Things have been a little quiet over here in Young and Hip-land. Part of the reason for this radio silence is that I'm working full-time while doing an internship while traveling for work while trying to write another novel while attempting to have one of those so-called "social lives" I've heard so much about while trying to give the cat the amount of attention she requires so that she will not destroy my shit while trying to coordinate my move back to Vancouver while....while..... drinking a lot of coffee. A lot of coffee.
The other reason, however, is that there's been very little to write about. All of the changes in my hip have been incremental and I wasn't about to subject anyone to a post on my newfound ability to lift my leg a fraction of an inch higher than I could before thus enabling me to wash my left foot for the first time in months. (Though I did privately celebrate this milestone). I'm still walking like a drunken extra in "Night of the Living Dead." Rolling over in my sleep on to the place where my gluteus medius is detached still hurts enough to make me dream that someone has sliced my hip open and I'm staggering around bleeding and being like 'damn, I should get me to a hospital.' My hip still clunks and shifts to a degree that often makes me cry out in surprise, (not in pain, really, just surprise), which I'm pretty sure has led people to believe that I have Tourette's Syndrome.
Today, however, I have news the report. I finally got my surgery date. On June 24th, I will go back under the knife to get my ass put back on, my leg length raised and possibly get a brand spankin' new socket. This means that I've got about 6 or 7 weeks left to live in America. This is good news on the "getting my ass put back on" front, but you don't need a weatherman to know that there's a weather system called Hurricane Getting-Deported-And-Operated-On-In-The-Same-Week on the horizon. You know what's not a great way to get your new life off on the right foot? Spending the first few months of it in bed eating frozen grapes and rubbing BioOil on your various scars. (That's also probably a bad way to start a E-Harmony profile. Note to self).
It's interesting to note the weird cyclical-ness (that's not a word) of this surgery. My first hip replacement was on June 23rd 2009. My second surgery will be on June 24th, 2010. Here's hoping this will be the last deja vu I'll experience, since I swear to God that if I wake up from this surgery saying, "Hey, shouldn't I be able to move this leg?" I will literally start shanking bitches with my IV needle.
You say limp. I say swagger.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Things To Do In Denver When You're Gimpy
On this blog, I do my fair share of complaining ("My ass isn't attached!" "I walk like a broke-down marionette being operated by someone who's high on paint thinner!" "America keeps trying to break up with me, despite my clinging harder than Jessica Biel on Justin Timberlake!"). When you break it right down, however, my life is pretty sweet.
I mean, a few days ago I was hanging out in a hotel room in Denver with L.T., who plays for the Australian national team. The last time I saw L.T., we were in a cafe on the streets of Paris eating dainty pastries and speaking the kind of French that made actual French people ask me if I was sure I'm Canadian, since don't Canadians speak French? (In my defense, I took Chinese in high school). L.T. remarked on how great it is to have the kind of lifestyle where you can hang out in Paris with someone a few years back, get drunk on pineapple tequila shots with them in a bar in Champaign Urbana, then chill in a hotel room with them in beautiful Denver, Colorado. I mean, who else can say that? Who else has that life?
Yes, I am indeed lucky. Right now, my two passions (wheelchair basketball and writing) have come together in Denver. (Denver the city, not Denver my brother....which is a source of endless confusion). My former wheelchair basketball team the Fighting Illini are playing today in the national championship (I-L-L! I-N-I!) and there's also a huge creative writing conference called AWP on. It's like someone designed a weekend just for me.
Now, I tend to be a pretty shy person. I was 20 before I could look people in the eye and, even now, meeting new people tends to give me the same symptoms as overcaffeination/ meth addiction: talking quickly! Making large hand gestures that occasionally cause me to hit people in the face or knock steaming cups of coffee into my lap! Slight tremor of the hands! (The fact that I am usually overcaffeinated on top of this doesn't help matters). For that reason, AWP gives me the cold sweats. Not only are you supposed to talk to people, but those people are generally anti-social writerly types like yourself, who are equally nervous and overcaffeinated but who suspect that their entire writing career might rest on their ability to charm someone at the conference into publishing their brilliance. (The fact that half of these people confuse "writer" with "someone who wears outlandish clothing in a bid to get attention" is topic for another day).
