I broke my arm a couple of days ago, specifically, the radial head bone in my elbow. I was riding my bike at top speed down a steep hill down to the gym for a workout. I had not put on my sunglasses and when a very large unidentified bug took aim at me and flew in my right eye at great speed, I lost control, veered off the road, pulled back on to the hard cement road (sometimes instincts are idiotic) and came to a shuttering halt. As they say, luckily the ground broke my fall. When 94 kgs at 30 mph hits a cement road, it’s not a pretty sight. In mid-air I instinctively shifted my body to the left to take the fall on my left shoulder and forearm rather than spattering my nose, teeth and head all over the concrete, but that’s where my luck ran out. I’m currently in plaster for at least four weeks and not in the best of spirits. I did, however, complete my workout on the elliptical trainer!
The following day, Dr. David Helfet, a rugby loving South African and Head of Orthopedic Surgery at the Hospital for Special Surgery, took the cast off, gave me a loose sling and a bunch of (very painful) rehab exercises. Thanks to him, life is rosier. Freedom. Three weeks of work…use not abuse. And with trips to Peru, Miami, Mexico and the UK all imminent, I need to get some fast practice in one-handed shaving, one-handed dressing and one-handed baggage carrying. But it’s about mobility and movement, not stabilize and immobilize. A metaphor for our times perhaps.
