Two miles!

My podiatrist has allowed me to go for a walk every other day, adding a quarter mile each time. I’m up to two miles now! I’ve been walking through the Sellwood neighborhood in SE Portland, which is very near where I live. It’s an interesting and pleasant place to walk and it allows me to easily measure the distance I walk. It’s fun to check out the houses for sale and dream of owning one of them. In fact, after my walk on Tuesday, I came home and surfed the Sellwood real estate listings, finding many awesome houses I would LOVE to buy. Sigh. I’m afraid owning a house, especially in that neighborhood, is not in the cards anytime in the near future.

I should start taking my camera with me on these walks because I see all sorts of interesting things. Tonight I saw someone’s small terraced front yard covered in rock towers. You know when you’re at the beach or the river and you try to stack rocks atop each other and see how high you can go? That’s what was all over this yard. It was awesome! I also saw a parked minivan with about two dozen rubber duckies of all shapes and sizes lined up on the dash at the base of the windshield. Hee hee!

Campfire

One afternoon at work this week, I somehow caught the faintest whiff of wood smoke. Considering there was not a fire of any kind in the nearby vicinity – we’re too far from the woodfire pizza place to smell its goodness here – it was all just in my head. But with that one whiff, I had an overwhelming desire to flee to the hills. Too bad it was the middle of the week, not the weekend. And the hills are still buried under many many feet of snow.

I miss hiking so much. I miss the forest and the wildflowers and the streams and waterfalls. And now that the weather looks like it might finally start shaping up, I long to go camping too. A whole weekend outside in the forest in the sunshine, hiking, roasting marshmallows, swimming, breathing fresh air, everything smelling like campfire smoke by the end of the weekend. I had grand plans for lots camping and backpacking this summer. But between the extremely late snowmelt, my busted foot, and weekend obligations, that isn’t going to happen. So at this point I’m just really looking forward to my two vacations and hoping that my foot and the weather don’t act up.

Laundry mishap

I worked the late closing shift today, which meant I had a good chunk of the morning in which to be productive and get things done at home. My priority was getting some laundry done, since my closet (where I keep my laundry basket) looked like it was vomiting dirty clothes all over the place. So as soon as the laundry room was open at 8:30, I threw in two loads. But when I later transferred my clothes from washer to dryer, I was horrified to discover that four white tops now had a pale yellow tint to them. The culprit: a long bright yellow skirt that I don’t wear very often, and therefore don’t wash very often. I’ve had to wear it more frequently in recent weeks due to the fact that none of my work pants fit right now and it’s been too cold to wear shorter skirts so I’ve been re-wearing four or five of my longest skirts over and over again, including this yellow one. Because it had been washed so little, it still had the capacity to bleed its bright yellow die all over my white shirts. What do you do when this happens? Go to Mom.

As it happened, I was headed to my parents’ house immediately after taking the laundry out of the dryer. I bought a bunch of fabric this weekend with which I plan to make new skirts, and Mom owns a sewing machine, which I do not. Two-thirds of my summer wardrobe doesn’t fit right now thanks to higher than normal winter weight gain that has only gotten worse during the last six weeks of my frustrating, sedentary, broken foot lifestyle. It will take me the rest of the summer to lose enough weight to wear those clothes, by which time it will be time to get out the winter clothes again (the very thought of which makes me want to tear my hear out and scream; I’d be happy if I never EVER experienced winter again). SO, I need something to wear while I’m trying to get in shape, and I can’t afford a whole new wardrobe. I have a few easy skirt patterns – it takes less than two hours per skirt – and buying the fabric is cheaper (sometimes HUGELY so) than buying a skirt at Macy’s, so I shall soon be the wearer of four new skirts that actually fit.

But I digress. I showed up at my parents’ house and held out my pile of wet yellow-white shirts to Mom, giving my best pouty-lower-lip sad face. While I sewed, we ran the shirts through the washer with some Clorox, but the shirts still looked pretty yellow when the washer was done. I threw up my hands in despair and disgust. I’ve been doing my own laundry for well over ten years now. You’d think I could do a simple load of laundry. I should have known better than to wash my whites with ANYTHING else. My desire to save money on doing fewer loads of laundry won out over common sense, and now I have four yellow shirts and no white shirts. Mom had me leave the shirts with her and she said she’d see what she could do. Good ol’ Mom. Silly silly me.

