And a goofy team photo is also a good idea:
Don't forget to thank your photographer!
Saturday, October 31, 2015
Carving Pumpkins at iCafé
An important first step at any icafé is preparation...
Then it's important to demonstrate:
After that, it's simply a matter of letting everyone just get on with it:
Finally, be sure to get some cool photos of the pumpkins:
A nice group photo can never hurt:
Saturday, October 10, 2015
Going to the theatre: a cultural experience
For our first project in Discours écrits et oraux 2 (DEO2), we read a play in French called the Old Woman's Visit. It was originally written in German and is set in German-speaking Switzerland. It was actually quite funny. Essentially, there is this rundown little town that is anticipating the arrival of a billionare-ess. The mayor, pastor, policeman and other townspeople all have these grand plans for how they are going to try to persuade her to give them the money they need to rebuild their town and restart their industries. When the old lady arrives (with servants and 7th husband in tow) she doesn't take much convincing. She tells the town she intends to give them 100 billion (50 for the town and 50 to be divided amongst the inhabitants.) However she has one condition: justice. The townspeople must kill the grocery store owner, her former lover, who, when they were younger, got her pregnant and then hired witnesses to say they'd also slept with her so he didn't have to marry her. So the rest of the play is basically the townspeople wrestling with not wanting to kill the man but also really wanting the money. It's kind of a critique of people and of justice but is also a comedy and there are some very hilarious scenes.
Going to see the play was very different from reading it. It was at a theatre in Malley, near Lausanne, in a former industrial building (the street name literally meant: Gas Factory Path). In the dark, it was quite a challenge for my classmates and I to find it. If it hadn't been for some passing car headlights, I'm not sure we would have ever seen the sign that eventually led us to arrive at the correct building. The TKM (Théatre Kléber-Méleau) was actually pretty small and packed. Our class had great seats about half way up, but no one had paid attention to the reserved signs to we had to tell the people that they were for our class. With all the people, it quickly became very warm and I was glad I'd left my jacket on the coat rack.
The strangest thing about The Old Woman's Visit, was the fact that all of the characters wore these ugly masks. (see below) They also had a smaller cast than the play called for so some characters were completely eliminated, which I think also took out some of the humour of the piece. The backgrounds and props were also pretty basic compared to what I had imagined and even having read the play, the people spoke quickly and it was sometimes hard to understand what they'd said. One thing that made me laugh is when the people are searching for the old lady's panther, which has escaped, they played a few bars of The Pink Panther Theme.
All in all, it wasn't very shocking at the end to find out that a man had played the old woman and a woman had played the mayor because the whole thing was just a bit ridiculous. I much preferred the written play to the play we saw performed. This play has had quite a lot of success and been translated into many languages and I wonder if depending on the culture in which it is performed, aspects of the performance change. (Would a version of this play in England have masks, for example?)
Going to see the play was very different from reading it. It was at a theatre in Malley, near Lausanne, in a former industrial building (the street name literally meant: Gas Factory Path). In the dark, it was quite a challenge for my classmates and I to find it. If it hadn't been for some passing car headlights, I'm not sure we would have ever seen the sign that eventually led us to arrive at the correct building. The TKM (Théatre Kléber-Méleau) was actually pretty small and packed. Our class had great seats about half way up, but no one had paid attention to the reserved signs to we had to tell the people that they were for our class. With all the people, it quickly became very warm and I was glad I'd left my jacket on the coat rack.
The strangest thing about The Old Woman's Visit, was the fact that all of the characters wore these ugly masks. (see below) They also had a smaller cast than the play called for so some characters were completely eliminated, which I think also took out some of the humour of the piece. The backgrounds and props were also pretty basic compared to what I had imagined and even having read the play, the people spoke quickly and it was sometimes hard to understand what they'd said. One thing that made me laugh is when the people are searching for the old lady's panther, which has escaped, they played a few bars of The Pink Panther Theme.
All in all, it wasn't very shocking at the end to find out that a man had played the old woman and a woman had played the mayor because the whole thing was just a bit ridiculous. I much preferred the written play to the play we saw performed. This play has had quite a lot of success and been translated into many languages and I wonder if depending on the culture in which it is performed, aspects of the performance change. (Would a version of this play in England have masks, for example?)
