Why Am I Here?

Where in the world is Bob?

And why have I not been?

Certainly I have not been at a loss for words.  Perish the thought.  Indeed, there are too many, as usual.  But I am at a loss for discipline.  For narrative direction.  And without that, any extended tale becomes a jumble, a mucky tidal flat of vapid speculation, dotted with abandoned hulks of pointless blather.

A banal vision of rusty ruin, in other words.  A low-rent Ragnarok.  Gee, I'd like to avoid that. Wouldn't you?

And so I have been silent.  It beats becoming a navel-gazing blabbermouth.  But not by much.

When disaster strikes someone close to you, it changes their life.  But it also changes yours.  In fact, no one will escape some effect, from family and friends to the hospital staff to the usual hordes of imperfect strangers.  On and on, in widening ripples of feckless fate.  If you are reading this, that includes you.  

Welcome to my metaphoric ripple.  The boom will now shift as we jibe and bear away. Remember to duck.  Ouch.   Sorry about that.

Mike is recovering more or less on schedule.  He is seeing the orthopedic surgeon today in hopes of gaining permission to remove the cast on his arm.  He is still being fed through a tube until his swallow improves, but there is improvement.  His memory is now pretty much intact, both short and long term.  His mind seems entirely back, but he is bored out of it, and sick unto death with being helpless.  

Getting his arm and leg free will, I hope, start a cascade of improvement.  He will be able to get himself out of bed, and go to the bathroom without humiliating assistance.  He will be able to move his wheel chair by himself.  He will begin to walk.  That exercise will improve his attitude and general fitness, and strength will flow from strength.

That is the plan.  

There is a spot of worry about his eyes not focusing together.  He can see reasonably well out of either of them, but not together.  They track separately, and this results in double vision.

Barney Google, with the goo-goo-googly eyes.  

He has an appointment with a neurologist specializing in opthalmology to see what can be done about that.  Until then he has no depth perception to speak of, and tends to interpolate the edges of things erroneously.  

So.  First, mobility.  Then learn to swallow positively enough that the epiglottis firmly covers the windpipe, and thus regain the ability to feed himself.  I expect the next two weeks to be about that.  Then maybe getting him out of that neck collar.  Then we will deal with his vision.  

He has disability pay until the middle of February.  Things could be worse.

As for me, I can't see any prospect of travel before next summer.  And I may sell the Beast.  

This morning, I discovered that the City has slapped an impound sticker on my motorcycle trailer.  It has been parked illegally in front of my house since Mike's accident.  So right now I'm going to go move it over to his back yard.  I'm surprised it took this long for the bureaucrats to swing into action.  Perhaps they have been distracted by more important matters.

Bob, who had more to say than he thought.  Maybe that will happen again tomorrow.