Friday, November 29, 2002

THANKFUL DAN Ten weeks to

THANKFUL DAN
Ten weeks to the day since I broke my wrist.  I can now look on the experience pretty much in hindsight and see it, with certain qualifications, as a blessing.  Maybe it’s just this Thanksgiving season, holdover that it is from pagan and pre-semitic harvest rituals and other less elevating sources, and maybe I’m a little emotional because we got to host thanksgiving and have my mom and sister and her husband, and Jon and his wife, two kids (one just ten days old) and his mom as well - a consumatory orgy with five kids under three years old and seventeen adults and nine pies plus four other complete desserts, two turkeys, spiced toasted almonds and crisp sweet persimmon slices and we’ve still got four bottles of the nouveaux left over… yea, it was an evening of indulgences and intergenerational communion, and that made me feel all warm and gooey inside, perhaps more inclined than usual to be thankful for my great friends, wonderful job and life, cool apartment, awesome dog and loving cat, all that stuff that I usually give thanks for…

But it’s ten weeks to the day since I broke my wrist and I do actually feel thankful for several aspects of that experience.  These items of thankfulness vary from things that could have gone worse, to things that just worked out really well, into things that the experience brought to me, elicited from me or something that I think I learned.  So despite further ado, here are 24 Things About My Broken Wrist That I’m Thankful For (in random order):
* I just broke my wrist, not anything that required me to be immobilized or even on crutches
* I didn’t hit my face, lose any teeth, get a big disfiguring scar like I so easily could have
* No brain damage (honestly, this is about how I was when I started)
* Only broke one of my arms - I’ve done both at once before, and I did have a nice heavy five point landing
* Didn’t break my glasses and have to resort to wearing spares and paying for a new primary pair
* Didn’t damage my bike, which I’m so ready to start riding again
* Happened where I could get help fast - cops were there immediately, and a pro bike team, and an ambulence
* My stalwart wife and friends were with me, stuck by me for hours in the hospital, brought me clothes and kept me comfortable
* Another guy with the same injury was in the bed next to me and he was definitely having a lot more trouble with pain than I was; I’m thankful that I was able to take it
* Happened in an area where medical care is good, not in the third world
* Happened in 2002, not 100 years prior when the hand would have been as good as lost for the rest of my life
* Made me slow down and see a lot more of what was going on around me
* My colleagues and supervisors at work really accomodated me
* I had an excellent surgeon
* My wonderful friend Dr. Andy cared for me post-surgery for a long time and made sure I was thorougly attended to
* I’m recovering very quickly
* I have some cool scars on my arm
* When I couldn’t shave, the scruffy beard wound up looking pretty cool
* Wonderful friends cooked and ran errands for us, let us lean on them and helped us through the toughest days
* Learned ambidexterity and now am able to do a lot more important things with my left hand, which is very useful
* Wonderful wife cared for me, bathed me, cooked for me, and cleaned our house while I was immobilized
* Wonderful family members coast to coast sent good wishes and baked goods
* Got free beers at happy hour from more wonderful friends and the cool bartender
* Leftover pain medicine