Saturday, October 3, 2015
Kuzco Kat
My roommate and I went to Geneva on a sunny day in early September to get our cat, Kuzco. He had grown quite a lot since the last time we had seen him at around 6 weeks. And, at four months, he looked much more like an adult cat. We were thus lulled into the false sense that he was mature.
Having a kitten, is a bit like having a child. He is always wanting food, attention, or to be played with. He sleeps when you're awake and then bounces off the walls when you're trying to sleep. He thinks your world revolves around him. And yet, you love him anyways. Especially when he's all curled up asleep or does something particularly cute.
Kuzco is fascinated by water, and it's practically impossible to take a shower or to go to the toilet without him wanting to come in and see what's happening. We have a bidet in our bathroom and this has basically become Kuzco's personal water entertainment center. Check out the video below:
We are also trying to convince Kuzco to be a lap cat and that isn't going very well. He doesn't seem to think it's as comfortable as the couch right next to you. We also have to stop him from eating our hair sometimes and I find it particularly annoying if he bites my toes in the morning to encourage me to get up and feed him!
For the most part, Kuzco is an indoor cat, although we do let him out on the balcony sometimes. He's grown a lot in the past month and we are confident he's going to be a big cat!
Having a kitten, is a bit like having a child. He is always wanting food, attention, or to be played with. He sleeps when you're awake and then bounces off the walls when you're trying to sleep. He thinks your world revolves around him. And yet, you love him anyways. Especially when he's all curled up asleep or does something particularly cute.
Kuzco is fascinated by water, and it's practically impossible to take a shower or to go to the toilet without him wanting to come in and see what's happening. We have a bidet in our bathroom and this has basically become Kuzco's personal water entertainment center. Check out the video below:
We are also trying to convince Kuzco to be a lap cat and that isn't going very well. He doesn't seem to think it's as comfortable as the couch right next to you. We also have to stop him from eating our hair sometimes and I find it particularly annoying if he bites my toes in the morning to encourage me to get up and feed him!
For the most part, Kuzco is an indoor cat, although we do let him out on the balcony sometimes. He's grown a lot in the past month and we are confident he's going to be a big cat!
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| at 4 months, the day we brought him home |
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| Sleepy kitty |
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| "This is my bed." |
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| On the balcony |
Monday, September 28, 2015
C'est la vie
If you're reading this, native English speaker, you are the crème de la crème, you never make a faux pas. I envy you your joie de vivre and the fact that your savior-faire has never been put in question. You speak English par excellence and tête-à-têtes with friends are never so difficult as needing to be ended by a coup de grâce. Au contraire, you have carte blanche to say whatever you wish, because you're a native English speaker, n'est-ce pas? The pièce de résistance is that speaking English is very à la mode and will make you friends en masse.
I wrote the above paragraph because going to classes here is sometimes a little bit like that but in reverse. You hear: françaisfrançais françaisfrançais françaisfrançais brainstorming françaisfrançaisfrançais input français. These days, there is so much English in French that I sometimes wonder if the other foreigners in my class are understanding as much as I am or if they just hear: françaisfrançais français wosdighaosdb français. Anyways, here are just a few musings from various different classes these past two weeks.
***
L'analyse de la bande dessinée franco-belge
This class is about analyzing French/Belgian comic strips, an important element of Francophone culture, and hence why it's an option for us foreigners to take as a way to better understand the Francophones around us. The professor has far too much content and enthusiasm to fit into an hour-and-a-half lecture, so he seems to be talking at twice the speed as the other French-as-a-Foreign-Language teachers. He informs us that the course is part of an inter-disiplinary option for the entire faculty so he asks if there are any students among us who are native French speakers. When two people raise their hands, he asks if they are comic book fans. "You mustn't hesitate to say that you are passionate about comics!" he encourages them. It occurred to me that it is probably one of the only places where they were ever going to be validated for loving comics, and the professor endeavored to show us in the rest of the lesson just how valuable and valid the art of comics really is. After all, it has a history, it has creativity, it has been around for longer than you would have expected, and it isn't just aimed at children. (Although most comics are directed toward a male audience.) But, he made the point that we often don't think something is a serious subject until it has been studied at universities and how many classes on comics do you know about? Once, film also wasn't considered a "serious" subject, although nowadays it is studied in lots of academic institutions and there are film schools all over the place. Ever heard of a comic book school? It's not like I'm a big comic book reader or anything, but I do enjoy a lot of the films that are based off of them and at the crossroads of cinema/art history/literature you will find comics.
