Back

February 23, 2006 fell on a Thursday. I don't remember that, though, and can state it as fact only after doing the calculation. But I remember many other things about the day. I remember that I took the day off from work and awoke early that morning in my parents' house feeling anxious and determined. I remember Mom took the day off from work too, and Dad, being retired, had nothing better to do. The three of us got into Mom's car and backed out of the garage in the dark at a time early enough to beat even the ever punctual Katy Freeway traffic. I remember eagerly waiting in the car in the parking lot of our destination because the front door to the building was not yet unlocked. I remember, once inside, filling out last minute paperwork. I don't remember changing my clothes, but I do remember sitting in a chair in a gown and shaking exceptionally as the nurse stuck me with a needle and moments later drifting off to sleep. I remember next waking to a sensation of a penetrating cold that felt like death and shivering violently till it passed. And sometime in the moments in between these last two memories, I was given a normally functioning adult body.

I don't trust myself to blog directly about my herniated L5-S1. It's a problem that caused me exceptional pain and grief from ages seventeen till twenty-six. It's a problem that, as a root cause, still exists but that I almost have been able to ignore for three years. Almost. It's a problem that can induce an incredible pain unlike any other I've known, and yet it pales in seriousness to health problems suffered by millions of people right now. So I don't trust myself to write about it because I can't possibly describe in detail the experience without coming across as exaggerative and superfluous and, worst of all, self-pitying. So I'm not going to write about it.

The pleasures of the body are every bit real and should be embraced and treasured. Because the pains of the body are likewise real, and you don't always get to choose which set you experience.