Recovery

Today is the first time in 11 days I wore trousers that didn’t have an elastic waistband. That, my friends, is a sign of recovery.

The other obvious signs are that I can walk at what most people call a normal stride (though I’d still say I was going at a snail’s pace), I can sleep on one side and not just on my back, and I am working a full day, albeit from the comfort, usually, of my bedroom.

I actually had to go back to my older posts to see what I may have written about my impending operation and recalled B is for Bureaucracy  mentioning the NHS postponement back in October. After a bit of telephone prodding and a reassessment of my condition, a letter flooded in with a revised date in February, and so it happened: I am the proud owner of a piece of mesh in my lower abdomen that my body has not rejected as a foreign object and a currently ghastly three-inch wound in a rather sensitive area. ‘Nuf said.

What I found out in the last 11 days about myself is not very surprising: I am a good patient when it comes to following orders; I am a bad patient when it comes to finding things to do to pass the time while following orders. I have taken several lessons in French on the Duolingo site (though I still cannot seem to master the possessives) and have watched a bit of the Olympics. I read part of my current book, Tulipomania (about how the tulip made and ruined fortunes), and probably read more news on line. I played one hand of solitaire before I realised I have become bored with solitaire. I am not a computer games kind of gal, so I didn’t even try one of those. I did catch up with some personal email so that my Inbox is a bit more manageable. (Oddly enough my work inbox is usually at 0 items by the end of the day, but my Google mail hovers at around 50 items at a time.)

And I’ve been occasionally challenged with the ebb and flow of workmen arriving at different times to do different tasks in different rooms, making it not possible to have a cup of tea or find something in the kitchen for lunch. I’ll admit it’s been mildly challenging, but it meant that I took a short “gentle walk” to the local supermarket for something for lunch rather than trying to enter the fray.

There was one day recently that had me just laughing out loud with the controlled chaos—the noise alone would have driven most people to flee! Merv and Leon the painters were busy sanding away while Leon was singing to his iPod and Merv, a lovely Jamaican, was singing mostly to himself in a wonderful Jamaican lilt. Ben and Reza were sawing kitchen tiles while listening to a rock station blasting 80s tunes. Ben tends to keep his head down; Reza occasionally sings a line aloud, just randomly, and then he laughs. With all this happening our electrician Sparky returned to finally push the recessed lighting into the spaces he created a few weeks ago where he left them hanging, seemingly to allow Merv to paint the ceiling. Sparky made an attempt at the first light, with bits of crumbly stuff and dust falling on our new unprotected wooden floor (to which Reza quickly responded and covered), ruined Merv’s paint work and just shrugged and carried on, making the same mess on another bit of the ceiling (which Merv tells me today may be difficult to just patch without re-painting the entire ceiling over).

Nevermind; it comes with the territory if you choose to inhabit a house in the throes of metamorphosis rather than sun in Spain.

There were a lot of things I wanted to do—my annual cull of the clothes that I haven’t worn in a year which then go to the charity shop, the dump, or a place that helps women prepare for interviews called SmartWorks where I occasionally volunteer, depending on the quality or worn-ness of the garment. Then I realised it was a lot of reaching, bending, and using my “core” which I have been told is a no-no, so that will wait.

I also wanted to move some of the remaining kitchen items down from their temporary, dusty abode in the second floor bedroom now that the kitchen is (gasp!) just about finished, but that would have meant overexerting myself, so that will wait, too.

But not much longer—the swelling is down considerably, I am sleeping better, and I feel more my normal self, so I will gradually add back a few physical tasks--starting with commuting to the office on Monday. I hope that by the end of next week when I know the painters will be done and it’s possible the plumber will be tidying up, we will have our house almost back . . . I say almost because there are small things around that need care—the newly-built cupboard needs doors so that my expensive wine glasses don’t tumble out when we whoosh by, but the builders needed to move on to another job while waiting on parts. There are a few wires here and there that need a trim and a tuck. And Tim and I need to do a picture inventory and decide which prints and paintings go back up on the walls, and where, now that we have a bit more space. It’s all good, and the once distant and seemingly elusive completion date, set in my mind’s eye of 17 March, looks promising.

To quote that well-known band Europe, it’s the final countdown.