My Achilles Heel

         Sometimes it's hard to believe that ripping something apart and making it bleed could be a good thing. But that's what they did.      

       As I walked to the hospital the day of my surgery, knowing I would not be able to leave the same way, I asked myself if I was making a huge mistake. Why am I walking the direction I am walking?? They are going to slice my skin and shave the bone and twist the tendon and I'm afraid of all of it. I should be running the other way!

   

   The doctor said this will help. I like to consider myself a realist, but if I'm being honest, on the scale of optimism versus pessimism, I often unintentionally lean towards the latter. Whatever my pain was a week and a half ago, I was still able to do my own laundry, get myself to places I needed to be, open my own doors, go grocery shopping, ride a bike, and not endlessly annoy the people who live beneath me when I noisily hop up and down while getting dressed. So I have to ask myself if it is worth it.

  

      In nine to twelve months I should be fully recovered. I have a problem with long-term perspective, and that is a long time to me.  I want to run again. I want to lace up my shoes and feel my heart pound while the sweat drips from my forehead. I want this everyday and not in nine months.

   This is forcing me to learn patience as well as empathy for people with actual struggles that last much longer than mine.  Also, did the doctor know that with his knife he would be removing not just bone, but pieces of my pride, as I would be forced to rely on everyone around me for simple tasks? 

   I am hopeful that my injuries heal quickly. I hope the incisions they made into my bone make me stronger than before, though it's hard to force my perspectively challenged brain to understand something that feels so counterproductive. I'm learning new emotions. I'm not really happy, but also not sad. It is more of a longing anticipation. I am anticipating the happiness that I will feel when I am better. It is a different flavor of the hope that I am used to. And whatever else I gain, I am glad that I've learned this new flavor of hope.

Sunday Selfie

            I could pretend I don't have an arrogant side. I could pretend I hate attention or that praise makes me uncomfortable. But I promised to tell the truth so I won't pretend. Today is Selfie Sunday--a cultural movement that made it okay to shout, "Hey, look at me!" So here is my selfie. You already know what I look like, and I don't care if the world knows when I'm having a good hair day.  So instead of a picture it is a self-portrait made of words. 

            Let's get the important things out of the way. I'm sweatier than the average person, and this is why I hate hot weather. My hands are usually cold, I don't like egg rolls, I'm not a touchy person, and I have no idea what color my eyes are.

            I like to watch TV. I'm sure this isn't news to anyone. I instantly like anyone who likes the same shows as me, regardless of how well I know them or if they even remember my name.

            Speaking of remembering names, this is my talent. It seems like the whole world regularly claims to be bad with names. Either everyone is pretending to have a bad memory or I am the only person with this talent.

           

            I can never be a hipster because I have terrible taste in music. Okay, I don't only like terrible music, but.......I get excited when I hear Call Me Maybe. This is a hard thing to admit to the Internet, but what can I say? It makes me want to dance, and I love to dance.  Sidenote: Dancing is a hobby and not a talent. Also I like Macklemore. Okay embarrassing confession time is over. (But Macklemore's so right. Who would pay $50 for a T-shirt? Probably people who aren't cheap. This isn't me.)

            Some people would say I am quiet. They would be right...sometimes. The people who say this probably have not gotten to know me very well. I have been in love with words for as long as I can remember for the way they can be arranged into emotion and ideas and beauty. I could talk for hours on end, but I could spend as much time in silence and enjoy it just as well. There can be nearly as much beauty in the absence of words as there is in their presence.

            I'm aware that a lot of people think selfies are obnoxious. Or maybe it's just the word. (Am I the only one who thinks toddlers must be controlling the slang words of our time?) I do this so that years down the road whoever writes my eulogy will have plenty of material to make it the best eulogy ever written. Or maybe I do it because I am currently unable to walk and I'm very bored, and I hope someone will read this and like it and then come hang out with me. Either way, thanks for listening to me talk about myself.

I Started Running in the Winter

     I started running when it was just starting to get cold. I'd never felt the cold before.  I'd never owned a scarf or gloves. They weren't needed in Sunny Southern California.  But now Utah was my home, and I was about to experience my first Winter.

            

     I don't remember why I did it--the first time I went running. I thought I was fat or something like that. I put on a pair of tennis shoes and the only pair of non-denim long pants that I owned, and I ran. I did this everyday. My feet slapped the pavement over and over. I breathed in the air that kept dropping to temperatures I didn't know existed. I loved it.  I was alive, and each biting breath of icy air told me so.

            

    Soon there stopped being a reason I was pulling on my tennis shoes. I ran because I had to. It became an obsession. If the sidewalks were too icy to go I cried. I begged my parents to take me to the gym so I could run on the treadmills there.  When they said no, I would get angry. I would sit alone in my room and shake with the silence of my anger.

           

    I wrote about my anger. Entire sections of my journal are about my anger. I wrote how I hated the feeling. It wasn't like sadness. Sadness was okay.  It could even be beautiful. But anger I hated. It was the mixture of sadness, self-loathing, fear, and confusion.

            

    The only thing that could drive away this feeling was to run again. To feel the invigorating shock of cold air in my lungs. To taste the wind and the sweat and the ache in my muscles.

           

    One day as I ran I smelled a familiar smell. The smoke from a backyard barbecue had escaped and reached my nose. I realized I was too warm for comfort, and I pulled off my sweatshirt. The sun touched my bare arms and I shivered in delight. My feet splashed through puddles from the melting snow. This was Spring. I'd never experienced it before. Spring can't exist without the melting snow and the surprise of forgotten sunlight.

           

     It was beautiful and delicious and I ran and I laughed and I ran and I laughed.