Until last night, the only new person I had met at AWP was the woman who also walked with a cane (cane friend!) who I met in the registration line-up. We bonded over our mutual gimpiness and our taste in canes (she had a sleek fold-up model with a little hook on the end so you can prop the cane up against tables and stuff and it won't fall over on the people and cause great injury and embarrassment) and the fact that we were wasting our walking time standing in line. Luckily for me, this Cane Friend was not afraid to tell the woman in charge of registration that they should have a special line for people who had trouble standing and got us to the front of the line, saving us at least 30 minutes! Go Cane Friend! The registration lady obviously didn't want to face the wrath of two angry chicks armed with metal poles.
During the conference, however, I tended to keep my head down. Like, what was I supposed to say to people? "So....do you like words?....Because I like words...." "So....are you wearing that fedora ironically?....." "So...do you also find the bookfair filled with thousands of people whose sweat smells like raw, unbridled ambition a little disconcerting?"
Luckily, however, you don't need social skills when you have good friends. Last night, M. and I hit the town and stumbled upon a fiction reading at a cool little bar. M. is a social butterfly and quickly made friends with tons of people, dragging me into the conversation with her. Long story short, we ended up at a party in a house/gallery talking to all sorts of writerly types about writerly things. Thanks to M.'s icebreaking/wingman skills and the assistance of some Coors Light (hey, when you're in Denver drinking Coors is practically a requirement) and Fat Tire, I ended up speaking words to people I did not know! This is progress, considering that most of my social skills were learned when some of the lesbians on the Canadian national team got sick of watching me blush and stammer my way through interactions and took it upon themselves to teach me how to pick up men (I know, I know) and would give me little homework assignments at tournaments (talk to 5 people, find the "sole mate" of one of the single-leg amputees on the team, etc) in attempt to hone my skills. That, however, is a story for another day.
I mean, a few days ago I was hanging out in a hotel room in Denver with L.T., who plays for the Australian national team. The last time I saw L.T., we were in a cafe on the streets of Paris eating dainty pastries and speaking the kind of French that made actual French people ask me if I was sure I'm Canadian, since don't Canadians speak French? (In my defense, I took Chinese in high school). L.T. remarked on how great it is to have the kind of lifestyle where you can hang out in Paris with someone a few years back, get drunk on pineapple tequila shots with them in a bar in Champaign Urbana, then chill in a hotel room with them in beautiful Denver, Colorado. I mean, who else can say that? Who else has that life?
Yes, I am indeed lucky. Right now, my two passions (wheelchair basketball and writing) have come together in Denver. (Denver the city, not Denver my brother....which is a source of endless confusion). My former wheelchair basketball team the Fighting Illini are playing today in the national championship (I-L-L! I-N-I!) and there's also a huge creative writing conference called AWP on. It's like someone designed a weekend just for me.
Now, I tend to be a pretty shy person. I was 20 before I could look people in the eye and, even now, meeting new people tends to give me the same symptoms as overcaffeination/ meth addiction: talking quickly! Making large hand gestures that occasionally cause me to hit people in the face or knock steaming cups of coffee into my lap! Slight tremor of the hands! (The fact that I am usually overcaffeinated on top of this doesn't help matters). For that reason, AWP gives me the cold sweats. Not only are you supposed to talk to people, but those people are generally anti-social writerly types like yourself, who are equally nervous and overcaffeinated but who suspect that their entire writing career might rest on their ability to charm someone at the conference into publishing their brilliance. (The fact that half of these people confuse "writer" with "someone who wears outlandish clothing in a bid to get attention" is topic for another day).
Until last night, the only new person I had met at AWP was the woman who also walked with a cane (cane friend!) who I met in the registration line-up. We bonded over our mutual gimpiness and our taste in canes (she had a sleek fold-up model with a little hook on the end so you can prop the cane up against tables and stuff and it won't fall over on the people and cause great injury and embarrassment) and the fact that we were wasting our walking time standing in line. Luckily for me, this Cane Friend was not afraid to tell the woman in charge of registration that they should have a special line for people who had trouble standing and got us to the front of the line, saving us at least 30 minutes! Go Cane Friend! The registration lady obviously didn't want to face the wrath of two angry chicks armed with metal poles.
During the conference, however, I tended to keep my head down. Like, what was I supposed to say to people? "So....do you like words?....Because I like words...." "So....are you wearing that fedora ironically?....." "So...do you also find the bookfair filled with thousands of people whose sweat smells like raw, unbridled ambition a little disconcerting?"