Seminare de littérature
Ah, the familiar subject of literature! Reading and reading and reading and then writing and analyzing. Discussing in class about literary techniques, and historical context, and groundbreaking stories. Falling in love with fictional characters and referring to authors as your bffs. Yup, I love it all. Wait, you want me to read three French novels and write two 15 page papers...in French? Umm, help?
It is abundantly clear that Professor B doesn't think much of the stuffy little classroom he's been assigned for our lit seminar. Or maybe I'm mistaken and his exclamation as he walked into class was more about the fact that out of the nine students in the class there is only one guy. After laying out his expectations for the class he launches into a little bit of a history lesson to give the context for the eighteenth century novel which is what we will spend the year learning about. He breaks down Descartes' entire Discours de la méthode without referencing notes and occasionally scribbling something on the white board. He talks about Montesquieu's Lettres persanes, the first novel we will be reading, as though he can hardly wait to start re-reading it and yet in the same breath warns us that it isn't easy and we should start tackling it as soon as possible. His obvious knowledge and passion for French lit is a little intimidating and just a tad contagious so that by the end of the lesson I'm thinking I can probably handle it. I haven't cracked open the book yet though so maybe I'll live to regret it...
Discours écrits et oraux 2
We generally refer to this class as DEO2 and it is essentially a language class where you practice reading and writing and presenting in French. Our professor is a young guy who is (unlike the professor I had for DEO1) extremely organized. Since he teaches another class as well, those of us in the diploma have him for 3 classes a week. He learns our names at an astonishing rate, and it takes him only one class to determine that I'm an English speaker. (This may have been helped by the fact that I was speaking in English to British girl in my class...) Our first project for the class consists of reading a 160 page play called The Old Woman's Visit. I spend a good chunk of my Saturday reading it and looking up each French word I didn't know. Vamper for example is: to seduce in the manner of a vampire, a word which would probably have been incredibly useful for Stephanie Meyer and perhaps is used in the French translations? It is a surprisingly funny and very readable little story that I actually found quite enjoyable. In about two weeks I'll have to do an oral presentation on it.
Atelier d'écriture scientifique
This class is a writing workshop. Finally, we are going to learn the nitty gritty little tricks to produce lovely academic writings. Things that have nasty words like thesis, argument, bibliography and footnote attached it it. I can't say that I'm particularly thrilled about the subject matter of this class although I do think it will be very useful. At the moment I'm mostly distracted by the fact that my professor looks rather like a female version of Geoffrey Rush...
Atelier d'écriture scientifique
This class is a writing workshop. Finally, we are going to learn the nitty gritty little tricks to produce lovely academic writings. Things that have nasty words like thesis, argument, bibliography and footnote attached it it. I can't say that I'm particularly thrilled about the subject matter of this class although I do think it will be very useful. At the moment I'm mostly distracted by the fact that my professor looks rather like a female version of Geoffrey Rush...
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| Have you done your homework yet, mate? |
Saturday, September 12, 2015
Shall we sally forth to the chalet?
At the beginning of this semester, the GBU had a training camp in the mountains at, you guessed it, a chalet! I'd never been to this particular one before but it was in the canton of Neuchâtel and took just under 2 hours from Lausanne to get there. (I was lucky enough to go by car.) After winding up narrow roads and through charming little villages we arrived at the chalet with a charming view of fields and mountains and...more chalets!
The weekend was designed for French-speakers so when two Finns came along from Geneva without much French between them, I translated for them for most of Saturday and another student translated for them Sunday. This required quite a bit of concentration when the different session leaders spoke particularly quickly. I wasn't doing any kind of formal translation so it was mostly just summarizing the main points of what the person had just said in whispers to the Finns beside me.
The main speakers for the weekend were a young French couple who had written a book designed as a kind of handbook for Christian students. They came with their two kids, a 13 month old and a one month old. This meant that during pretty much every session one or other of them was wearing the baby and the wife would sometimes pull out a bottle, stick it in the baby's mouth and continue talking! They were pretty impressive. Their parenting skills aside, their content was also really great and engaging. I struggled to keep up sometimes since they spoke super fast!
