. I spent all morning thinking it was Monday after a weekend and all afternoon thinking it was Sunday before my week was about to start. I eventually figured out what day it was, and decided it was about time to respond to the request sent on Facebook by someone with my sister's picture to give them a call. Naturally, I called my sister and found out it was my dad who has yet to discover the purpose of a profile picture but we had a nice chat. I'm currently in a race with my second nephew to find a new home. He is due to arrive June 18, and I hope to leave here until June 28 - please join me in prayer that my insurance who has yet to respond will grant this request from the doctors. I'd like Baby Gooey to win this race.

I've made such great progress in the last few weeks, and I hope to continue making significant progress in the coming weeks, and hopefully here full time.

I hope to ease my way back into being a productive member of society by showing off my walking skills to friends like my German neighbors and roommates who came to visit today. My goal, as I told Gundi when she came to visit today, is to learn to walk up stairs to join my friends at frauenchor again soon. There's a large flight of stairs to reach the choir practice room, so I'm taking it one step at a time. Right now, the next step is drying between my toes so I can live alone safely. Odd step, I know, but if I don't learn this, I could develop "fusspilz" or "feet mushrooms" - fungus.

It's not just about walking. If that was the only concern I had as a newly christened paraplegic, my life would be a relative walk in the park. My body isn't done healing, so I'm asking for prayer that my muscles will relax, my nerves will reconnect, and my bodily functions will resume naturally. 

Reference: My nephew named his unborn brother Gooey; I take no credit for this genius. Though the three year old has also told me, "His name's not gonna be Gooey when he comes out."