In October of 2010 multiple surgeries brought me to the need to replace my right knee. Just in case the good Lord smites me with memory loss someday, I pervertedly stashed a few hospital and recovery photos of that insane surgery in a folder on my laptop aptly titled "HELL". To make matters worse....after Rusty accompanied me in learning to walk again....three months later the surgeon decided he needed to "revise" the results and I had to do it all over again. Basically, twice, I had to literally relearn how to keep me balance and walk again. And, for the curious among you, an added absurdity was the effort to try to balance to sit down and pee with the surgery leg sticking straight out. Oh, yeah. That would have been a photo for sure! But its not in the folder.
I can never ever forget those long days and even longer nights of recovery. Pain that put child birth into a distant perspective as this pain was not over in hours. No, it went on for months. Many a nap or night's sleep I'd be jolted awake with a particularly efficient stab and involuntarily awaken and cry out. And who would awaken also and move himself from the foot of the (our) bed up to "kiss" my chin and plop closer to me? Oh, yeah. The man. My guy. My pain bodyguard....Rusty. He knew. What's more....when all others (who really did care) tired of my misery....he never wavered. He's canine, baby! Somehow they understand by osmosis when and how their masters need them. I remember that every time I sat on my shower bench and I closed the curtain he'd hop up and assume his position of self-appointed as my life guard on top of the fuzzy purple toilet seat cover. When I was done...off he would hop and place himself just outside the small bathroom door.
This dog is so docile, so UNpomeranian, so quiet....I can't imagine how he might have ever given any external assistance besides comfort if I'd fallen. Heck, I don't know if he would have even barked to annoy connecting neighbors to check on me. But...his presence was always so sweet and so restoring. Rusty is what every human friend should be: just always there for you.
And when the intensity of my pain had finally diminished to a degree that the surgeon made me start physical rehabilitation....there was Rusty. Walking beside my rented walker, always just outside the path of its movement. First to the kitchen, then in agonizing paths on the carpet across the living room. (Thank heavens it was a small apartment.) We finally evolved out of doors, to the outer sidewalk in our complex....down the 452 steps of that sidewalk to the gate....and later across the street and around the lovely neighborhood of Willow Glen, San Jose, CA. Every. single. step. He stepped as slowly as I stepped. He moved, when needed, to my left side because of an oncoming bush....then to the right to avoid the lamp post. Step by step.
Finally...two years later, we had evolved into being able to take a brisk eighteen minute one mile walk around San Jose State's track near home. I remember that first day I timed it. I picked Rusty up, held him above my head and threw him a few inches from my hands into the air as if he were a child and yelled, "WE DID IT GUY! WE DID IT! WE'RE BACK!"
No comments:
Post a Comment