The Saving of the Right Foot

Two years ago this week, I was in the hospital having surgery on my right foot, and then recuperating from that surgery. It went very well. Thankfully, because of that very important surgery, I was able to save my right foot. It's funny, because I think about what it would have been like if I had lost that foot. I can't even fully imagine. I'm so glad that it worked, because living my life with only one foot, would have been very tough.

That was a very hard week. That week, in addition to having my foot saving surgery, my old life was ending, and I wasn't there to see it end. While my girlfriend, and our six kids were packing, and preparing to starting our new lives an hour away, in Shenandoah, I was laying on my ass, in a hospital bed. I was wearing a blue gown, that probably had more drops of urine on it than I'd like to imagine, playing on my computer, and watching TV. 

I spent much of that week on the phone with the woman who would all too soon become my fiancée. I remember talking about how scary it was to be moving to another town, away from the city that we had spent our entire lives in. It was scary, and exciting at the same time. And while she was working her ass off, I was still there, in my hospital room, feeling sorry for myself. It was a very rough week for me.

There were doctors, and nurses in and out of my room that week. Why is it that they push lots of sleep, and rest while you're in the hospital, and yet they wake you up so damned often, that you are almost guaranteed to not get much rest, or sleep? I don't know how much sleep I got that week, but I'm sure that it wasn't much. Then again, when do we adults ever get enough sleep? I'm not thinking that it is all too often.

There was this large window in my room, that opened up to a beautiful wooded area, where I would sometimes see a deer, or two. If it weren't for the awful situation, I might have enjoyed that scene a lot more. If not for Bartholomew the Owl, I would have been completely alone. But as I looked out that window, I couldn't help but feel an immense sense of isolation. As if maybe the world had ended without me. Could I have been the only human being to survive? It was a depressing thought. But still, I had Julia to talk to on the phone. I swear we spent most of that week on the phone. Thank goodness I had bought a cheap headset to talk to her on, or my arm would have been so tired, I would have thought that I had just flown in from the coast. Haha.

In addition to the stresses of worrying about how my new life was going to begin, there was much worry about  the old life ending. My soon to be ex wife made that week very hard. There were threats, yelling, and a lot of mean words being thrown by her. I can't say I blame her for some of them, as she was seeing her old life coming to an end as well. But some of it just made my healing that much harder. Thankfully, I was able to block much of it out, or I may have lost my damned foot. They say that positive thoughts help with the healing process. I had a lot of positive thoughts. I was about to move in with a woman who had my heart from that first hug, so very long ago. 

Have you ever completely changed your life from the one that you thought you would end up miserable, and dead from? A life that, no matter how hard you tried to be happy with, you just couldn't find a way to be? I blamed her for most of my unhappiness for a while. But after a little time had gone by, I was well aware that it took to of us to end that marriage. And while she still blames me for all of it, I've moved on. There's no anger in me. Sometimes, I can even acknowledge that there were good times, but as I said in a song on Liberty's Exiles seventh album, "moments of happiness will always come and go." For me, those good moments started coming with less frequency. 

My kids had to pack up the old house by themselves. To my son, I am very grateful, as I know that he worked his ass off to get it done. And to my oldest daughters, well, they tried. There was a lot of stuff that we needed to take with us in our journey. But as good as they did, there were a lot of important memories that got left behind. I still don't know everything that was lost, so I guess they couldn't have been all that important. There was a lot of life taking up residency in that old house. And yet, while I was laying on my ass, my kids had to fight hordes of fleas, and far too many material positions, so that I could change my life, and force them along for the ride. It had to be so very hard for them, but I thank them. With all of my heart. 

Anyway, that week was a hard one for me. Julia had to drive to clear to Shenandoah, and Red Oak while I was in the hospital that week. As luck would have it, it was also a day of potential tornadic activity in Shen. And she happened to be in town for that. I can't imagine how scary it was for her, but the deposit had to be paid. And as it turned out, so did the guy installing the cable. I feel bad for that to this day. It was the first of many sacrifices of time, and comfort for her. And for that, I will be eternally grateful to her. 

I got out of the hospital on June 30th, the day before we were set to move to Shenandoah. It was just in time. I wasn't much help with the move, as Julia, our kids, my brothers, and her sister had to do the majority of the work. I was hooked up to a wound vac that kept my wound clean, so that I could keep my foot clean. As a result, I couldn't go into our old house, and make sure that nothing important was left behind. Many things of importance got left behind. But those were just possessions, and certainly not worth losing my right foot over. 

After that trying move, and many months of healing, my foot would go on to be fine... for a short amount of time. We moved into our house in Shenandoah, and I began my life with the most amazing woman in the world. We also had to fight with six kids; double the amount of kids that we were both used to. But I was limping along, and up to the challenge. We had some ups, we had some downs in that first half a year, and before too long, Julia was pregnant. But that is a story for another time.

-Rob