One of the Swiss staff did a session on sharing your faith and her main point was to find the ways in which the gospel connects to our culture. She incorporated secular music videos and films to illustrate how it would be easy to get a conversation going, to identify what are the problems we agree with and how the Bible offers different solutions. Even if you don't speak French you can check out below a music video by the popular Belgian artist Stromae that she used as one of the examples. In it, Stromae asks a lot of questions about who is God? And why doesn't he answer? His video crosses a church service with a rock concert and the idea is that instead of worshipping God he worships music.
All in all, it was a pretty cool weekend and I'm glad that I went. I think everyone learned a lot and went away feeling encouraged.
The weekend was designed for French-speakers so when two Finns came along from Geneva without much French between them, I translated for them for most of Saturday and another student translated for them Sunday. This required quite a bit of concentration when the different session leaders spoke particularly quickly. I wasn't doing any kind of formal translation so it was mostly just summarizing the main points of what the person had just said in whispers to the Finns beside me.
The main speakers for the weekend were a young French couple who had written a book designed as a kind of handbook for Christian students. They came with their two kids, a 13 month old and a one month old. This meant that during pretty much every session one or other of them was wearing the baby and the wife would sometimes pull out a bottle, stick it in the baby's mouth and continue talking! They were pretty impressive. Their parenting skills aside, their content was also really great and engaging. I struggled to keep up sometimes since they spoke super fast!
All in all, it was a pretty cool weekend and I'm glad that I went. I think everyone learned a lot and went away feeling encouraged.
Thursday, May 28, 2015
The Extraordinary in the Ordinary
Obviously if you have a blog, you have to write about important things, otherwise why would you bother to have one anyways? A diary is for writing about boring everyday things like: did laundry, bought groceries, considered signing up to go skydiving and then remembered my crippling fear of heights. But, sometimes I don't have anything super important to say just that I have a voice (King's Speech, anyone?). So, anyways there are some pretty extraordinary things about what has become ordinary for me and as I was recently reflecting on this fact, I thought that perhaps even things like doing laundry might seem a bit extraordinary to someone else. Thus, in no particular order, ten rather everyday things that are perhaps somewhat ridiculous to an American audience.
#1 Laundry
I have access to laundry once a week on Fridays. It costs 1 franc 20 centimes to do a load. There is no dryer, but I have a drying room, or else a drying rack on my balcony. Pros: apparently the wind and sunshine gets into your clothes, apparently you save money/electricity by not having a dryer. Cons: it takes FOREVER for things to dry, my towels are never fluffy.
#2 The View
I am surrounded by some of the most stunning views you will ever see in your life. This has the happy result of making every photo look amazing and I don't think it's something you can ever completely get used to.
#3 Language
In my bathroom I have shampoo that is in Italian, shower gel that is in German, and a body wash that is in French. The popcorn instructions are in 16 different languages. Last year, I could listen to the Winter Olympics and the World Cup being commentated in German, French, or Italian. I can order in Starbucks in English, but prefer not to. Pros: you know you're not in Kansas anymore! Cons: English can't be your secret language because most people know it and shamelessly eavesdrop.
#4 Restaurants
Not that I have been to many, because it's crazy expensive to eat out, but you have to ask for the bill and you don't have to tip! Say what????
#5 Trash bags
I know we all have to buy trash bags to put in the cans to put our waste in, but in Switzerland I have to buy specific white and green trash bags. In order to get these lovely "sacs taxés" you have to ask for them at the register in the grocery store. They come in rolls of 10 and cost 20 francs!
#6 Phone Calls
Unless you really hate talking to people, calling someone on the phone is something you do without a second thought. It's something I never had a problem with before I had to talk in French! Talking on the phone in a foreign language is so much harder than face to face because you have no facial expressions or hand gestures to help you. Your listening comprehension is tested to the max and God forbid they ask me for my telephone number because in French you don't say the individual numbers but combine them into five hundred and sixteen for 516 for example.
