More update

I gave up the car about a year ago. It needed new brakes and "front end work". I drove it longer than was safe, but when it scared me I passed it on to Dale, my honorary son-in-law. He still riggles under cars to change oil and install new brakes. 

For a while I hired rides to my infrequent doctor appointments. Then I seriously fell. Not the first time, but the first one I could not bail out of. Flat on my back with a seriously broken hip. Painful ride to the hospital where they decided my blood chemistry was to wacky to risk surgery. Bla, bla, bla.

Eventually a handsome young orthopedic surgeon proudly described his repair. A rod down my femur and another across my hip to repair the damage. An extra week in the hospital to tranfuse blood and iron and stuff, off the rehab, finally home. 

It turned out I still had a lot of bones left to break. I'll spare you the details. I already wrote they consumed half a year or more of my life and Beth's, who squoze me in with work and her return to school to earn her CPA. 

Beth is still lugging me to various doctor appointments, with no complaint to me, though I know the cost to her. However, she is focused and determined and will not let me slide. On the one hand, she makes me crazy. But arguing simply ends in fights, and the couple of those we've had are worse to me than breaking bones. Now I just give in, lips zipped.

We have one last problem to solve. I finally gave in to a full spinal study, which Beth has advocated for some time. It involved MRI's, which I have declined for years. My last MRI was over ten years ago, and I emerged close to unconscious.

Well, those have changed since then! Or I have. I do have hearing aids now, and taking them out quiets my world considerably. Add ear plugs and music and it simply was an uncomfortable hour or so on a hard table with underlying construction noise in the background.

In a subsequent visit to a spine specialist I mentioned the surgery twenty years ago and the neurologist showing me the x-ray with the nerves of my neck squeezed to the size of Scarlet O'Hara's waist, comparatetivly. "Oh, yes. That's why you're falling again!" said the spine specialist. Two new disc collapses. So, a visit to a neurologist is in my near future.

I didn't open this blog to whine, by the way, but have done plenty of that. I really wanted to show you what's become of Mr. Yesberger's trees. I linked the story of the day Emily and I went to photograph those trees I found so fascinating. There's a lovely set of photos of "my tree" by the pond (my header photo!) in all four seasons here.

My sister had opportunity to drive down Truxell Road recently and told me my tree and the pond are in rough shape these days. I asked for pictures and the other day I got them.

Yes, that's my tree. The pond, foreground, is choked with rushes and covered with scum. The Conservancy, to whom Mr. Yesberger's acreage now belongs, is returning the golf course to meadow by neglect. 

That's my sad update for today.

Extraordinarily tough year

Been a long time, hasn't it! Though not for you, I hope. I haven't read any blogs for a year. It's my next undertaking. 

I celebrated every holiday, and my birthday, and family birthdays and events from a hospital room or a rehab facility. Now I'm home, and intend this to be my last time returning. No more falls, no more broken bones, no more surgeries.

Nothing is woven in all this time. Once Shelly was here and volunteered to weave a bit on the towel warp languishing on the loom. She's an excellent weaver and I agreed. 

I watched her for a minute, then sat on the other side of the loom and watched. After a bit I realized one harness was not rising. One treadle had detached from its corresponding lamms. Inches needed unweaving. Dale lowered himself to the floor, scooted under the loom and made the repair. A two hundred pound hero.

Shelly, and later Beth, tried to convince me to simply carry on and cut out the bad section in finishing. I cannot bring myself to do that. Bad enough I'll have two or three knots in the thread because of all the yards coming out. I'm not done yet; a few more inches to go.

On the family front, the last of the grands are graduating. France from his Colorado college a year ago. I watched him graduate on streaming YouTube. He is the business manager for a small start up company he joined while still in high school. It manufactures gluten and dairy free ice cream. This weekend he's moving to Boston to be with his girlfriend.

Caroline graduated a week ago from Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa, and will remain there to continue her work with autistic children. Another streaming graduation.

Laura must finish two summer classes at Akron U and will join the December graduating class. Her major is geology and she has a rock collection to match my dads'. She hopes to join the atmosphere group at Davey Tree.

And finally, on my homefront, "we" are working in the garden. I'm doing almost nothing except carrying plants on my lap out to the gardens (I have an electric chair!). Here's a selection:

Here's the flowering dogwood:

And finally, the diplandia, the closest I could come to a mandevilla three years ago. We need to add a lot of fertalizer. Maddy has over wintered it the last two years, lugged it water, trimmed it. I tell her it really is a Maddy-villa. 

OK, that's it. Thanks for waiting and watching. I'm off to unweave some more and hope it will not be so long for the future. 

One thing I did try to mention earlier and kept deleting every sentence: every time I came back from rehab I was greeted with a new list of departees. I've come to grips with the realization that really is our last job to do, here. In blogville, I know about Sue. She did it her way, and we all love her for it. As I read through the list of bloggers I admire, I hope to encounter no more. Namaste.