Leg girl, again.

At high school(s) we were the leg girl.
Hobbling along.
In and out of plaster too many times, and it didn't help.
That ankle is still crap.
It never healed.
I hate doctors who don't consider the damage treatment causes when they make their decisions.
And I'm still angry with my mother.

At the Bugsplat Hospital on Friday a physiotherapist taught me how to use crutches and it turns out that all those years in my teens, I'd been doing it wrong.
That's how stupid things were for me then. I was pretty hopeless.
There were lots of us hobbling around and we weren't doing much talking to each other.

It's better now.

Long day.

Over the last six months I've had a lot of pain in my knee, following a very stupid incident at *sigh* a first-aid course where I took my responsibility to save the life of that stupid dummy a little too seriously and damaged my knee as I kneeled down far too quickly onto cold concrete. I probably should have had it checked out, but I didn't and it would get better, then worse, then better, then worse, but it never stopped me doing much and it certainly didn't stop me boxing, going to yoga or teaching bellydance at the Bugsplat Family Centre.

For a while there were six yoga asanas that I couldn't do because of my knee - and Yama taught me modified versions of them but gradually I was able to do more and more of those without the modifications and last week I did them all without any modification. Last week I was feeling pretty confident about my knee and believed it to be healed. Unfortunately, last night, almost at the end of bellydance class, it completely collapsed on me and I had a really horrible night of pain and when morning came I found I couldn't walk properly and that got steadily worse and Gray took me to Bigsplat Hospital.

The staff were really nice. I liked the nurse, and the doctor and the radiologist and the physiotherapist. Not having much fondness for Bigsplat as a town, I was pleasantly surprised by how lovely all the staff were. It wasn't too bad. They got it all done on the one day. There's no bone damage showing on the x-ray. It's either going to be fine, or not. That was the doctor's opinion. Either way, we won't know until I've given it four weeks of rest. They've given me a splint and some elbow crutches and some physiotherapy exercises and I have another physiotherapy appointment on Tuesday where I can expect much worse now that she knows she doesn't have to be careful on account of the possibility of there being bone damage. No Dancing for at least four weeks until it heals. If it heals. If it doesn't, then it's something really horrible requiring surgery in SeaSide City.
So, much as I am fond of SeaSide City...

It's been a long, painful and distressing day.

Living and dying.

All living and dying things like these dogs and me coming and going without any duration or self substance, O God, and therefore we can't possibly exist. How strange, how worthy, how good for us! What a horror it would have been if the world was real, because if the world was real, it would be immortal."

-- Jack Kerouac, "The Dharma Bums"

It's Saturday night and we've just come home from the Bugsplat Film Club showing of a West African/German collaboration Anansi. It was a beautiful film and very delicate but everyone there was a bit flat. A few days ago there was an accident involving a motorbike and a four wheel drive and a dirt road. Two Bugsplat boys died. The funeral was today.

There was a funeral scene in Anansi. Over tea, it was widely remarked that the Africans do death so much better than we do. There was dancing and singing, in Ghana, but there was only a stranger priest here. Imitating ritual.

It was a sad day for Bugsplat. Gray and I were edgy and anxious all day. I cut my finger while I was scissoring up mint. Gray cut his finger after dropping a jar of zuchinni relish. We have matching band aids and matching glum faces.

All in a day's work or Lost: some big white marbles.

Update: We've spread ourselves out a bit, with some new blogs. Trouble has one of her own, all about work. Anybody here is welcome to read. Just ask.

Today was the culmination of several weeks of work for us on a project we initiated - the return to their communities of origin of 17 indigenous artefacts held (in custodianship) by the Bugsplat Visitor Centre. It's been a very intense few weeks for Trouble and Just Jo working on this project. In the agreement brokered last week there were a dozen stakeholders reaching agreement from very different philosophical, moral, cultural and political perspectives. (HEY! That sounds familiar! That could be Polly making any decision at all, no matter how trivial. No wonder we're GOOD at this stuff.) And today was the day the artefacts left the Bugsplat Visitor Centre and the end of an era.

It was meaningful and challenging work and we're glad these precious items are going home to their people where they will be cherished and respected and are no longer on display to the general public. I'm glad they're less vulnerable to theft too. I will no longer run into the collection room, every morning, just to see that they are okay. It was a good day. It's been great to work with the local indigenous community and I have met some great people along the way.