Luckily, however, you don't need social skills when you have good friends. Last night, M. and I hit the town and stumbled upon a fiction reading at a cool little bar. M. is a social butterfly and quickly made friends with tons of people, dragging me into the conversation with her. Long story short, we ended up at a party in a house/gallery talking to all sorts of writerly types about writerly things. Thanks to M.'s icebreaking/wingman skills and the assistance of some Coors Light (hey, when you're in Denver drinking Coors is practically a requirement) and Fat Tire, I ended up speaking words to people I did not know! This is progress, considering that most of my social skills were learned when some of the lesbians on the Canadian national team got sick of watching me blush and stammer my way through interactions and took it upon themselves to teach me how to pick up men (I know, I know) and would give me little homework assignments at tournaments (talk to 5 people, find the "sole mate" of one of the single-leg amputees on the team, etc) in attempt to hone my skills. That, however, is a story for another day.
Friday, April 2, 2010
Freaky Cyborg Hip ENGAGE! Power up! Attack!
In the 9 months since my surgery (has it already been 9 months? Is it a bad sign that it takes longer to fix my hip than it does to turn a speck of genetic material into a fully formed human being?) I have been waiting for my Freaky Cyborg Hip to wake up and go rogue. My new hip's not too great for the whole "walking" thing, so I figure it probably has other strengths: like shooting lasers...or destroying Tokyo...or even just re-enacting the Pink Floyd Laser Light Show. Who knows?
Well, today my Freaky Cyborg Hip got its chance to power up. I was in the security lineup at the Vancouver airport and after a mild bout of security-sanctioned groping, they asked me if I would like to step into the full body scanner. I jumped at the opportunity. (And by "jump" I mean "gimped over in the direction of the scanner in my socks hoping that the fabric of my socks was tough enough to ward off the swamp of foot fungus that must be on those carpets"). I mean, first of all, any day when I get off easy in the security-line groping department is a good day. (Those of you thinking that beggars can't be choosers need to check yourselves). But second of all: stepping into a weird, pod-like scanner and being pelted with lord knows what rays seemed like a good way to engage the Freaky Cyborg Hip. Isn't that how it happens in the movies? The hero steps into a pod and thanks to the Miracle of Science gets transformed into a cyborg?
Standing on the little footprints in the body-scanner cylinder and raising my arms above my head as the machine scanned my body, I felt like a freaking Power Ranger or Clark Kent in the phone booth or Iron Man or that guy in Avatar. I could almost hear the voice over: "She thought she was the recipient of a malfunctioning hip replacement. She thought she was heading to a small midwestern college town. She was wrong. This April, one woman learns that a journey of a lifetime can begin with a single, gimpy step. Arley McNeney stars in....Hip To Destruction." (What? You don't narrate your own life in the voice of Don LaFontaine?)
Any moment, I suspected, the cyborg in me would be activated and go on a rampage. And frankly, seeing as how the customs guy was going through Every. Single. Thing in my backpack and inquiring as to whether my Moroccan Hair Oil was "medicine" (I told him that it was, if bad hair counts as a medical condition), I could hardly wait. I was like, bring on the lasers, Freaky Cyborg Hip! Let's get this party started!
Not so much. I gimped out of the body scanner and was so busy trying to get a peek at what was shown on the monitor (spoiler alert: they don't show any nudity) that I bumped smack into an attractive guy. I apologized. Then, while putting on my backpack, I hit the same guy in the shoulder. I apologized. THEN, I turn to grab my cane, it slipped and I hit the guy AGAIN! With my cane! This poor guy thought he was going for a friendly vacation and I end up beating the shit out of him in the customs line!
Instead of activating the rambo switch on my Freaky Cyborg Hip, someone activated the "romantic comedy" switch! This is not quite the destruction I was looking for. Instead of destroying Tokyo, I reminded myself why I will probably die alone in a small apartment and my 57 cats will eat my face. Psyche/ self confidence destruction doesn't count! Worse, it was all the romantic comedy embarrassment without any "falling in love and living happily ever after" business. I've said it before, but I'll say it again: I want my money back.
Well, today my Freaky Cyborg Hip got its chance to power up. I was in the security lineup at the Vancouver airport and after a mild bout of security-sanctioned groping, they asked me if I would like to step into the full body scanner. I jumped at the opportunity. (And by "jump" I mean "gimped over in the direction of the scanner in my socks hoping that the fabric of my socks was tough enough to ward off the swamp of foot fungus that must be on those carpets"). I mean, first of all, any day when I get off easy in the security-line groping department is a good day. (Those of you thinking that beggars can't be choosers need to check yourselves). But second of all: stepping into a weird, pod-like scanner and being pelted with lord knows what rays seemed like a good way to engage the Freaky Cyborg Hip. Isn't that how it happens in the movies? The hero steps into a pod and thanks to the Miracle of Science gets transformed into a cyborg?
