While Mike died on March 3, today, it is 365 days since he died. We’re off by one day because of the leap year. I feel somewhat empty. I’m not aware of missing Mike; I just feel slightly empty.
It was a two sweatshirt morning when I walked Elsa. I dropped one before I left the house for Bikram. In the yoga class, I worked more on lifting the right hip to release the left. This made the left hip and leg somewhat uncomfortable. So far, so good. The discomfort diminishes.
I went to Office Max right after yoga to buy a toner cartridge. I had started to look for one the other day but realized I didn’t have enough information. Before I went this time, I took a picture of the cartridge I have now. I still couldn’t find the one I needed. I asked for assistance. When the clerk arrived, she led me to the next aisle. Ah, that’s where all the HP replacement cartridges were. It was just as well that I turned stupid and didn’t check that aisle. I would usually have done that. Because I didn’t, I wound up buying something more suitable for my needs. The toner cartridge I had was an 80x. The clerk told me the 80A would also fit my printer. The difference is the price. The A is $100 cheaper than the X, and the amount of toner in the cartridge. She said the X held a lot more toner. I am sure it is relatively much cheaper than the A. I asked her if I would be better off buying the X if I didn’t use it frequently. She said no, I went with the A.
Then it was off to PT. Katie did most of her work on my upper back and neck, which are some of the causes of the problems I have in my hip. The misalignment in those areas throws my hips off. Maybe someday, my spine will be straight. As Heather stands over me, she gives approving nods and thumbs up when she sees what I do. I must be doing something right.
Katie checked how I lower myself onto or into a chair and how I got out of it. Because I can’t get more than a 900 flexion in my left hip, my back muscles have to overwork. Boy, is she ever right about that! I know it is as much my back, causing me problems as my hip. She showed me ways I could make compensations to take the strain off my back. This woman is absolutely amazing. She has a new bag of tricks to show me with each session.
I was skeptical about physical therapy. The ones I had contact with before Katie were uninspiring at best. When I had my shoulder surgery for my rotator cuff injury, I had a young woman who operated on, “It’s Thursday, it must be Belgium” prescription. In other words, she never carefully looked at me and made adaptations for my needs. Each person is a unique example of the body. There is no one-size-fits-all. Worse yet, I had two therapists that only did an ultrasound on Michael’s muscle, the one he injured. One was so bored he yanked my leg absentmindedly to get it in a better position causing further injury. I howled for quite a while. I never went back to him, which was just as well. I asked around for therapies that might work and was directed to MELT and Tom Ockler, who lives outside Cleveland. I saw him for two sessions. Whatever he did, it made a permanent difference. He’s one gifted dude. Of course, he didn’t accept insurance so he could follow his own instincts instead of being confined to the prescription of some orthopedic surgeon who only sees PT as a supplement to his work. Surgeons are like that proverbial man with a hammer that sees everything as a nail, etc., etc., etc.
The next stop was Costco. What is going on? This is the second time that I found the parking lot on overload. Is everyone storing up for an anticipated quarantine because of the coronavirus epidemic? This is part of what I did. I bought a Costco-sized supply of bath tissue, cans of tuna, and cans of salmon. The tuna I will return if we don’t get to use it. The salmon I will keep. I love canned salmon on a leaf of romaine. Dinner.
One the way home from Costco, I finally called my friend Carol in Ohio, the Cleveland area. We met during my first year of teaching at Licking heights. I was servicing the middle and high school students at the time. Her classroom was across the hall from mine, and we became friends. I was 64 at the time; we’ve known each other for 15 years. We don’t get to see each other too much. After we moved to Hawaii, Mike was involved with the Seminary distance learning problem in Ohio. As a result, he traveled there for some face-to-face meetings with personnel. We would stop off there on our way to the east coast for Thanksgiving each year. I drove up from Columbus, Carol came down from Cleveland; we would meet halfway.
I have been thinking about her a lot. I was worried I hadn’t heard from her. She has her own health issues. I spoke to her on the drive home. She was fine. There was a moment of an awkward conversation after we both established that we were doing well. Then we talked about her family, and then we talked about things we remembered from our youth. Carol is five years younger than I am. I guess by the time she got to school, TVs were already in people’s homes. They weren’t when I was five. We talked about the number of clothes we had. How different than today. We often wore the same outfit day after day. You have to remember, people didn’t have washing machines in their homes. I remember when I was five, my mother would use a laundromat across the street. But I also remember her hanging her laundry up on the roof of our apartment building. Did she do that because there were no dryers or to save money? I also remember that my father bought her a washing machine with a manual wringer; it squeezed the water out of our clothes into our tiny kitchen.
Then there was my middle school gym outfit, a blue cotton jumpsuit with baby doll sleeves and short pantaloons. We had to make sure it was washed and ironed once a week. My mother took one look at that outfit and declared that she was not ironing it. She taught me, and I had to iron all my clothes after that. That was actually great. My mother was one of those perfectionist control freaks that never allow my sister and me to do anything unless she thought it was perfect. We learned to make our beds in camp. From then on, we got to make our own beds every day. I know those of you who were burdened with housework wonder what I was complaining about. But there is such a thing as too little participation in maintaining the physical environment where you live as well as too much. I know of a situation where a mother turned their daughter into her personal slave.
When I got home. I put my clothes away and finally said good-bye to Carol. I was ready for a nap. The morning had been full already. When I woke up, it was 4:30. I did some quick ironing, taking advantage of the dropping sun’s rays falling on my solar panels.
Then endless games of FreeCell. I know. It’s disastrous for my wrists. I should at least give it up for lent. No way yet.
When I walked Elsa, I found the package with the clear plastic zipper bags I ordered for organizing and storing the bed linens. I friend of mine did that. She put a whole set of bed linens in a bag. It was easily accessible that way. I still haven’t opened it to see if these will suit my needs.
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