One summer, shortly before I turned into a very randy teenager, I attended a week long 4-H camp with my younger brother. The camp was a couple hours drive from home and in the foothills of the Pocono mountains. When all the campers arrived the first day of camp, we were divided into small groups and assigned camp counselors. The camp counselors were older teenagers - and they all wore light tan slacks and brilliant canary yellow shirts.
I was assigned a young Nordic goddess for a counselor - her blond hair shimmered in the sunlight, her clear complexion glowed, and her gleaming white teeth shined like a lighthouse beacon in the darkest of hours of the night. She also had perky twin protrusions under her shirt and long, slender legs that yanked all the red-blooded boy's heads around when she walked by.
Little did I know what fate had in store for me that first day of camp - for coming like a on-rushing freight train without brakes were two events - one was hurricane Agnes - one of the largest June hurricanes on record - which would bring nearly 19 inches of rain and massive flooding which threatened to extend our stay at camp as roads across the entire state were flooded and some bridges were even washed away.
The other event would bring unforeseen grief and embarrassment to a young, impressionable camper. I'm not sure which event I remember with more clarity - they both seem like they occurred just yesterday.
I, of course, do not remember the name of the Nordic goddess that showed my small group of fellow campers to our cabin and then around the campground. Each day she would lead us to our next activity and watch over us and our efforts to sing songs, swim laps, weave baskets, paint watercolors, and perform campfire skits. As the hurricane quickly approached, the days turned into hours of unending rain and activities became less and less varied and more confined to those held within shelters.
One mid-week day, during a very brief respite from the rain, my soggy group found itself outside at a picnic table under gray skies waiting for our turn at the next activity. Just as most of the group had left to go on inside, I suddenly was seized by the idea of impressing the goddess, who was briefly watching me as I dawdled at the table. With a vision of Peter Pan flying through the air in my head, I climbed on top of the table and said, "I can fly! I can fly!" - for surely if I truly believed that I could, I would...
I leapt from the top of the table - and soared through the air - for all of the time it took to crash into the ground... I landed on the side of my face and my right shoulder, bruising my chin and dislocating my shoulder. In my embarrassment, I turned away from the camp counselor and murmured, "I was ok." I was somehow able to push my arm back into the socket myself and once I had done that - most of the pain went away. The flexibility of youth - I guess.
Little did I know that I had hairline fractures in several of the shoulder bones and torn several muscles and ligaments - and that later they would find a way to "complain" about my rough treatment. For the remaining days of summer camp, I sat quietly, protecting my arm and told anyone that asked, that I was quiet because of endless rains and from being soggy all the time.
A little more than two years ago - my shoulder decided it was time to tell me it didn't appreciate what I had done to it, so it gave me an early Christmas present that I wrote about (
here and
here)
After some surgery and more than six months of physical therapy, it was feeling much better and I had hopes that the worse of the discomfort and its lack of motion were behind me. And then about two weeks ago, I had my handful of things in my arms and I missed a step...and fell half a flight of stairs and landed on my shoulder. This time my shoulder did not wait years before complaining. I've been off-line until the last couple days because I've not been able to "reach the keyboard". I hope to catch up with all of you soon - the current prognosis from the less than reassuring doctor is that more surgery "probably wouldn't help" and that three to six more months of physical therapy are in order.
I sit here thinking, what if?... what if I had been able to fly?... what if the Nordic goddess had been
favorably impressed? ...or failing that, what if she was the physical therapist? ...instead of the wrinkled old dude that greeted me yesterday with "Oh, its you again. Well...you know what to do, get going."