Sunshine

Today was a beautiful, warm, sunny day in Portland, for which I am very grateful. It helped boost my spirits, which have been flagging so much recently that I frequently go to bed hours early because I’m too sad to bear being awake. I went to the farmer’s market, which was fun, as always, and after running other errands I spent several hours at the park this afternoon. I laid my blanket out in the sun and soaked up some rays while I read my book. The warm sunshine felt fantastic.

I hope the weather holds for awhile, because it’s the only thing that keep me from going bonkers right now. Reading posts about recent hikes and trips on the local hiking site PortlandHikers.org, and seeing beautiful pictures from hiking and backpacking treks on flickr makes me depressed that I cannot do any of these things right now because of my foot. And thanks to the Saturdays I work this summer and other commitments, I won’t even be able to go camping until the end of July. I miss the forest so much.

Greg and I aren’t seeing each other this weekend, but I am hanging out with my family for a picnic lunch tomorrow, which – in combination with what promises to be another beautiful day – should help cheer me up. My sister can always make me laugh.

No manners

Today at work I witnessed a man (who I guessed to be in his 20s) hold open the door for the woman behind him as he entered the library. The woman didn’t even look at him or acknowledge him in any way. No thank you, nothing. He seemed to take it in stride, but I was appalled at her rude manners. At the VERY least, smile at the person who has just held the door open for you! Don’t just breeze by as though he’s not there.

Foot news

I saw my podiatrist this morning. He took x-rays of my foot to see what was what. He was able to see now what he couldn’t five weeks ago, that the fracture went through nearly the whole bone. Fortunately, though, he said that it was healing. The swelling is from the bone callous that is forming. As long as I’m careful, keep my foot elevated as much as possible, and follow his instructions, I should be 85% healed after eight weeks, which will be early July.

I can wear a normal shoe again on my right foot, but I still can’t go hiking, and it remains to be seen if I can still go on the guided llama trip in July. I will have to make that determination next week. But after describing the trip to my doctor, he seemed optimistic that it was possible. I can, at least, start taking walks for exercise, slowly building up distance over time.

My relief at hearing that I was in fact healing, and that I could stop wearing the surgical shoe, was quickly squashed when I realized the bleak shoe future I now face. I have to wear custom-made orthotics in my shoes at all times because in addition to the fracture, I also inherited my mother’s deformed feet. You can see in this diagram what a normal foot should look like (on the left). Unfortunately, my feet look like the one on the right, with the big toe at an angle, instead of straight. Ten years ago my mother had to have surgery for this very same problem, and I may face a similar fate later in life.

The problem with orthotics is that they’re huge. They take up an astounding amount of room in the shoe, leaving very little room for your foot. You can only wear shoes with removable footbeds so that you can take those out and put the orthotics in, but the orthotics are three times as thick (and wider too) than the footbeds that come with the shoe. I had bought a cute (and expensive) pair of Keens (mary jane style) when this whole fiasco started, thinking they would be fine. But the sole isn’t stiff enough, my doctor says, and when the orthotics are inserted, it’s too cramped in there for my foot.

I went shoe shopping tonight with a list of recommended shoes from my podiatrist. There were some halfway-decent mary janes on the list. But once the orthotics were put in the shoes, I could barely get my foot in. After trying on half a dozen pairs of shoes, I came home with some expensive and ugly shoes that I may or may not keep. Until I can find shoes that work, I still have to wear the surgical shoe.

I never thought I’d reach a point in my life when I’d hate shoe shopping. But when all the cute shoes are beyond your reach and you’re left with ugly old-people shoes, that’s what happens. After I came home from the shoe store, I tried the orthotics in my hiking boots. They don’t fit in there so well. And I cracked. I sat in my hallway with my hiking boots and orthotics and cried.