#7 Public Transport
Perhaps some of you take the metro everyday to work but before moving here I was used to driving everywhere. Now I get on and off buses, metros and trains like it's a piece of cake. It's still a little strange that you have to buy tickets from machines (or else have a travel pass) and you aren't checked each time or forced to go through barriers. However, if the public transport staff do a random check and you're found to be without a valid ticket, it's an immediate 100 franc fine that increases if you can't pay that 100 francs right away in cash. Better to spend a few francs on a ticket each time even if I can go for weeks sometimes without having my pass verified.
#8 Printing
As a student, I am given printing credits at the beginning of the semester and I have access to computers and printers at the university. At UNIL (University of Lausanne) there are iMacs along the corridors that I can use them to print whatever I need. I've never yet run out of credits!
#9 English
This is kinda cheating since I already mentioned language, but here I'm talking specifically about how weird it is to overhear someone on the metro talking in English. The thing is, it isn't always native English speakers who are speaking it! I once heard a couple talking in heavily accented English together using mostly swear words. It made me cringe. I also feel like if I'm the one talking in English to a friend on a bus or street, everyone else tries to eavesdrop. The weirdest thing of all though, is when you've spent time with some other English speakers and then you leave and walk out onto the street and suddenly realize that you've forgotten that if you bump into the person walking their dog, you will have to say "excuse me" in French. How can you forget that not everyone speaks English? I guess the frequent use of English in advertising doesn't help.
#10 Dog tax
Not that this effects me, but dog owners have to pay a tax for their pet. How crazy is that? The Swiss also have other annoying taxes like for having a TV and a monthly tax for being a foreigner.
#1 Laundry
I have access to laundry once a week on Fridays. It costs 1 franc 20 centimes to do a load. There is no dryer, but I have a drying room, or else a drying rack on my balcony. Pros: apparently the wind and sunshine gets into your clothes, apparently you save money/electricity by not having a dryer. Cons: it takes FOREVER for things to dry, my towels are never fluffy.
#2 The View
I am surrounded by some of the most stunning views you will ever see in your life. This has the happy result of making every photo look amazing and I don't think it's something you can ever completely get used to.
#3 Language
In my bathroom I have shampoo that is in Italian, shower gel that is in German, and a body wash that is in French. The popcorn instructions are in 16 different languages. Last year, I could listen to the Winter Olympics and the World Cup being commentated in German, French, or Italian. I can order in Starbucks in English, but prefer not to. Pros: you know you're not in Kansas anymore! Cons: English can't be your secret language because most people know it and shamelessly eavesdrop.
#4 Restaurants
Not that I have been to many, because it's crazy expensive to eat out, but you have to ask for the bill and you don't have to tip! Say what????
#5 Trash bags
I know we all have to buy trash bags to put in the cans to put our waste in, but in Switzerland I have to buy specific white and green trash bags. In order to get these lovely "sacs taxés" you have to ask for them at the register in the grocery store. They come in rolls of 10 and cost 20 francs!
#6 Phone Calls
Unless you really hate talking to people, calling someone on the phone is something you do without a second thought. It's something I never had a problem with before I had to talk in French! Talking on the phone in a foreign language is so much harder than face to face because you have no facial expressions or hand gestures to help you. Your listening comprehension is tested to the max and God forbid they ask me for my telephone number because in French you don't say the individual numbers but combine them into five hundred and sixteen for 516 for example.
#7 Public Transport
Perhaps some of you take the metro everyday to work but before moving here I was used to driving everywhere. Now I get on and off buses, metros and trains like it's a piece of cake. It's still a little strange that you have to buy tickets from machines (or else have a travel pass) and you aren't checked each time or forced to go through barriers. However, if the public transport staff do a random check and you're found to be without a valid ticket, it's an immediate 100 franc fine that increases if you can't pay that 100 francs right away in cash. Better to spend a few francs on a ticket each time even if I can go for weeks sometimes without having my pass verified.
#8 Printing
As a student, I am given printing credits at the beginning of the semester and I have access to computers and printers at the university. At UNIL (University of Lausanne) there are iMacs along the corridors that I can use them to print whatever I need. I've never yet run out of credits!
