My recuperation in Canada is now over. I must return to the world of the working this week, a long trip of several days drive, then almost immediately into the the workplace fire. Am I ready?
A little more than two months ago I was a slab of meat on a hospital bed, unable to move my legs, and scared to death. Today I can walk and move about, mostly without the use of a cane if in the house. I have been able to stay the whole day without having a nap, another improvement. Yet I still don't sleep through the night, medication be damned.
I have worries that maybe it is time to "pull the plug," to change to a more sedentary lifestyle, one that allows for naps and daysleep, and moving about only if I feel up to it. Maybe retirement is the answer after all.
I feel there is more to give. I love teaching, and want to continue to do so. The youth of my community are reaching out for roll models, for teachers that understand and want to lead them, not yell at them. I have an intense sense of self-reward form watching the young people in my classes grow, even over just the one year I have them, and I feel privileged to be in some small way connected to their lives.
I go back into it with a profound feeling of sadness that I do not think I will be able to handle the pressures and give-and-take of everyday work. What then? I fear.
I fear that life is changing me, changing around me, and I have no control. All the things I was warned about years ago when I got this wound originally, after 20 years, are all coming true. I thought I had beaten the Beast, that I was leading a normal, fruitful life after all. Then, it comes back to me, changing me, beating me after all.
I tell my students that sometimes things happen over which we have no control. Prepare for life, I tell them, and meet it head on. Now it is time to take some of my own advise.
Crow.
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