The ugly (and inexplicably bright blue) orthotics

Five weeks

Five weeks ago today I found out that the reason my foot was hurting was because I had a stress fracture. I was told to wear a special surgical shoe at all times except when sleeping or showering and to walk as little as possible. Whenever I was sitting – which should be the majority of the time – my foot should be elevated (easier said than done when your desk doesn’t have much room under it.)

And so began a very long and very stressful month. Life can pretty dull when you’re told to stay off your feet. I have had ZERO exercise these past five weeks. Combined with the cold gray weather, this has had a pretty detrimental effect on my psyche, and I have felt depression slowly sinking in these past few weeks. When you can’t (or rather, shouldn’t) walk, you can’t do much of anything. On Sunday, for instance, I tried to go downtown to Pioneer Courthouse Square to see the big flower display. But I couldn’t find any parking close enough to the square so that I wouldn’t have to walk far, so I had to leave. Knowing the cost of gas, I tried to make something of the trip into town by driving to the east side of the river where I would sit on a bench with my book. Again, I couldn’t find any close parking. So I went home, having wasted an expensive bit of gas. This has been my life this past month.

Tomorrow I see my podiatrist again and I will find out what, if any, progress has been made. I’m not expecting good news. I have not felt any pain because the surgical shoe prevents my toes and feet from moving in a way that I’d be able to feel whether the fracture still hurt. However, the swelling at the site of the stress fracture has not diminished a single little bit this whole time. I’m not a podiatrist, but that certainly seems like a bad sign. I will know soon enough.

Bleeding money

Funny how quickly good intentions can go off the tracks so very quickly. My intention to be better at budgeting got completely derailed almost right from the beginning. I found out about a broken foot and I contracted mono within the same week, and there began a month in which I bled money on a seemingly daily basis. Between prescriptions, cold medicine (a fruitless attempt to relieve my mono symptoms), new vitamins and supplements to help my bones heal, co-pays, and new shoes to accommodate the new orthotics I will soon have to wear, I had an extra $450 in expenses last month. Toss in the cost of the orthotics – NOT covered by insurance – and we’re pushing $1,000. In just one month.

Learn from my mistakes, people! Have money set aside for unexpected emergencies like this. I had no such money set aside. I had read about just this very thing and had every intention of starting to save for emergencies, but the emergencies happened before the saving even begun. So my expense-tracking and budgeting exercise has turned out to be a far more painful learning experience than I anticipated.

Fireworks rule

It’s Rose Festival time in Portland, which means a guaranteed two weeks of rain. However, the festival kicked off with a fireworks show on Friday, which turned out to be a beautiful day. After an early dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory, we went down to the Eastbank Esplanade and staked out a spot where we could watch the fireworks. We got there at 6:45, exactly three hours before the show started, and there were already people set up along the railing. We snagged the last railing-side spot in that particular section.

It was a really gorgeous evening, sunny and warm and beautiful. God, I love Portland. We kept ourselves entertained as the sun slowly sank and darkness gradually settled in. Dusk was just barely ending by the time the fireworks started at 9:45. I adore the long lingering evenings in June. It’s a shame it’s too cloudy and cold most of the time to actually enjoy them.

The fireworks were awesome. I took a bunch of pictures, about 15% of which were worth keeping. It’s a crapshoot when you’re photographing fireworks. But the nice thing about it is that you can set your camera up, then just keep pressing the shutter button without looking, thereby allowing you to enjoy the show with your eyes, not your camera’s viewfinder.

It breaks my heart that I won’t be able to go to the Celebration of Light fireworks show in Vancouver this summer. I can’t get the time off to go, since it falls right in-between my two vacations, for which I was lucky to get THAT time off. I dearly love Vancouver, and the thought of not making a trip up there this year makes me really sad.

Another gray month

Dear May,

When I bade good riddance to your predecessor, April, I had high hopes for you. April was miserable. “April showers bring May flowers.” Right?  You have heard that saying, haven’t you? Well, you gave us a little more sunshine than April. You even gave us a nice little heat wave for a few days. But the majority of the month was gray and cold. You disappoint me, May. I’m not sorry to see you go. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.

Sincerely,
someone who misses the sun

(Image from Weather Underground’s weather history view.)