I’m so glad this month is nearly over, and all the catastrophes are done with (for the moment).
My nephew Dylan (10 months old) is out of the hospital. He still has a tube sticking out of him (that gets removed in a week), but watching him crawl around his house and laugh and play I wouldn’t know that just a few days ago he was in a hospital room with his parents camped out with him. The infection that landed him in the hospital for days and days (it felt like forever) is mostly gone. He’s going to be fine. And his parents may even recover from the fright as well.
My back is mostly pain free now. For nearly two weeks at the beginning of the month I was in excruciating pain. It’s so easy to forget how bad my back can get. On a normal day I have twinges of pain, mild discomfort. Occasionally it’s real pain and severe discomfort. It’s almost never real pain. Real pain means muscle relaxers and heavy duty pain killers (the kind that are regulated by law, the kind that are habit forming). Real pain means breathing hurts, sitting hurts, laying down hurts, being awake hurts, and being woken up from sleep because you accidentally moved.
My car was out of commission at the same time as my back. Double whammy. The cost of a new radiator, etc., set my rainy day fund back a bit (added to the expenses of the orthopedist, medications, etc.). The fact that after I got my car, the very day I got my car, it overheated again and needed to be towed back to the mechanic’s shop because they didn’t fix it correctly didn’t help. I was without a car for a few days, which in Houston is forever. You cannot get around without reliable transportation. Or unreliable, as the case may be. But my car is fixed now, and working just fine.
This is all coming off two months of intense work. The first week of this month marked the end of three projects that had consumed my work life for weeks and weeks and weeks. It was supposed to mark the beginning of several weeks of slow period to catch up with other items on my plate. I didn’t anticipate that those other items would all be personal.
With everything that’s happened it would be easy to forget that this month is an anomaly. My life, as ordinary and dull as it is, is ordinary and dull. My work environment has gotten better over the past few months, to where it’s occasionally fun again. My health is mostly OK, as long as I remember not to overdue it (in spite of back problems, my mild carpal tunnel and my recent diagnosis of arthritis in one shoulder). The family is fine (even Saul, who is overseas and always in the back of my mind). The kiddos are growing – brilliant and beautiful. I never have enough free time, nights out with my friends or the money to do anything I want (though I may be unrealistic with that last request), but I never actually lack for anything.
So September is nearly over, and I’m glad. I want my ordinary life back.