Standing on the little footprints in the body-scanner cylinder and raising my arms above my head as the machine scanned my body, I felt like a freaking Power Ranger or Clark Kent in the phone booth or Iron Man or that guy in Avatar. I could almost hear the voice over: "She thought she was the recipient of a malfunctioning hip replacement. She thought she was heading to a small midwestern college town. She was wrong. This April, one woman learns that a journey of a lifetime can begin with a single, gimpy step. Arley McNeney stars in....Hip To Destruction." (What? You don't narrate your own life in the voice of Don LaFontaine?)
Any moment, I suspected, the cyborg in me would be activated and go on a rampage. And frankly, seeing as how the customs guy was going through Every. Single. Thing in my backpack and inquiring as to whether my Moroccan Hair Oil was "medicine" (I told him that it was, if bad hair counts as a medical condition), I could hardly wait. I was like, bring on the lasers, Freaky Cyborg Hip! Let's get this party started!
Not so much. I gimped out of the body scanner and was so busy trying to get a peek at what was shown on the monitor (spoiler alert: they don't show any nudity) that I bumped smack into an attractive guy. I apologized. Then, while putting on my backpack, I hit the same guy in the shoulder. I apologized. THEN, I turn to grab my cane, it slipped and I hit the guy AGAIN! With my cane! This poor guy thought he was going for a friendly vacation and I end up beating the shit out of him in the customs line!
Instead of activating the rambo switch on my Freaky Cyborg Hip, someone activated the "romantic comedy" switch! This is not quite the destruction I was looking for. Instead of destroying Tokyo, I reminded myself why I will probably die alone in a small apartment and my 57 cats will eat my face. Psyche/ self confidence destruction doesn't count! Worse, it was all the romantic comedy embarrassment without any "falling in love and living happily ever after" business. I've said it before, but I'll say it again: I want my money back.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Things That Rocked This Week
This week, a girl who lived a few doors down from me while I was growing up, and who was friends with my sister, passed away from Cystic Fibrosis. Eva Markvoort blogged about her life and her preparation for death and was a spokesperson for Cystic Fibrosis research. When she received a double-lung transplant a few years ago, she allowed camera crews to film a documentary about her. (Check out her blog here: www.65redroses.com). I didn't know Eva very well, so I don't feel as if it's right to wax poetic about her, but I will say that I admire her commitment to both living well and dying well.
In that spirit, I've decided to inject some positivity into my own blog. I mean, if the worst thing that ever happens to you in life is that your ass gets detached and you have to walk like a zombie for a little while (knock on wood that it's only a little while), then you can count your blessings. So here, then, is a brief list of Things That Rocked This Week.
In that spirit, I've decided to inject some positivity into my own blog. I mean, if the worst thing that ever happens to you in life is that your ass gets detached and you have to walk like a zombie for a little while (knock on wood that it's only a little while), then you can count your blessings. So here, then, is a brief list of Things That Rocked This Week.
- Watching the sun rise at Dunkin Donuts with A. at 5:45 a.m on the way to the train station. I am lucky to have a friend who's willing to get up at obscene hours to drive me places. I am also lucky that coffee exists in the universe.
- Getting to come back to Vancouver for a little while and see my friends and family.
- My mom's Easter feast. When Warren Zevon was dying of lung cancer and was asked by his pal David Letterman if he had any advice about living/dying, he said, "Enjoy every sandwich." I enjoyed every sandwich. And every slice of turkey. And about 18 pounds of Easter candy, especially anything with the word "mellowcreme" or "mallowcreme" in its name. What is "mallowcreme?" Lord knows. Probably rendered beef fat and high-fructose corn syrup, but man do those little pastel-colored candies go down easy.
