Happy (Nearly) New Year...

Some lessons circle round us, catching us often. This is one for me. And it begins here...

...I look at the clock, then back to Twitter. One minute, two minutes, three, four, five. All the way to ten minutes.

Time is flying, Julie.

Sigh.

Opening the car door, my hand lifts my leg. Twist and turn, ouch, stand up outside. At the back door, I grab a cane. Slowly, slowly on the icy sidewalk, a pace much slower than most.

To the front desk, where I check in.

Hello, it is nice to see you again.

Heading down the hallway, a goal humming in my head: 15 minutes of walking on the treadmill.

You go girl.

My grandfather's words roll around: If something is worth doing, Julie, it is worth doing well.

And the question comes: Am I doing this Amputation Thing well?

As soon as it comes, I discard the question; because I have no patience with it. Not at all. For I have woken after surgery, missing a leg. Yet in the awful, crushing brutality of that moment...

...a gift came too. A golden gift. If I could stand to be unkind to myself before, I could bear it no longer.

As I had looked down, banged up and broken, gratitude came too. For myself and my body.

And I needed my own kindness...

...more than ever.

Lying in bed, doped on painkillers, I had a choice: to try or give up.

To my left, to my right, it was only me. To try to walk, to try to drive, to try, try, try...it was up to me. So many tasks and goals before, I could blow off, ignore, quit before I started even. It seemed so luxurious then, as I looked back. For this one...if I wanted to have a leg again, it was up to me to learn to walk on it.

So I embarked on my imperfect, good enough amputation journey. The one that would teach me, again and again, that sometimes my best intentions or goals just weren't going to happen. Some days, I would be tired, my body exhausted from learning to move on a prosthetic leg.

Stop, Julie. Rest awhile. Get back up again.

Some days I just didn't feel like putting that leg on - so I didn't until afternoon or later.

Two hours then, Julie...two is less than five, but better than nothing.

When I could stand it, I put on my leg...and gradually I was walking without a cane. Then hobbling less, an eager toddler. Now 13 months later, I am walking quite well. Quite well, thank you very much.

Look at me, Mommy and Daddy, look at me!

The plank hasn't been done for eight months, but I will begin it again soon. Last week, I made the decision not to lie to my physical therapist...

...I haven't done my exercises since my last appointment...six weeks ago.

So I stand on the treadmill and walk for 15 minutes: 2.4 mph and an incline of 9.

You go girl.

Someone steps onto the treadmill next to me. Perhaps 4 or 5 mph, and my memory goes to when I could walk that fast. A tinge of envy, as I wonder if I will ever walk that fast again. Letting that thought go, oh I don't know...

...but what I DO know is the beauty, the sheer and awesome and stunning beauty, of trying again.

Over and over and over: a stubborn hope, exquisite listening and kindness for ourselves, and an unwavering conviction that trying is something. A holy business, friends. Not just at very dramatic times like amputations...but every single day, or every other day, or the best we can do. To begin something again, after we have fallen down or fallen short, not done what we planned, stratagized or hoped to do.

Our New Year's resolutions come and go, often forgotten by the first or second week of January. Why bother, we figure, so hard on ourselves then. But we can blow ourselves a kiss, and just get up again.

Rest for awhile, get up again.

When we can, get up again.

P.S. As I write this blog about New Year resolutions (a week before Christmas)...my year-round tree is still without ornaments. Tomorrow I will get up, and make my tree pretty; these things happen, they do.