GONE TO CHI-CA-GO

Wednesday,October21st 2009
Rockford Illinois (just outside of Chicago)

Since my last post a great deal has happened and not all of it good but some of it incredible!!Sometimes I think this is the way life should be lived-always on the edge of disaster and triumph,agony and ecstasy,sacredness and profanity...Life sure has a way of testing one's resolve and being as this blog is as much about that as it is a just a traveling blog,it gives me more to write about as a result...

I've had a real setback with my traveling plans because on October 12th the day after my 59th birthday I found out I needed hip replacement therapy....
For the last 3 weeks or so I had been having back pain which I had experienced from time to time but never had a problem dealing with over the short haul....I went to the chiropractor and he would treat me and a few days later I'd be right as rain...this time no dice...I went to the chiropractor and it got worse. So, here I was a mere few days away from leaving on the trip of a lifetime and I had been crippled by intense back pain...I went to my doctor and he said to takle tylonal and rest for a few days...well, that wasn't good enough and the pain just kept getting worse so ...on my birthday I went to a walk in clinic and I was in so much pain I couldn't even detail my medical history and he gave me some heavy duty anti-inflammatories which as it turned out I should never have been prescribed...I was hoping for a positive outcome as I was leaving for Chicago in a week to spend some time with family I hadn't seen in over 40 years before I had to come back to Victoria for my son Evan's grad ceremony on November 9th...You see ,this was why I couldn't just go south right away and I suppose now with good reason beyond the obvious...
By the day after my birthday I was in so much pain that I decided to just go to emergency and hopefully get an xray....as it turned out the xray showed years of arthritic damage and the doctor said I would need my right hip replaced....I saw years of planning just go down the drain in one huge counter-clockwise deluge as I mistily stared at the xray for 10 long minutes...What about the miles and miles of backpacking I was planning in Central America?...What about the mountain climbing in Ecuador and Peru?...What about the nailbanging in New Orleans for Habitat For Humanity? What about writing this great blog full of exciting details of late in life mischief and adventure?....?...as a transplant recipient no less?.....
Well, here I am now in Rockford Illinois with my cane and my oxycodone and a head full of ambition unable to be actualized at least at this point and I'm just trying to process all of this now...Everyday though, the pain is settling down and I'm able to move around more and more.

The trip down was quite an experience. Leaving Victoria for the Vancouver airport at 545am then waiting til 1150 for a 3 hour flight to Minneapolis.Then a 1 hour wait for the final flight to Chicago,arriving at 630pm Pacific Time.
Upon arriving in Minneapolis I was so stoned I felt somewhat disoriented but i felt little pain and hadn't since leaving Victoria...I had the better part of a mile to walk from the arrival gate to the departure gate and that was mitigated by moving sidewalks just like The Jetson's !!..The airport colours were muted gray and blue which created an ambience I wasn't expecting...spacious,uncrowded and some great classical music playing through the speaker system...The sun was setting and the outside temp was in the high 60's...It certainly created a surreal effect...
Then Chicago...upon arrival I was greeted by the cacaphonous sounds of some very loud jazz playing through their speaker system... and not the cool Diana Krall or Norah Jones type either...mnore like the old Thelonious Monk, Bix Beiderbecke school...very interesting...and the same cool muted colours of Minneapolis airport...
Then this strange woman walked up to me and said "David"?..... Turned out it was my cousin whom I hadn't seen since 1970...which brings me to where I am this day..Sitting poolside on a warm sunny day somewhere on the outskirts of Chicago nursing a crippled hip and leg wondering what's going to happen next...I'm hoping to go and see Bob Dylan tomorrow but now it depends on how much pain I'm experiencing...
I don't want you all to be feeling sorry for me though,hehe...I'm still going to make this whole experience the "trip of a lifetime" and i will be adding to the blog daily even if nothing's going on.....I have yet to learn "the art of doing nothing" or "the art of none-doing"...
A dios
David