Doldrums.
On the morning of this day last week I was scooting to work on my bike. There’s a corner I take off of Newmarket road down toward the river Cam. I usually take it pretty fast, leaning a lot into the turn, trusting my knobbly mountain-bike tires to hold me. Last week it was damp, there may have been some old grit on the road, and it didn’t hold.
I hit the tarmac like a sack of lard dropped from a great height. Knee first, probable, then chest, then hands. Bleeding – I righted the bike, jammed the front wheel between my legs and sharply twisted the handlebars back to true. Then slowly cycled into the office, mostly one-handed as my right hand was numb and immobile.
At work I showered and cleaned up the worst bits, my knee and hands feeling the most pain. Then got on with the day, a little shaken but stuff needs to be struggled on with regardless. I left earlyish and popped home via a beer in the Live & Let Live. Once home I got off to bed.
The next morning I felt pretty awful – mostly at the front of my chest. Movement was a bit painful but bearable, I chose to work from home – dosed up on a few ibuprofen. That was the Thursday before the extra-long Easter long-weekend – much of which I ended up spending in bed, in pain, or trying to sink the pain beneath alcohol. Eventually on Monday I took myself to A&E at Lister Hospital as by that stage I wasn’t getting any sleep and enough people had told me to go and see someone that I gave in.
Nothing. Nothing interesting anyway – all bones in place, etc. They won’t scan or x-ray me I was told, since I was up and walking about. But they gave me some strong painkillers and said to take them and try to get more sleep. They haven’t worked so far. The pain is less, but the sleep elusive – they seem to make me sweat and possibly see little demons crawling around in the dark. I’m usually a little paranoid, which has always lost me sleep, but the painkillers seem to make it worse. I probably shouldn’t have been reading a Clive Barker book. People watch all their television, but it has never worked for me as I create imagery enough in my head that TV always seems incredibly dull.
I managed to get one thing done this weekend however, with much aid from Kat. Our UK “Indefinite Leave to Remain” application has been sent. Just another thing to add unease to life. Will it be accepted, or have I made some fundamental error somewhere? What happens if something was wrong with it? Will we have to go back to Australia? Well the documentation is off now, and has arrived at its destination, all 1.6kg of it. Only time will tell, and the really annoying thing is that it could be a couple of weeks of time or a couple of months. We won’t know until we hear back.
We’ve also been looking for a new place to live, since our current landlord needs to move back into his house. We’ve only just settled into this one and I had great plans for the garden this year, I spent a lot of effort tidying and preparing it last season. Yet now we must move. To where? We have no idea. Everything available isn’t satisfactory, the little that is goes before we even get a change to lay eyes on it. Letting agents don’t answer their calls. It is a dis-service industry – the people in it just want their pay for the least involvement possible. When we do find a place, what do we do with it anyway? Stuff the garden – it isn’t mine and will just be taken away eventually.
The whole time I’m feeling fragile of mind and body. How can such a small fall from a bike cause so much pain. Silly of course, since smaller falls can cause breakage and even death. Still – it’s the worst I remember doing to myself, even if nothing broken. Meanwhile what to do with life, it trundles on but doesn’t seem to particularly get anywhere.
Anyway – that’s the end of my boring story. I’ve had a shit weekend.