Oh hey, something momentous happened. I had this incident accident I never told you about. Well, a few weeks ago, Ming and I were walking by the urban river, on the under-utilized bike trail. Suddenly, I was slipping and fell. It was a weird slow motion kind of thing.
Unbeknownst to us, there was a slick of mud. Usually I’m a careful person, careful walker. But I was excited that day, and I missed the mud.
So I was on the ground. Ouch, so sudden. I landed on my right knee–it really hurt, and I wailed a little bit. I tried to get up, but then I just rested a while, crying. Ming encouraged me to rest.
Then I got up. My shoes were slippery with mud. My leg was all muddy, and my hands. There was a long streak in the mud where I’d slid.
I was like–wow, I can walk! The mechanism of my knee seemed fine. What hurt was the tissue around the mechanism. The skin, fat, and fascia of my knee hurt.
Yeah, I was walking just fine. I walked to the car, and we went home. I took off my clothes and washed the mud off me, in the shower. The accident had been sad and disturbing–the fragility. I was really happy I didn’t break anything, thanking my body for how well it endured the accident.
mud splinter
But then I saw, on my left thumb, I had some of that mud stuck in my skin. I showed Ming. It was like a splinter. I took a pin and tried to free the mud, but it was stuck in there really good.
I gave up and hoped the mud would be ok, and my thumb wouldn’t get infected. Every so often, I evaluated my mud splinter. It was getting slightly smaller. Very exciting!
Then I wondered if the last dot would stay there forever, like a tiny tattoo. But then the amazing happened. I was lying in bed with Ming, talking with him. There was a weird feeling like glue stuck to my thumb. The mud splinter was coming off.
“Wow! It’s finally happening!” I told Ming.
“What?” he asked.
The mud splinter is gone. My thumb looks all naked now. Probably this story is not that dramatic, for you. But I’m so glad my body can heal and handle an accident.
I didn’t break my hip, get a thumb infection, or snap anything in my knee. Yay!!!
fat
Some people want to tell me that I “don’t take care of myself,” because I’m fat. But I love my body tenderly and pay a lot of attention to its needs. Food, exercise, movement, sunshine, nature time. The pain I feel, the pleasure I feel. I love to dance, walk, ride my trike.
My body is very dear to me, and I take care of my body all day. Please don’t believe that seeing my fatness means you know anything about how I care for myself, how much I love myself, or anything about my health. My health is my business and on my terms.
Doctors, products, magazines, websites, commercials, health insurance, the government–they don’t own my health. My body is mine.
cave
We went to this cave in Arizona, on our way home. The trails inside the cave are steep, in places, and lots of stairs. I had to take rests, and it was work. I was at 5300 ft, so a mile high in elevation. My body has always struggled at high elevations, regardless of how fat I am or how much I’m exercising.
But I was really happy I could do the whole cave tour, and enjoy the beauty of the cave. I didn’t want the words of the tourguide–I wanted to pray. A few times, I did pray. Here’s a picture Ming took.
