Hospitals and Ambulance Rides. Part Three

I am bored. I am also tired, irritable, uncomfortable and far too often my entire back hurts. I am chronically tired and my digestive tract is a nightmare. But the worst of it is that I am bored. The only place that I am comfortable is laying flat in bed, which is great in terms of pain control but my bedroom ceiling is not much fun to look at. Sitting is alright for a while but after twenty or so minutes things start to hurt. Not terribly so - but enough so that it hard to concentrate on anything including the TV.  The other problem with staying in one position too long is that when I do try to get up my back muscles start to spasm and that gets really uncomfortable in terms of doing anything including breathing.

Pain, of course, is a subjective thing.  Our bodies have, thankfully, little capacity to actually remember pain. I have no objective measure of how much better I am now than I was three days ago. I don't think I feel any better but then I need to keep on reminding myself that I can get out of bed most of the time far easier than I could on Tuesday or Wednesday - I think.

I am just really bored and frustrated....... I need to keep on reminding myself that things could be a whole lot worse.

Hospitals and Ambulance Rides. Part Two

The hospital has just called (4:10).....they have reviewed my x-rays.....I apparently have a compressed fracture of the12th vertebrae. Apparently I have nothing to worry about......except my back may hurt more for longer.

The doctor says I should keep active. I didn't ask if that meant that hitchhiking with a pack was ok......

As well ambulance service have called and confirmed that my wallet is officially lost.

Not been a great day!!!

Hospitals and Ambulances Rides

I have been in a ambulance twice in my life time.....once in 1980 and once last night. I don't have fond memories of the first one and I suspect that the one last night will not be high on my list of favourite things to remember.

I got up to go to the bathroom around 2:00 AM - I somehow missed the entrance to the bathroom door and ended up falling down the stairs that lead to my front door . I landed on my back. I knew right away that I was in serious trouble. After laying there for a while cursing and swearing I crawled up the stairs  and into the bathroom  (I still needed to pee. It is fortunate that the toilet bowl is quite low. Peeing while on ones knees can be quite tricky). I continued my trip to the bedroom and managed to get onto the bed. I laid there for a while, swearing at my stupidly, the pain and all of the Gods. After 45 minutes of being unable to find a comfortable position,  I decided that I needed help. I manoeuvred  myself around on the bed so that I could reach the telephone on the floor. Every time I moved, my back  spasmed, sweat oozed out of every pore and I had to gasp for breath. It took an extraordinary amount of time to move my head from top of the bed to the foot. I finally got into a position where I could snag the phone. I dialled 911.

The phone didn't work but without my glasses I couldn't read the message on the screen as to why. I reversed the manoeuvring process to get my glasses on the night stand, tried dialling again and found out that the phone couldn't find the base station. After some more cursing, I gently slithered put of the bed - crawled to the dining room, got the other phone, dialled 911 and asked for the ambulance.

The two young attendants were really nice, professional, caring and quite willing to go along with and even participate in my inane humour. Because the stairs are so steep they requested additional muscle power from the fire department. I was, after some discomfort (that is medical terminology for it hurt like hell) strapped into a half backboard and then placed in some sort of  a wheelchair. They placed my wallet, a pair of pants and a t-shirt at the bottom of the chair. The trip down the stairs was not fun. They were careful as they could be but every bump hurt.  At the bottom of the stairs they transferred me  onto a stretcher/gurney and away we went.

It didn't seem that it was that busy at emergency but it did take a while for the doctor to see me.  To make a long story short, after 3-4 X-rays, it was decided that while I may have done some damage to my back muscles etc., nothing was broken and I could/should go home. No one asked me what I thought of that plan. I think I would have benefited from a few hours rest. Getting dressed was a challenge and I had a sense that the nurse assisting me thought I was a bit of a wimp for not moving faster or perhaps jumping up and walking the first time I tried to sit up.

When I asked for it, no one could find my wallet. I hung around trying to get someone to call the ambulance dispatch. When finally a nurse talked to the dispatch supervisor - the answer was - "sorry - we have looked  but we can't find it". I had to walk home as I had no money for a taxi. Fortunately it is normally only a 15 minute walk. Besides the Percocet had started to do its magic.

This afternoon I have (along with my landlady) checked around the stairs and driveway for the wallet but we can't find it. I guess I am going to have to cancel my cards and get a new licence, health card etc. Most of which will not happen before I go out west - if I can go at all.

