― Ellen DeGeneres
Lying in my bed, I shift my left knee this way, then that.
There doesn’t seem to be a position my leg is willing to consider for longer
than a few minutes. My knee has every right, after all, to be resentful after
everything I’ve put it through in the pursuit of a more healthful lifestyle. At
any rate, the torn meniscus should be easy enough to fix, but until then I find
myself relegated to going against my very nature. Slowing down is anathema to
me. The faster I can do something, the better. I tend to be impatient in lines,
driving behind people going the speed limit, waiting of any kind. Moving about
in a pokey way holds no charm for me, but I have had to learn to stubbornly go
along with it, because my knee seems to want me to, and at the moment, it’s the
boss of me.
This injury has put me on a slower, more equal footing with
my son, Cliff. I mean this in the sense
of our “mph” rating. He’s not a fast mover, generally speaking. The word I might
use to describe the way in which he does most things, is languidly. This morning, for instance, when his van arrived in the
driveway and beeped once at 8: 10, Cliff sat in front of his unfinished
breakfast, lifting the fruit cup in slow motion to his mouth. The van driver
beeped again at 8:14. I fidget and pace; he eats with a tortoise's sense. The
fruit cup finished, he has to digest for a minute before he finishes his orange
juice. I hover, sing-songing my pleas to hurry, hurry, hurry up. When he is
finally out of the chair, he stays true to his nature—in the time it takes him
to get from the breakfast table to the van, I could have run up and down the
street twice (That is, I could have before the injury). It’s a rare morning to
find Cliff ready on time, despite all my pleading, which doesn’t seem to have
any effect. It’s like trying to push the
positive and negative poles of a magnet together.
After completing physical therapy for my knee, I was
admittedly impatient about getting back to running. I love to run; I feel
strong, powerful, as if I could live forever. I’m a sometime believer in the
Greek motto, “Nothing to excess”, but not when it comes to running. When I last left the house alone for some
exercise about three weeks ago, my knee hurt but I assured my husband I would
just walk. “I’m just going to walk, see how it feels”, I told him as he looked
at me skeptically. My promise lasted about a thousand feet. A quarter mile later,
it felt as if some small being, a teeny-tiny knife-wielding troll perhaps,
stabbed me in the right side of my left knee, thereby causing such pain as to
force me to turn back and sheepishly hobble home, to admit what I had done.
If Cliff is the tortoise then I am the hare in this
relationship. The hare is humbled and the tortoise is grateful for a mother who
is as slow-moving as he is. Our walks have been more pleasant of late, because
I’m not urging him along to work off a few calories. To someone driving past,
we must look adorable, strolling arm in arm as I point out something or someone
interesting around the corner. We stop occasionally to watch the roofers on the
house nearby, and admire their skill. “Oh boy, Cliff, do you suppose they’ll
fall off?” and “Shall we ask if we can come up there?”
He replies with a giggle, “Silly mother!”
He replies with a giggle, “Silly mother!”
Here is what I would have missed today if I had run past it
all: the perfectly imperfect spider web extending out from my little maple tree;
my neighbor’s new hopeful white arbor in her side yard, the first sign she’s
moving past her husband’s unexpected death of two years ago; the brindle-colored
terrier standing so still I mistook her for a statue; a little boy stepping off
the yellow school bus in his pine green, fall jacket, backpack bouncing, as he
ran towards his mother, waving the artwork he’d been waiting to show her. And
13-year-old Maddie across the street, singing out on her walkway, uninhibited and joyfully
swaying with the music in her head.
I’ve often heard, from others who parent someone with an
intellectual or physical challenge, that they have learned patience from their
children. Cliff has been a good teacher, but I have no more learned patience
from him than he has learned to be in a constant mad rush from me. I must say,
however, watching how Cliff walks and moves about in the world, I’ve at least
developed an appreciation for the joy of a pace that isn’t all bad. I have had
to adapt, just as he’s had to adapt his whole life to a world that doesn’t
always wait for him to catch up. He seems okay with that, very happy even.
Thoreau said, “If a man loses pace with his companions,
perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music
which he hears, however measured, or far away.”
I’m inclined to agree. Of course, as soon as my knee has forgiven
me my transgressions against it, it’s a safe bet I will get back into my
running. For now, though, I have no choice but to walk in Cliff’s shoes awhile
longer, languidly making my way to wherever it is I’m going. Can’t promise I’ll
completely embrace the walking life, but I will certainly endeavor to try.
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