I have my days. Good days. Bad days. Days when I start to feel sorry for myself. To think, "Oh poor me, how I wish things were different." I know. It's ugly. It makes me want to vomit to even admit this crap. But I know I'm not the only one who feels this way occasionaly.
So here I am over at SMELLS LIKE BULLSHIT when I happen on this fabulous post addressing just this sort of thing.
It can always be worse
by Nightmare a blogger in the take-no-prisoners humor genre. Enjoy!...
Most people know or at least have heard that 20 years ago I broke my back. I fell off of a house drunk at a party one night in Los Altos hills CA and fell approx. 50 feet. This caused tons of damage to my back, I crushed 3 vertebrae and cracked 6 others. I then proceeded to baffle the hospital staff by enduring 3 CAT scans, and a litany of reasons why I needed three of them, machine wasn’t calibrated, the machine was broken, and finally “Well we don’t know how you did it..but you don’t have any nerve damage and you’ll be walking out of here Sunday” that was a week after I went in.
But why am I telling what most people know anyway? Because I had to wear a brace for 45 days after the accident to keep my spine straight so my vertebras would mend. During this time of sitting up straight and wheeling myself around campus in my rental wheel chair ( my brace didn’t allow for bending the right way to fit into the college desks) I learned a very important lesson from a very unsuspecting person.
I was standing in “Joes U Save liquors” , the groovy liquor store by my apartment that was extremely lax on carding people, buying a 12 pack to help with the pain killers that didn’t seem to work unless I added a beer or 10. So I’m standing in line waiting my turn to pay, vaguely wondering if Joe was going to card me this time(he was lax, but sometimes he would bust your balls just to be busting them), when I hear a voice behind me say “Wow, did you break some ribs or something?”
I didn’t bother to turn around I just said loudly “Not ribs, I broke my back”.
“Jesus, how did that happen?”
Again without turning I gave the cliff notes version of what happened, and moved forward to pay for my beer. Joe didn’t card me and as I waited for my change I heard the guy say, “ Well it could have been worse.”
I turn around to ask this talkie Mcspeakerson, “how the fuck does he think it could be worse, with a all league football player with 4 full ride scholarship offers, and now a broken back more than likely ending his illustrious albeit short career..what the fuck could be worse about this situation?”
Before I spoke and as I turned, I got a look at who I was conversing with. There was a man standing there shirtless, wearing cut off jean shorts, covered in tattoos, holding a 12 pack in one hand and a hand carved wooden crutch under the other arm, and as my anger cooled I looked down and saw that his leg was amputated at the crotch.
My mouth froze. My brain stopped and I knew he was absolutely right. Things could be worse. I looked him in the eyes and replied, “You got that fucking right, thanks man”
Now when I get to the end of my rope at work or even at home and I am tired of dealing with assholes, and clients and I am trying to find a reason not to get my pistols, and go on a tri state killing spree I always remember that guy, his missing leg, and the fact that no matter how bad it is it could always be worse.
It can always be worse.
6 comments:
Nope I can totally sympathize with the pity party feelings. I have them too, especially since just 6 months ago I felt great. Now I take 2 drugs to keep me mobile, one to counter the effects of one of the mobile drugs, 1 to help me stay asleep and one for when the pain gets really bad.
Then I go visit my mother in law. She was paralyzed in a car accident in 2001. My HULK was driving and he actually caught her before she flew out the front window of the truck and held her in the vehicle as it flipped over. If he hadn't she would have died.
Some days though I see her battle infections and bed sores and a line from "Pet Cemetary" seems relevant... "sometimes dead is better."
It CAN always be worse.
Some days are just shit days. But with each day there is a chance it won't be.
It is difficult not to have self pity.Human nature.But bad things are a pary of life.And someone is almost always in worse shape than you.My wife we think is in the early stages of Dimentia.Things will probably get very difficult for me.But I look at it this way.She took care of me for 33 years.Now its my turn.
wow Rick. That situation is beyond my ability to catalogue in suck factor. How awful to see that future for your wife and know that there is probably nothing you can do to prevent it.
"Things can always be worse", and in your case, not by much. You have my sincere condolences. I hope you are able to enjoy as much as possible the time you have left together.
Wasn't that just the best post? I love that lil Nightmare!
Nightmare is a great blogger. I get the feeling he was something of a jock in highschool and college. I thoroughly am enjoying peering into the mind and thoughts of one who because of his group (the jocks) I would have despised on principle.
There are thinking brains behind those muscles. I have learned a lot since highschool and really work at seeing people as individuals, not the groups that it is easy to fit them in to.
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