I have no sense of how badly hurt my back is. Right now, in spite of the Percocet and some other stuff that is supposed to reduce inflammation - I am still a bit uncomfortable (there is that word again). I suspect that by tomorrow I will have stiffened up and will feel worse, but hopefully from that point on it will gradually feel better. The question is not only will I be well enough to travel but will I feel up to getting ready?

Sometimes life sucks.

People Watching - or how we spend our time

For the past five Saturdays I have been going to the Peterborough Farmer's Market to sell my weaving. The weather the first few weeks was pretty miserable. One Saturday it was so windy that vendors were having to hold down their awnings (in spite of everyone have weights dangling from the corner poles) so that they were not blown away. I solved the problem by running ropes from my car to the awnings and my rug racks. The following weekend it was just barely above freezing (which is tough when you spin in bare feet). The last two weekends however, have be just grand.

It is also a fair amount of work getting set up. For me it means loading the car the night before - making 5-6 trips up and down the wooden staircase to my second floor apartment. Given that I have a rather small car it has taken a bit of practice to get the racks and product into it. It is sort of like playing Tetris in a three dimensional environment. Setting up at 6:00 AM at the market feels rushed and what one thought would work in terms of display, never is quite right. Packing up at 1:00 is just as much work as setting  up The carrying of all the stuff back up the stairs is even harder than the carrying down.  None-the-less the whole experience is a surprising amount of fun.

Shoppers at the market seem to come in waves. There are those who come just for the food. Some of them are there before 6:00. They seem quite focused, knowing exactly what they are going to buy and appear to seldom deviate from their mission. They quite frequently shop alone without partners or without children. It is not that I don't sell anything before 9:00 or have people stop and chat but it is definitely a slow time. At some point around 9:00-9:30 it starts to get busier. Families start to appear in greater numbers and in general people seem to be less in a rush. For the next three hours, on a nice day, the isle can be crowded with friends stopping to chat, dogs making new friends and people walking along looking at most of the vendors' displays. Because I am spinning, I sometimes attract  a fair amount of attention. Older people walk up to me and say "I can remember my mother or grandmother doing that" or others saying "oh - is that how it works". It is surprising how many men stop and watch me. I suspect that a many of them would  probably not stop and watch a women do arts and crafts stuff but because I am a guy - they get curious and we talk about the "machine" that I am using. One gentleman this past Saturday actually got down on his hands and knees to see how it worked!

The most fun is when kids stop and watch. I make sure that they get a chance to feel the wool and if their parents have time, I talk about what I am making etc. Unfortunately some children are clearly interested but never get chance to watch as their parents are in a rush to find the best price of asparagus. I feel sorry for these kids.... parents should pay attention to what their kids want to look at. Perhaps even worse are those parents who drag their kids over to my wheel and either explain what I am doing (sometimes erroneously) or else make the kids ask me what I am doing. All the while the parents are totally oblivious to the fact that the kid is bored stiff and does not want to talk to this bearded stranger. 

Generally speaking between 9:30 and 12:30 is when I sell the bulk of my weaving. By 12:00ish the crowds are thinning and by 12:20 some of the vendors start to dismantle their displays. While I am always amongst the last of the vendors to start the packing up process - I am quite glad it is over. I am tired. I have given my standard speech "I buy the wool from the farmer in Indian River, wash it in my bathtub (wait for gasps of shock from some) and then card, dye, spin and weave it in my two bedroom apartment in downtown Peterborough" a hundred times. Depending who is looking at my stuff the speech gets longer or shorter. I have explained again and again how the wheel works (not that I really understand myself), where wool comes from and how and why I use the dyes I do. I have shared with people some history of spinning and weaving. Hopefully there may even be a few people who may take up the craft themselves. I have had a number of invitations to speak to groups of people and at least two requests to take on an apprentice.  On a good Saturday morning I sell a couple of hundred dollars worth of weaving, I have had chance to visit with some friends as they walk by and I hopefully have taught/demonstrated an ancient craft.

I don't like selling - I would be happier if I could just give it away. But it is immensely validating when people look at the weaving, perhaps come back a few times to look at it and to touch it and then finally to buy it. I have started to get a few repeat customers "I love the shawl I bought last fall and now my mother wants one too", and even when people don't buy anything they almost always complement me. It is nice. It is well worth the cold toes, the early mornings and the numerous climbs up and down that wooden staircase.

On the Road Again 2014 Prologue #4

I leave for the west in 26 days. Usually by this point, I would have had my camping/travelling gear out, checked it, seen what I needed to wash, repair or replace and been basically packed. I would have written at least once about my anxiety/fear of making that first step into that uncontrolled (by at least me) venue that is hitchhiking. I would have created numerous lists of what I needed to do, what I would take with me and what I needed to mail. But not this year. I have done virtually none of that.

