Bicycle Disasters

We’ve been having some major bicycle disasters. First David crashed into a car door as it opened before him at an inopportune time. He got scraped up and twisted out of shape but didn’t break anything. After a few visits to the osteopath he’s achy but doing better. His bicycle fared a bit worse than he and was in the shop for a while, but it’s back now and more to the point, he’s back on it again, riding to work and back.

Howard started the week full of enthusiasm. He signed up for a graduate class in limnology and arranged to audit an Italian class. He rode his bike to the first day of school, attended his classes, and then mounted his steed to ride home. Crossing the street from Neuberger Hall, where he had his classes, he was struck by a car while on his bicycle. The driver was turning left onto Broadway looking right over his shoulder at oncoming traffic and not where he was aiming his car. He hit Howard and bicycle. Howard rode the hood for a while with the car still in motion, then he slid over the left side of the car (taking the side mirror with him) and came to rest on the ground. At that point the car ran over his left foot.

He spent many hours in the emergency room, Andrine by his side. The upshot is that his left second metatarsal is broken. His foot is so swollen that he can’t have surgery to pin it together until next week. He’s pretty frustrated about the whole thing. He tried to attend classes on Wednesday in a wheelchair only to discover that it’s not an option. It was exhausting and frustrating and even dangerous to try to maneuver around campus in a wheel chair with an unset broken foot stretch out in front among oblivious twenty year olds. They wouldn’t even take the next elevator so that he could ride it. He had to wait for several because they didn’t have the concept that the elevators were for disabled people not for healthy but lazy young people.

Meanwhile, I’ve been thrust into caregiver mode again, only not with Howard. Andrine has taken over that position. I’ve been looking after Stephen, our housemate, who just had knee replacement surgery. He came home from the nursing home on Monday, the same day that Howard broke his foot. Now we have two members of the household in wheelchairs. I’ve been cooking and shopping for food to keep the household fed. Andrine hired Petra to clean so the house isn’t falling apart while we are tending to the wounded. Andrine, bless her heart, is cooking tonight.

My energy has been great, however. I recovered from the surgery in record time. The anesthetic didn’t linger as I had feared, and I actually feel like myself again. It had taken a whole year, and I thought that I might never see the day again, but I feel healthy and energetic again. Good thing, because it’s time to spring into action. I must admit, I prefer to be the caregiver instead of the care recipient. Although, don’t get me wrong, I greatly appreciate everyone who did care for me. It was an amazing year that way, to realize how kind my friends and family are. But I can really appreciate now how wonderful it is to have the energy to contribute to the well being of others. I now can run up and down the stairs with little thought, instead of contemplating it for hours because one trip up or down could use up my energy for hours.

I don’t know if I’m back to 100% yet, but it’s damned close, damned close.