WHERE’D HE GO

Dear readers of Give a Dog a Bone. I know, I disappeared from my Substack, and I apologize for not explaining sooner but it’s hard to do when my story begins with lights out, like the boxer. “Holy cow that dude with a walker just fell over and banged his head. Everybody’s in a tizzy.” Well yeah. He hit the ground like it was a daisy bed, it turned out to be concrete” That was my beginning of the day when I went to the Fusion Theatre to see the Seven. I was gathered up and whisked away to UNM to see if the big rabbit will hop. Not so much, it seems Thumper rattled his head like a bongo solo. The music wasn’t good on playback. 

 

“Our man, the prisoner of Bingo Bongo, who fell on the daisy bed that wasn’t, once embraced at 6’1 and 175 pounds by UNMH, you could feel the clock ticking and the muscles fleeing. Four months is a wrecking ball. “So, what now?” “Screwed comes to mind.” “No, in for a penny, in for a pound.” 

 

That is his dilemma with no certain answers. I write from a rehab facility where my progress is measured in minutes, standing. In a wheelchair, my knees are placed against a padded board. A harness is slipped under my butt so my PT can clip her rope to a ring that gathers my butt sling. There is another who helps when it’s time to stand. The PT clipped to me takes 60 pounds. 156-60 leaves 96 for me. I go up, my bad left arm is helped on to a grab handle, the good arm is already gripping its partner. Realize I haven’t stood up my body to weight-bearing since the accident at Fusion. The sensation going through me is like Electric eels racing up and down my body. Minute counting is happening. When my breath begins to come in short bursts I signal stop. Four minutes. I do this again. Four minutes. Then one more go. Four minutes.

 

A PT named Sam, who has been on vacation swoops in, a Philippine dervish of clarity and task. Now I’m working my wheelchair in the hallway pushing backwards. He says all right. I’ll put you at the end of the hall, you push backwards to the nurse's station and that will be 50 feet. Check. Now try pulling yourself forward. I get, maybe,14 feet. Next session. I’m not feeling confident. He says pull yourself forward. You have six minutes. Off I go. Before I know it, I’ve gone 50 feet. He tells me I’ve graduated from the Wheelchair work. We’re going to focus on sit to stand.

You get the picture of the work ahead, lucky me. I want to continue to write on my Substack. It might be a little erratic given I’ve been spin dried and dumped on the kitchen floor, the helpless baby, determined to reclaim the title of the Prince of Bingo Bongo.