As you can see from my Hipstamatic pics, I snagged one of the early Verizon iPhones, which I’ve been waiting on for, oh, a few years, and its delivery on Monday currently ranks as the high point of my week. Yesterday, for about an hour, I had a different high point: my graduation after three weeks in encasement to a short-arm cast. I had my elbow and thumb back, and boy, did they hurt. Still, my spirits remained high until I returned to work and my brand new iPhone rang with a call from my orthopedic doctor, who told me that he’d just showed my x-ray to a colleague and they were now concerned my wrist might need surgery.
This was the second time he’d called me after a cheery visit with a more sobering second opinion, and I felt my confidence in the guy starting to slip. I found it hard, though, to accurately gauge our conversation because, as the Manly Fireplug put it, orthopedic doctors are assholes. Or, as another friend put it more diplomatically, while the rest of us spent our college years getting drunk and sleeping around, they spent them looking at bones.
A series of missed calls, crossed signals, and “Are we speaking English here?” doctor-patient conversations stretched on over the last two days, and I found myself wandering the halls of the law firm and staring at the walls of my cubicle, trying to grapple with the prospect that the last three one-armed weeks were a total waste, and that my recovery had yet to begin.
In that time my sense of humor, which I stumble across every three days or so, abandoned me again, and I de-friended two Facebook saps who had the temerity to leave more fisting jokes on my profile’s wall. I banished them from the warmth of my virtual aura, and yes it felt good.
So I began to type this with one hand, muttering to myself during my hour covering reception, mourning the possibly extended loss of softball and the gym, two pursuits that have reliably taken on and vanquished my noonday demons, picturing myself withering away to that scrawny kid I used to be, and and and my little violin played on…
Then an email popped into my inbox with a rather demanding subject line: “Write your book, damnit!” Blushing already, I clicked it open and what followed was less an admonition than a plea, laced through with more than a few very kind words, asking me to, yes, finish the damn book.
The last three months distracted me with money worries and day-job negotiations. It felt good to start earning some money again, and to be, after six weeks, fielding more than one job offer at a time. Still, that nagging little voice, common to every writer, nibbled away at the back of my brain, saying the same words contained in this email.
So, Sandi, thank you for reading this blog, thank you for the email, for the kind words and the little nudge. You have good timing.