New News

 

A new day is coming for me.  The past 2 weeks or so have been really hard for me.  I won't go into it all, but I will mention some things.  

First, 2 weeks ago last Thursday, I went for my driving test for my motorcycle license.  I failed the test when I fell over on my brand new scooter.  I wasn't hurt, unless you count my pride, and a few scratches on my new scooter.  But my confidence was destroyed.  I started thinking that I was an old fool, trying to ride a 250 cc scooter at my age.  Then a few days later was the first home game for the Utes.  Tori and I walked from Dave and Kristen's apt. down to the stadium, probably 2 miles or more.  Then we walked up to the 51st row to our seats.  I thought I did pretty well for the first really long walk on my knee since the surgery.  But walking home was another thing.  I am sure it was 4 miles back and the longer I walked the slower I walked.  I was in so much pain in my left hip and my lower back that finally I had to lay down on the lawn by the side of the road.  Tori was very patient with me, never complaining about how slow I was.  When we finally got to the apt. complex, I was turned around and lost and would have never made it if it hadn't been for Tori knowing the way.  When we got to Dave's, he sort of barked at us for ringing the bell so late.  He didn't know how much pain I was in and how depressed I was, thinking that just a year ago, none of this was a problem.  I sat in his bathroom and cried, feeling very sorry for myself and wondering if I need to get a rocking chair and sit on the porch.  When I had gathered some strength, Tori and I drove home, but I cried most of the way.  That night I took Motrin, Percocet and Ambien because I was in such pain all over and didn't think I could sleep.  I felt better the next day and have actually felt better on my knee since then.  I still don't have enough strength in my quads, but the flexibility in my knee seems improved.  

Another thing that has been weighing very heavy on my mind is the problem with the neighbor horse.  Cloud is my horse and Maia is the horse sharing corral space with Cloud.  Her owner, whom I will call Robert, is very hard to "live" with.  There are a myriad of things that I don't like about him, but the one thing that is bugging me the most these days is his laziness.  He rarely comes over to see Maia, only shovels her manure once a week (if we are lucky) and never offers to take the garbage can full of the horse manure out to the street on garbage night.  And he never cleans out the water trough and refills it.  These are rather heavy chores and since his horse is there, it would be nice and equitable if he did the chores 50% of the time.  He pays the landlady to feed his horse, doesn't clean up after the horse, rarely rides her and doesn't spend anytime working her on the ground.  I could understand it a little more if he worked at a job, but he is on "disability", so he doesn't have a job, which means some of my taxes go to support him and then I still have to do the manual labor.  Lately, Maia has been cribbing on the wooden divider between the two stalls.  Cribbing is when  horse chews and eats the wood, destroying fences, posts, etc.  I finally bought some stuff to paint on the fence, but it didn't slow her down.  I spent 3 hours one day, with my drill/screwdriver and some deck screws, trying to shore up the boards where she was chewing them apart.  No sign of Robert, either to see the damage his horse was doing or to do anything about it.  Finally, I texted him, complaining about the filthy bandages the vet had left in the corral when he came to change Maia's leg bandage.  Robert, of course, didn't know anything about it (because he never comes over to see his horse) and then left messages on my phone all weekend, wanting to talk to me.  After about a week, I returned his call, only to have him say that he knows Maia is chewing down the divider and he will "get on it" this weekend.  That was last weekend.  No Robert.  I was so mad today when I fed Cloud that I started thinking about where else I could board her.  

This evening, I rode my scooter to the DMV riding course and practiced on the motorcycle  test course and I think I can now pass the test.  Thanks to Mike, who spent an evening helping me to gain control of my bike and listening to me complain about how I couldn't do it.  I now have a lot more confidence and control on the scooter when I am going slow.  Then, I went over to feed the girls and found that the landlord had taken down the remnants of the wooden divider and put up a metal panel, which is basically a section of metal bars used in fencing.  I cannot express the relief and joy at that problem being solved.  It will be interesting to see how many days go by before Robert comes by and sees the solution provided to him.  And the lovely thing is that I can't think of a reason that I need to speak to Robert on the phone for a long time.  

So, my life is making a turn around.  Things are looking up and the best part is that I am regaining some of the confidence in myself that I had lost.  It is hard to think of yourself in the same way when your mobility is diminished.  I told my Physical Therapist that I feel old these days.  I have never felt that way before, at least not to this depth.  But it looks like maybe this was just a big bump in the road and that I am coming up the other side.  

Yesterday was my grandson's one month birthday.  I am now going to attempt to put some pictures of him on this blog site.  Here goes......I am a retard.  I can't figure out what I did with the pictures.  But they are pictures of K.C., mostly. I don't know how that  picture of bicyclists got in there.  I don't know how to add the pictures later in the text.  I will work on this later.  Sue