#9 English
This is kinda cheating since I already mentioned language, but here I'm talking specifically about how weird it is to overhear someone on the metro talking in English. The thing is, it isn't always native English speakers who are speaking it! I once heard a couple talking in heavily accented English together using mostly swear words. It made me cringe. I also feel like if I'm the one talking in English to a friend on a bus or street, everyone else tries to eavesdrop. The weirdest thing of all though, is when you've spent time with some other English speakers and then you leave and walk out onto the street and suddenly realize that you've forgotten that if you bump into the person walking their dog, you will have to say "excuse me" in French. How can you forget that not everyone speaks English? I guess the frequent use of English in advertising doesn't help.
#10 Dog tax
Not that this effects me, but dog owners have to pay a tax for their pet. How crazy is that? The Swiss also have other annoying taxes like for having a TV and a monthly tax for being a foreigner.
Monday, February 23, 2015
My time in the US
From the end of November to the beginning of February, I was stateside having knee surgery and recovering from it. Here are some things I've said about that time and here's what I actually mean.
It was so nice to be home for Christmas.
From baking Christmas cookies, to watching Christmas movies, to eating cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning, there are lots of traditions that surround the Christmas season and while some are general, some are family-specific. I had a lovely English Christmas last year but there's no place like home for the holidays! And it was fantastic to not have to be home for Christmas only in my dreams! I loved opening the advent calendar each day, decorating (a slightly shorter than normal) Christmas tree with my mother and sister, doing our annual KayStone gift exchange and being with my family to open presents around the tree.
Being handicapped…had some perks.
It's incredibly humbling to have to constantly ask other people to assist you because you're so helpless. While it's nice to have people who care for you, you sometimes just want to do something yourself (like, say, put on your left shoe?) It was exhausting walking around even with my brace on because my other leg still had to do most of the work. Shortly after my surgery I went to get something out of the pantry while my mom was tutoring in the basement. I somehow managed to open the door right over my toe on my uninjured leg. My toenail was bent back quite deeply and blood was on my sock, but I couldn't hobble to get first aid supplies since now both legs had problems. My cell phone wasn't too far and after a quick call to my neighbor, she ran over to help me bandage my toe.
I loved seeing friends.
Um I think I could probably say this ten times over. It was soooo nice to get to see so many friends and to spend time just doing nothing! It's the hanging out time that you just can't recreate over Skype and I was loving just soaking that in. But, also, you guys (you know who you are) made me feel so loved and special with all the effort you put in to seeing me and to encouraging me through ACL recovery.
Physical therapy kicked my butt.
I don't think I had a proper understanding of physical therapy before I was doing it three times a week. They make you work hard! If they feel like you're not working hard enough, they hook you up to a torture device, aka electrical stimulation machine, which delivers an intense current for 10 secs every 30 seconds to help "activate your quad" in a sequence known as the Russian. This was all before I was allowed to be weight bearing. After I was cleared to walk around, my next form of torture was wall squats, a feat especially daunting when you feel like you just can't trust your newly operated knee. When I first went to PT, I felt like I was the worst one there. I couldn't do anything very well or for very long and it seemed like everyone around me was doing so much better. I was holding out for the day when I'd see someone more injured than me come in and have to hobble to a table. I clearly wasn't there long enough, because that never happened…but I did realize that what was hard for me was easy for another person and vice versa. In the end it was actually good when something was challenging or my leg was shaking because it meant that I was strengthening my leg and getting back the use of my knee. I'm not gonna win any awards wall squatting, but at least I can mostly do it now!
It was hard to say goodbye.
I had such a wonderful time even with the surgery, the helplessness and the pain of PT. I was so sad to say goodbye to family and friends and I felt incredibly blessed to have been so warmly supported during my time at home. It made it hard to leave again. I cannot wait to see you all again and thank you so much for letting me lean on you when I wasn't strong…then and always!
It was so nice to be home for Christmas.
From baking Christmas cookies, to watching Christmas movies, to eating cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning, there are lots of traditions that surround the Christmas season and while some are general, some are family-specific. I had a lovely English Christmas last year but there's no place like home for the holidays! And it was fantastic to not have to be home for Christmas only in my dreams! I loved opening the advent calendar each day, decorating (a slightly shorter than normal) Christmas tree with my mother and sister, doing our annual KayStone gift exchange and being with my family to open presents around the tree.