It is not that I don't have some anxiety/worries about the inherent dangers of my upcoming adventure. I am aware more than most people that there are potentially more than a few risks in travelling the way I do. I know that there might be times when I will be wet to the bone with not a willing driver in sight; that there very easily could be times when I will have to sleep outside in the middle of nowhere with perhaps a bear or two in the general area and it is a pretty fair bet that I will have at least one ride from someone who is a racist or at least far more interested in expounding their world view than engaging in any type of conversation. I also know that there are people out there who for whatever reason hurt other people. But I have always known those things and so my lack of almost over-whelming uneasiness about getting started does not concern me. What does surprise me however, is my lack of anxiety about the control - or rather not having any control over what will happen.

I am a bit of a control freak. I live alone and therefore it is easy to be in control. My days are fairly structured; when I get up in the morning I usually know what I will accomplish that day. I have low expectations of anyone doing anything for me and therefore I assume that if something needs to happen I will do it. It is a good system. Hitchhiking of course, changes all of that. I have absolutely no control over who picks me up and (to some extent) no control as to where they let me off. I am totally in the hands of someone else. Giving up control is a bit of challenge for me and in the past the transition from being in control to having none at all has worried me a bit. But not this year. And I wonder why.

I may have just postponed the conversation in my head. School stuff has hung on longer than normal. There are, for example, a couple of program issues that need to be addressed before next fall and none of the full time staff appear to be interested in having a conversation. Spinning and weaving have consumed more of my time than perhaps in other years, and certainly the fact that I am selling product every weekend at the Peterborough Market has meant that I am spending more time replacing that product. Perhaps it is simply the fact that after 12-13 years of making this trip, it feels less of an adventure than it use to. Perhaps I have finally figured out that I don't need to worry about things so far in advance.

Next week is consumed with family stuff.  By the second week of June all of my doctor and dentist appointments will be done, the car will be as fixed as well as it is going to be and as I will have no more clean wool to spin or weave, I will not be able to lose myself in playing with wool.  Perhaps then I will start that internal conversation about the absurdity of hitchhiking across half of Canada.

Alternative treatments - Who Decides?

The CBC (CBC ) reported this morning that an Aboriginal family are supporting their 10 year old daughter's (who has leukemia) wish to withdraw from chemotherapy  and to use traditional healing practices. The case has been referred to the local CAS (Children's Aid Society). It appears as if the child's community are prepared to physically defend her right to choose an alternative method of healing. The question at hand is: does the family have the right to withdraw a child from a treatment regime that according to the hospital has a 75% success rate? 

There are countless examples in Canada of the state intervening in a child's care when it appears that the family is not following culturally accepted practices in maintaining the life and well being of a child. For example children whose families belong to the Jehovah Witness faith are apprehended if the family will not allow blood transfusions to save a child's life. Within the last week there was a case reported of an 11 year old boy who was apprended because his family didn't want him to undergo a second round of chemotherapy ( CBC ). For much of this spring there have been regular reports from both Quebec and Ontario as to the Lev Tahor Jewish community, their practices of child education etc. and the need for the state to intervene ( Global News ) In each of the above cases the provincial community at large accepted without significant debate the right for the state to intervene. In fact we demand that they do. When such a decision is made, while we acknowledge the legitimate frustration and anger of the parents at the decision, we expect the parents to honour it.  If, for example, the Lev Tahor community had bared their doors and had been prepared to fight the investigators or the workers who apprehended the children we would all have been shocked and outraged.

However, it is my sense that because of the past miscarriages of justice and the blatant cultural genocide that has been practiced upon the First Nations communities for the past 175 years by the Canadian government, we will all tip toe around this issue. The First Nations have already raised the issue of the state taking their children in the "adoption scoop" of the 1940s and 50s and saying that it will not happen again. There are times when we need to be sensitive to the past and to take those mistakes into our considerations of what to do for the future. I do not think that this is one of those times. It would seem to me that in this case, it is not about cultural suppression but rather what is best for the child and perhaps equally as important how do we decide that.

There is however, another question that needs to be discussed. At what age and under what conditions can a person decide that they do not want treatment. The law is fairly clear. An adult can make a decision about a medical treatment if that person has the capacity to understand the consequences of that decision AND the consequences of not making a decision. There is also the assumption that the person has not been under the influence (coerced) of another person. While the former condition is possible depending upon the maturity of the child, I am less convinced that a ten year is outside of the influence of her family. But I do think it is time that we at least listen to the kids and give their opinions about what they want some value.