Twinkle Toes Alert!
Sparkle shoes
Let's be clear about this. Ginger Rogers I'm not and I can't take dancing lessons any time soon. Those black boxes in the photo are post-surgery shoes designed to protect my latest toe fix. I bedazzled them because of my frustration with having to clomp for the next month. If you're going to look stupid, you might as well look outrageously stupid, right?
I have to admit I've been luckier with other body parts. No broken bones, no replacement parts nor serious repairs, except maybe that left shoulder surgery seven years ago caused by a torn rotator cuff and severed ligament. For someone who hated sports, I guess I've had more than my share of shoulder issues. It's because I carried suitcases for 20 years before wheels were invented. Then, there were two displacements of that very same shoulder because I had a tendency to not look where I was going and going wherever it was too fast. But then, the saving grace was that when I fall I don't fall far since I'm short.
My feet are another story. Spending a career on my feet, regrettably in heels, combined with hereditary genes for bunions, arthritis, and hammer and mallet toes, has resulted in a series of resuscitation efforts. Starting about 20 years ago docs removed, realigned, scrapped, sawed down, screwed together and cut out stuff on my feet. This last round came about when I found myself last year walking on several of my toe nails and other toes were slipping away from or pushing into my big toes. Not a pretty picture for sure. If I didn't do something pretty quickly, I was going to be in black orthopedic lumpy shoes for the rest of my life, looking like my grandmothers' feet back in the 1940s. How would that look with skinny jeans?
So here I sit, inside today but looking out over the balcony (it's winter), nursing my feet back to health. The pain is minimal if I take 500 mg Tylenol every six hours, keep my feet elevated and wear those bedazzled shoes when walking around the house. The dressings need to stay dry so showers require creative plastic bagging of the feet and careful maneuvering so I don't slip on the soap. Not graceful, but it's a functional solution to not washing for a week. Then, after my first check-up, I'll be able to get about outside.
Why do I write about this. Surely, it's a TMI situation for many readers. However, it's a lesson for us all. No matter what aliments attack us in our old age, don't give in to them. I've have friends who beat off cancer, degenerative arthritis and walk today because of hip and knee replacements. Put your energy into keeping your strength, agility and sense of humor instead of worrying about what might happen or delaying symptoms that need to be addressed. Get it done.
Whatever time I have, we must keep moving to keep my body alive, just like I have to keep thinking, exploring and questioning to keep my mind alive. Do I have full control? No, honestly, I don't. I may live well into my 90's. I'm learning that it is not about staying young (no one is going to stay young). It's about enjoying being older, soaking in the joy, creativity and freedom old age can bring me. As Carl Reiner once said, "If You’re Not in the Obit, Eat Breakfast." Stay busy and live! Watch Carl and his friends talk about what keeps them going. Watch Netflix's Grace & Frankie to laugh at life, a life that can continue to surprise in ways I never expected.