Tag: Health

The UP Side of Being Down

The good thing about being at a low point in your life is that there’s nowhere to go but up.

Fracturing my right fibula in mid-June last summer was inconvenient, requiring crutches for only a couple weeks.  The biggest annoyance was that I couldn’t drive and had to use Uber to get to and from my doctor’s appointments.  The bigger challenge came shortly thereafter when I dislocated and fractured my left ankle in two places.  That required surgery, a week in the hospital, and follow-on rehabilitation.  Losing Romeo only added to my despair.  It was one of the lowest periods of my life—only two or three things have left me more devastated.

Yes, I ended up with two fracture boots! Anybody need one?

That was 13 months ago.  One year ago I made the trek down 4 flights of stairs to visit the orthopedic surgeon for follow up.  That may not sound like much, but it was.  Partly because that trip also required coming back up the steps, by myself.

Living alone is hard when you’re physically incapacitated.  There’s no one to help you with anything.

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A Tale of Two Ankles

Note:  I’ve had the best intentions of finishing the cliffhanger post, but every time I come to the blog, I get sidetracked with the design… as you can see.

So… the right leg healed reasonably well.  I became officially bootless on July 24th or thereabouts—at least toward the end of July.  (Can’t remember the day of the week I went to the doc.)  The ankle was still a bit sore as it turns out the break wasn’t completely healed.  But I was cleared for shoes, albeit with ankle support of some kind, and warned not to go on any day hikes or such.

My car started up fine after 6 weeks of sitting idle.  (Subarus may not be sexy, but they sure are reliable!)  And life got back to normalcy, except for a bit of digestive problems I was having.

On Tuesday, August 6, I went to the 7-11 in the afternoon to pick up some milk (because I was out) and chicken noodle soup (for my digestive distress).  While waiting in line (the guy in front of me was taking forever, what with talking on his phone and trying to get just the right kind of “cigarillo” [or whatever those cigar-colored cigarettes are called]) I became dizzy.

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Adventures in Cooking

My sister-in-law Margie posed with her childern Ted, Rich, and Kristen before her untimely death.
Margie (top right) and her three wonderful kids, c. 1990.

My sister-in-law, Marjorie Forsythe Overholt (not to be confused with my mother, Marjorie Carter Overholt), was a terrific cook.  She claimed, however, all one needed was to follow the recipe.  I’m sure she was being overly modest; lots of people follow recipes without great success. (raises hand)

Margie had the most amazingly organized brain.  Being a math major and high school math teacher probably had something to do with it (or vice versa).  Once I opened a cupboard door in her kitchen to find a hand-printed calendar of evening meals planned out for the month.

My nephew Ted (top left) wasn’t quite so impressed, though.  He said she may have been a good cook, but they had the same thing again and again.  That may be true, but that’s how the majority of us live.  We have 20 or so recipes we use in a somewhat cyclical fashion.

For example, growing up, our Sunday dinner alternated between pot roast and fried chicken.  Then there were the standard meals in between.  The ones I remember most fondly are pork chops with rice and onions (possibly my favorite—besides my mother’s pigs in blankets 😉 ) and liver and onions (probably because I liked it, whereas my dad and brother did not).

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