***
Some other Christmas highlights included: going to two Christmas Eve services and having our whole family stand and lift the candles together in Silent Night and driving around looking for Christmas lights with some friends while also hotly debating which Christmas carol to listen to next. Christmas is such a fabulous time of year and I loved celebrating it with my parents and sisters so much that I didn't even scold my mother for forgetting the Christmas crackers. ;) |
| Christmas Eve Service |
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| The KayStones |
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| The decorated tree on Christmas Eve |
It's incredibly humbling to have to constantly ask other people to assist you because you're so helpless. While it's nice to have people who care for you, you sometimes just want to do something yourself (like, say, put on your left shoe?) It was exhausting walking around even with my brace on because my other leg still had to do most of the work. Shortly after my surgery I went to get something out of the pantry while my mom was tutoring in the basement. I somehow managed to open the door right over my toe on my uninjured leg. My toenail was bent back quite deeply and blood was on my sock, but I couldn't hobble to get first aid supplies since now both legs had problems. My cell phone wasn't too far and after a quick call to my neighbor, she ran over to help me bandage my toe.
***
Freedom is walking to the bathroom without a brace or crutches. Or at least it feels like freedom after a month of shuffling and hopping. I don't think you ever stop to appreciate how easily you can do something until you can't do that thing anymore. For example, did you realize that you have to be able to stand on two legs in order to take a shower like a normal person? You apparently need two legs to even step into a bathtub, something I wasn't able to do for a month! Stairs are also quite problematic…
***
However, there were some nice things about being handicapped. I got wheeled around the Kennedy Center like a VIP when my family went to see Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. I had a temporary handicapped parking pass which allowed me, or anyone driving with me, to park in the spots closest to the stores. Absolutely, hands down, greatest way to have friends chauffeur you. Target? Here we come. Walmart? No problem. Have a hankering for Panera? I'm there. It helped that the motorized carts at certain stores were quite entertaining to drive around. May or may not have knocked things off the shelves, but hey! I'm handicapped!
***
I went into the movies with some friends and it was a theatre where you had the super comfy reclining chairs and had to choose your spots before going in. There were some nice looking seats with a better angle on the screen towards the back and so I asked the lady if we could sit there. "No," she said. "They're handicap seats." I told her I was handicapped. She laughed. We sat two rows from the front craning our necks because, short of pulling down my pants and showing her my scars, I didn't have any way to prove my story. #handicapproblems |
| The view from a motorized cart in Costco-Christmas shopping. |
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| In a wheelchair at the Kennedy Center |
Um I think I could probably say this ten times over. It was soooo nice to get to see so many friends and to spend time just doing nothing! It's the hanging out time that you just can't recreate over Skype and I was loving just soaking that in. But, also, you guys (you know who you are) made me feel so loved and special with all the effort you put in to seeing me and to encouraging me through ACL recovery.
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| Hanging at the creek |
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| Hanging at the creek |
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| Out to eat-did I mention I did this a lot? |
I don't think I had a proper understanding of physical therapy before I was doing it three times a week. They make you work hard! If they feel like you're not working hard enough, they hook you up to a torture device, aka electrical stimulation machine, which delivers an intense current for 10 secs every 30 seconds to help "activate your quad" in a sequence known as the Russian. This was all before I was allowed to be weight bearing. After I was cleared to walk around, my next form of torture was wall squats, a feat especially daunting when you feel like you just can't trust your newly operated knee. When I first went to PT, I felt like I was the worst one there. I couldn't do anything very well or for very long and it seemed like everyone around me was doing so much better. I was holding out for the day when I'd see someone more injured than me come in and have to hobble to a table. I clearly wasn't there long enough, because that never happened…but I did realize that what was hard for me was easy for another person and vice versa. In the end it was actually good when something was challenging or my leg was shaking because it meant that I was strengthening my leg and getting back the use of my knee. I'm not gonna win any awards wall squatting, but at least I can mostly do it now!
It was hard to say goodbye.
I had such a wonderful time even with the surgery, the helplessness and the pain of PT. I was so sad to say goodbye to family and friends and I felt incredibly blessed to have been so warmly supported during my time at home. It made it hard to leave again. I cannot wait to see you all again and thank you so much for letting me lean on you when I wasn't strong…then and always!
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| Reflection Retreat Group Selfie |
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