A New Adventure

Three weeks of Adventure

During a 'bulla' session yesterday, one of my friends passed a comment, 'Tere ko to vaise bhi hero banna acha lagta hai' (You like to become hero anyways), and I was bemused. By hero he did not mean the 'reel hero', but the essence of the word was 'to stand out from the rest of the lot'. I was confounded with his statement, as he was right to a certain extent, rather in a certain way. I do like to do uncommon things most of the times and these are small little things not worth thinking/talking about. Although it still remains a question - do I like to do because I really like to do them, or do I like people appreciating me doing it. Let that philosophical dialogue remain a question for some later post, this post is about a little 'uncommon' thing I used to do, and the last time I did it, it led to three weeks of adventure :).

Most of the times I have lunch at Canyon View in UCSD, and many a times I go there by my bicycle. The final leg of the route has a small sloppy path which merges into a flat road by a means of uneven banking. There is however, a small one feet strip which curves into the path where I am to go. Ideally I should use the road to go there, as that is the safest and easiest way, - but I often choose the small curvy strip. Last time I did that was three weeks back when lo I was not able to control my bicycle and I landed on my right palm. I have skidded a couple of times riding my bicycle but, the feeling was different this time. I had a premonition just instants before the fall, and things exactly went the way I had seen it all. Although it was not paining a lot then, I knew something was wrong with my right wrist. The adventure begins.

Few more hours into the pain, and the wrists starts to swell up. Reluctantly, I go to the health center and they take an X-ray. There is no fracture and I belittled myself for going to the hospital without any serious injury. But pain soon turns into agony and agony into torment. I can say that that night was the most painful night in the recent past. It was interesting to see the play between sleep and pain - both fighting hard to have my attention. There was no clear cut winner. The next day was as bad. No relief whatsoever. Reluctantly, I went to the hospital again, and thankfully this time I was seen by a sports injury specialist. In no time he referred me to a wrist specialist. He confirmed that there was no fracture visible in the x-ray but proposed that it could be a bad sprain or else a micro fracture. I was a bit satisfied with this meeting, and got another appointment in two days with the wrist specialist. From then on the pain mollified and when I went to see the specialist I was able to move my fingers marginally. He was not able to make a firm decision either and vacillated between a bad sprain and an inconspicuous fracture. Nevertheless, he advised me to put on a cast for three weeks, rationale being it will aid the healing process in either case.

So the past three weeks I have been living off my left hand :). It was an interestingly frustrating experience. Here is a list of the things that are interestingly frustrating to do, to the limit that some of it can’t be done with just the left hand,.(in order of recall)
1. Applying toothpaste on the tooth brush/the process itself
2. Bathing
3. Writing
4. Typing
5. Washing dishes
6. Buttoning the cuff buttons
7. Buttoning the pant buttons
8. Opening a jar/bottles
9. Always sleeping on left side
10. Paying via cash
11. Eating
12. Cutting vegetables
13. Doing laundry
14. ...

Anyway, this journey ends tomorrow (hopefully, no fracture, does not feel like it), so this had to be a blog today.

posted by Nikhil @ 10:15 PM