Highway Miles

 Pardon me while I take a quick break from the fray. 

Not that this post won't dwell on the current experience, but it will be particular to me and without a political bent. 

A few days ago I reported to the Kaiser Injection Clinic because I had been told that without an updated TB test I would not be allowed to teach this fall. I will confess that, for a moment or two, I weighed these options. Not having to go through the relatively painless but mildly arduous task of not only showing up once to get jabbed with a sample of germs in my forearm, but I would have to return two days later for them to inspect the spot where they put that sample of germs in my forearm to give me their official okey dokey to return to my job. 

Oh, and I also needed an updated tetanus shot. Which was just enough leverage to get me up and out and into that chair where I was poked and stabbed and sent on my way. With the promise of coming back in two days for the aforementioned inspection. 

Preventative maintenance, right? Well, I have been recounting more of these incidents lately. They are, I am assured, part and parcel of the aging process. Every bump or bruise could be a sign, a signal of something that could kill me. 

That is not the way I felt back in 1986. When I was still finding my way out of my twenties, I made what could be described as a tactical mistake when I mixed Budweiser, LSD and a swing set.  This became known as "my knee operation." I spent the rest of that summer and into the fall in a brace and on crutches. I worked at home to rehab my knee, and as legend has it, I danced before I walked. 

Then I went back to running. Not fast, at first, but nine months later I was ready to run the ten kilometer Bolder Boulder race with my father. And it would be a tribute to me if I had taken that moment in time to embrace a sober, more cautious lifestyle. 

This was not the case. I didn't do my body any particular favors for a few more years. In spite of major reconstructive surgery on one of my appendages, I assumed that I was for all intents and purposes indestructible. Finding a lump on my tongue? So what. Pass me another beer. Your boss says you need a TB test? Who needs that kind of aggravation? 

Well, here I am. Sixty-two years old and still in one piece, more or less. I do what my wife and my doctor tell me to do, though sometimes begrudgingly. I take the pills and the tests and show up for recommended treatment. And I abstain from swing sets. 

For the most part.