Rocky Mountain Southern Bell: January 2016

Tuesday, January 12. All my grand intentions have skidded to a halt. I have spent the better part of the last 3 weeks sick. Some days, I had more energy than others but I have essentially done nothing to get any closer to my goals. I am disappointed in myself, and have only myself to blame.

I could wallow in my self pity and ineptitude, or I could pull myself up by my bootstraps and pick up the pieces of what I started and make something of the year. After all, it's only been 2016 for 12 days, there are 354 more to go. That, is plenty of time.

I've also been giving some thought to why I am writing this blog. I want people to read what I write, and maybe find a little bit of laughter, hope, encouragement and creativity along the way. I love to write, and tell stories. I want to gain followers and have people comment on what I have written. I want to help people find a way to help themselves to learn to be a better version of them. But that doesn't happen overnight. In face, it may never happen. I can still hope. I can still share my stories and ideas. I can still leave a legacy of a life well lived, even if I don't have children.

So today I start anew. I will keep plugging away at my goals, dreaming big dreams and sharing ideas. But I am also going to write for me a little more, and an audience a little less. I have no idea if anyone will ever read my words, years from now, in the hope that they might know me better; and I am no longer sure that it matters. As long as I get to know me better, and perhaps entertain a few folks along the way, then I did my job.

There is a Internet meme going around on Facebook, it's had several incarnations, but the gist of it is this:
"It takes real skill to choke on air, fall up stairs and trip over completely nothing. I have that skill..."
If you know me in "real life", you will know how well this applies to me. One of the nicknames my father had for me growing up was "Grace", because I had none. Unless I am performing, am about as graceful as a giraffe on roller skates. Today's story is a perfect example of this.

This morning, at about 5:45, I was coming down the hill toward my house after walking the dog. The neighbors had done a piss-poor job of shovelling after this last snow, and the mail man had driven up the gutter once again, splashing the already slick sidewalk with slush from yesterdays melt off. This combination created a 30 to 40 foot span of sidewalk that was covered in ice. Mind you, it was pitch black, I am walking downhill (okay, being pulled downhill by the dog), and it's colder than a witches' you know what...

Suddenly, I find myself flailing. I'm going down, and there is no way I can stop myself. There is a car to my right and my elbow catches on it, yanking my arm up at the shoulder as the rest of me continues my decent in what felt like slow motion. And then it was over. There I was, on the cold, hard cement, right arm trapped upwards by the car that caught my elbow, my right leg sticking straight in front of me and my left leg, bent at the knee, and twisted behind me. I had no idea my body could even bend like that.

My first thought was "OUCH!". My second thought was more like a string of explicatives, than an actual thought. I realized then, that I was on the ground, in the dark, without my phone, sprawled on the frozen ground. I was going to have to get myself unfolded, up, and back to the house alone. The dog wasn't going to be much help, she was in a hurry to get inside out of the cold; although she did turn around and look at me when she felt the tug on her leash.

Gingerly I maneuvered my left leg back to the front of my body. I pulled up my pant let to check for bleeding, and when I found none I made my first attempt at getting back up. No luck, I was on ice after all, and I had no traction to push up from a seated position. I rolled over to my hands a knees, which my knee and shoulder protested to, and used the car to pull myself up to my feet. I took a tiny step, testing the knee to be sure I could support my weight, wiped the tears that were threatening to freeze to my cheeks (I didn't even know I was crying before that point), and slowly began to make my way home.

I'm not even sure that I made it five feet. Whoop! My feet were suddenly flying out from under me, and I was making a much more rapid decent to the sidewalk - this time there was no car to slow me down. I landed hard on my tailbone, before falling back and cracking my head on the cement. I laid there a minute or two, trying to decide if I should laugh or cry. The dog even came back to me and licked my face. I think she thought I was trying to play a new game and she didn't understand the rules. She whined, I cried, and together we surely looked pitiful. I felt like the guy in the movies that keeps slipping and falling on the greasy floor, only this time it wasn't funny.

Eventually, I got myself back on my feet and hobbled home. I could walk and there was no blood, so I went to work. As the day went on, the pain started. Now, all I want is some Advil, a hot shower and bath. If there is a lesson to be learned in all of this, its either "never walk the dog without your phone" or, "even if life keeps pushing you down, keep getting back up no matter how much it hurts". Either way, tomorrow we walk in the street, and I take my phone.

Rocky Mountain Southern Bell

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Fall Down, Go Boom

Friday, January 1, 2016

Hit the Ground Running

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