An avalanche of bad news can cheer you up
Rehabbing from a total knee replacement can be a boring, monotonous drag. It numbs your mind even more than all the icing numbs your wounded joint.
Every day you work on extending, bending and strengthening your knee. Considering that the surgery makes your quad muscle the human equivalent of tapioca pudding, that’s a chore.
Of course, the goal is to regain some degree of normalcy. Like being able to walk down steps and not resemble a drunken giraffe on roller skates. Or being able to get up from the toilet without the aid of a crane.
The daily rehab ordeal makes each day seem like Groundhog’s Day. Except for the fact that you seldom see a groundhog with bad knees.
I had my left knee replaced last summer and my right knee replaced this summer. Since I’m hardly a glutton for punishment, I’m grateful God only gave me two knees. In comparison, some centipedes can have 117 pairs of legs. Imagine their rehab if they blow a tire on all 234 of their knees.
Suffice it to say, this isn’t a fun way to spend a summer. I’d much rather be hanging out with celebrities on the French Riviera. Heck, even Blue Marsh sans the celebs would do right now.
It’s easy to sink into depression. But I hate being depressed. It has a tendency to bring me down.
Fortunately I’ve found a way to cheer myself up during my rehab sessions at home. I watch the news. With the world more screwed up than my knees, there’s endless fodder to feel good about myself in comparison.
For instance, the COVID Delta variant has the pandemic raging back with all the force of a pulsating firehose on crack. Most of the surge is because not enough people have gotten vaccinated. I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather be rehabbing my knee than sucking on a ventilator.
By the way, do you ever wonder why they named this dastardly variant after Delta Airlines? Doesn’t the airline industry have enough problems right now?
I wasn’t sweating COVID much in recent months because I got the Pfizer vaccine. Then I heard the bad news that the Pfizer vaccine fizzles out dramatically after six months. I was vaccinated five months ago. You do the math.
Strangely this horrible news cheered me up. If I possibly have only one month to live, that means my knee rehab will last only 30 more days. Both my knees should be ramrod straight while I lie in my coffin for eternity. Rigor mortis also will help out.
In the interim, I’m glad I’m stuck only doing rehab instead of being stuck in Afghanistan. Never a country known for its comedians, it definitely isn’t the place for yuks and chuckles these days.
My rehab has me somewhat sequestered at home
Indeed, this forest fire of trials, tribulations and travails should be instrumental in enabling me to grin and bear it through my rehab.
except for my three weekly trips for physical therapy and an occasional walk outside. But I’ve kept the latter to a minimum after my sneakers began melting into the sidewalk.
Yep, this hot summer has made walking outside like walking on the sun even if you’re taking a midnight stroll.
So imagine how utterly giddy I’ve been walking in air-conditioned circles from my family room to my kitchen to my dining room to my living room ad nauseum while watching the climate change news scorching my two downstairs television screens?
Global warming has made Mother Nature nastier than a rhino with raging psoriasis.
Exacerbating the landslide of bad news is the perpetual political partisanship paralyzing our country.
Indeed, this forest fire of trials, tribulations and travails should be instrumental in enabling me to grin and bear it through my rehab.
Cheers, everybody!