Toe Story 2: Damn Straight

Viewer Advisory: Some images may be graphic in nature. If you are squeamish, you might want to skip this post! Today was my first post-op visit to Campbell Clinic. They cut off my beautiful cast, and no, I didn’t save it. I’ve got photos of all the original art work. Odorless photos. Anyway, that part was fairly painless. Except for when this yucky bandage was kind of stuck to some of the stiches.

Then they pulled out the stitches. A couple of ouch! Moments, but again, not too bad. Then the moment of truth. Dr. Murphy said the surgery appears to be successful. I looked at my toe and said, “damn straight!” The toe, that is. It used to turn under the second toe and now look at it. (Well, don’t worry about the color… my husband says it looks like a morgue photograph. Remember it’s been inside a cast for two weeks.)

Next they put on new bandages, separating my toes and wrapping the area where the stitches had been… where they cut the bunion out. Then they showed me the color options for the cast. Pink. Camouflage. Blue. Green. Flowers. You name it. I asked for white. White? They couldn’t believe I wanted white. I’m an artist, I said. And my friends are artists. I’ve got two coffee mugs full of colorful Sharpies at home just waiting for a fresh white canvas. So… here’s my fresh, white cast… in my new cast shoe, ‘cause now I can put some weight on that foot, but still have to use crutches or a walker.

Two more weeks in the new cast, so come on over and decorate it, folks! Tonight John and Gabby came by with a delicious roast chicken meal from Kerry… so I got Gabby to get the new canvas art started. Here she is working on her masterpiece. And here it is… I love the crosses, especially. A good reminder that God is taking care of me.

God and my friends. This morning when hubby and I got to Campbell Clinic for my 10:15 appointment, they told me the appointment had been rescheduled for Wednesday. They forgot to call me. I said that wouldn’t work for us, that I needed to see the doctor today, please. So they said come back at 12:45. (Doesn’t always work that way, but I’ve learned to ask for what I want and go from there.) Only problem was although hubby was off work from the VA Hospital today (Martin Luther King holiday) he had a conference call scheduled in the afternoon. And the round trip to the clinic had already taken an hour and a half of his time. So I called my friend Sue, who lives near the clinic, to see if she could bring me home after the afternoon appointment if he drove me out. Instead, she invited me to spend the rest of the morning at her house, and she would take me to the appointment and drive me home afterwards. Basically, she just gave up most of her day for me on the spur of the moment. She even made homemade soup for our lunch.

With so many of the conversations of the weekend women’s retreat on Friendship still on my mind, I thought about how blessed I am. Sue is a real friend. When I tried to thank her, she insisted the blessing was hers. I thought about this song. Yes. That's what frirends are for.

P. S. Thanks for the yummy chicken, Kerry!

So... nothing very literary in this post... probably because I'm multi-tasking... watching the women's quarter-finals in the Australian Open while I'm posting. Serena just lost in straight sets to Jancovik. Maybe I'd better start paying closer attention. It's a nice change from the football play-offs... and warmer!