TIMBER!!! MY EXCELLENT FALLING ADVENTURE WITH MY GRANDBABY IN MY ARMS

Two weeks ago I fell with my grandbaby, Rose, in my arms. I don't recommend it.

I've since learned that such falls are the ultimate grandmother rite of passage.  Every grandmother I've talked to has had one (although not all of them widely admit it).  I feel like I've joined a secret society (sort of a "Skull and Bones" for old ladies) and am just waiting to receive my super-duper covert decoder in the mail, and instructions for the furtive handshake.

Fortunately, Rose is OK. (Well, actually, she's absolutely perfect, but that's been the case since the day she was born.)

Unfortunately, for me, however, the fall involved one of those classic "I've fallen and I can't get up" scenarios, followed by what I call "hardware surgery" on my leg. Surgery involving power tools, bone grafts, and screws.

I am home now with a walker (pimped out with its own wire basket!), wheelchair, old-lady commode, bed on the first floor, 10 foot ramp into my house, OT, PT, and one of these grabber contraptions:

Last week I had to open an account at the local medical supply store, and was wheeled into a secluded back room. The walls were shrouded in multi-colored compression socks and faceless mannequins modeling incontinence supplies. It was the closest thing I will ever have to a bad acid trip.

My daily activities are logged in this folder: 

An uplifting visual for a woman in her 50s, don't you agree?

I can't put any weight on my leg for another 6 weeks, which should give my thigh plenty of time to atrophy to the size of a spaghetti noodle.  Unfortunately, too late for bikini season.

What I've learned over the past two weeks, however, is that an ordinary misadventure brings out the extraordinariness of family and friends.

Soon, I will (hopefully) forget that, after the fall, my leg felt like Jell-O, and Rose and I spent 65 minutes on the floor before help arrived.  I will alwaysremember, however, Duncan arriving on the scene, gently stroking my head, and quietly telling me how proud he was of me that I had shielded Rose from injury.   I will remember my sisters keeping a vigilant eye on my physical and emotional well-being.  I will remember my friend, Brie, who dropped everything, and has been my daily home health aide, doing the unimaginable in exchange for my agreeing to watch the occasional bout of Bachelor in Paradise. (She also took this week's picture of the dogs!) I will remember my beloved goddaughter bringing me a picnic and coloring with me while we watched old home movies on a vintage Bell & Howell projector that smelled like it was burning.

Soon, I will be back up on my feet, living purposely, with wild abandon, and deliberate joy.  Watch out world!  I can't begin to imagine the fun I will have with a bionic leg.  I will probably buy myself a cape. But, at least in the near future, I will avoid compression socks.