- My awesome job. I worked at a wheelchair rugby tournament this weekend and somehow ended up doing the play-by-play commentary for the webcasts, which would not normally be a problem (as you can imagine, I'm a talker) but for the fact that I know next to nothing about wheelchair rugby. Happily, Kevin Orr and Duncan Campbell were there to provide the expert commentary, while I was there to get the rules wrong, the names of the players wrong, the team names wrong, and say "um" a lot. It was actually a lot of fun, and now I know how to play wheelchair rugby. (If you want to see me in action, check out www.sportscanada.tv)
- The fact that my awesome job allowed me to reconnect with some friends I haven't seen in ages and reminisce about the old days...when I once got stranded on a Greek island without any of my luggage and was rescued by three Canadian wheelchair rugby players. By "rescued," I mean "given a jacket and enough alcohol that I no longer cared what country I was in." You know those St. Bernards with the barrel of rum around their necks? Same principle. Anyhow, it was good to see D. and be filled in (six years later) about the drunken exploits I do not remember.
- My mom bought me two nifty sweaters! One has an owl on it!
- The fact that the Edible Book Competition is approaching. I still have not decided what my entry will be (and even if I did it would clearly be classified information. The Edible Book Competition is serious business!), but whatever it ends up being, I'll probably spend at least a few days covered in molten Starburst, which is my idea of a good time.
- Champaign-Urbana no longer resembles a vast Arctic tundra.
- The Chicago O'Hare airport did not lose my luggage. Granted, this was because I did not have luggage, but considering the potent screwing-up-your-travel-plans black magic of the O'Hare airport, getting out with only a minorly over-aggressive pat-down from security staff is a miracle.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Discrimination: Ur Doin It Wrong
One of the burdens of being relentlessly attractive is that you're constantly harassed by cat calls and wolf whistles as you walk down the street. You can barely go a foot without someone complimenting you on what your mama gave you or what a fine, fine piece of top quality ass you are. And the guilt that comes from causing distracted motorists to crash into street signs: it keeps you up at night! Yeah, it's tough being pretty.
Okay, I wouldn't know. Usually, the comments I get on the street fall within the spectrum of "damn, girl, you're TALL" and "Hey, sweetheart. What's wrong with your legs? Want me to teach you how to spread them?" I do get cat calls, but they're literally from my cat and therefore have the subtext of "feed me now before I slice you." Well, today the boys of Champaign-Urbana took their harassment game to a whole new level. I got my first cat call. Cat call...homophobic epithet...to-may-to, to-mah-to.
Last night, I was walking to a friend's birthday party. Incidentally, the party had a "Crazy Hat" theme and I was decked out in an orange-and-blue toque (knit cap for you Americans) complete with a pom pom on top. In the dark, I kind of resembled "Where's Waldo?" (I'm not sure if this played into what happened or not). Also, I wasn't using my cane, so I was in full swamp-creature lurch mode. Inconspicuous as always.
As I neared the apartment, a silver Camry-Accord-Tercel-mid-level-manager-or-accountant-type car drove past me and slowed down. The passenger rolled down the window, leaned out, and informed me that I was a (wait for it...wait for it...) "fucking faggot." Now, I tend to assume that if someone's yelling at me from their car, they must know me, so my first reaction before I processed what he said was to wave and I had a moment of "wait...no...this isn't a friendly yell...Abort wave! Abort wave!" Too late. I half-waved and the guy (further enraged by my gesture) yelled, "Fuck you. You're fucking weird." In retrospect, what I heard as "fucking weird" was probably "fucking queer." Oh, men of Champaign-Urbana. You really know how to make a girl feel special.
Now, I've received my fair share of "hey, mister! You can't go in that washroom," which comes with the territory when you're six-foot-two, have shortish hair and live in a climate that often requires you to bundle yourself in warm clothing to the point where it's impossible to tell whether you're a male, a female, or the Michelin Man. These comments, however, are given in the spirit of misunderstanding and the commenter is usually way more embarrassed than I am, especially when I choose to smile politely and point out that I am the proud owner of a lady garden.
So yes, in the eyes of the frat-boy-gang-rapists-in-training crowd, I am a "fucking faggot/queer/weirdo." Which is kind of embarrassing on their part. Obviously, homeboy in the small-penis-mobile needs to go back to Hate-Based Stereotyping 101. There must be some sort of remedial class he could take to help him properly identify markers of otherness and respond with the correct slur for the situation.
Because, Lord knows I walk like a lot of things...Gary Busey on the season premiere of "Celebrity Rehab with Doctor Drew," Jack Nicholson at the end of The Shining, pretty much any Frankenstein/swamp creature/alien in a 1950s B movie, but I do not walk like a stereotypical gay man. I mean, haven't these assholes seen "Will and Grace?" Do I sashay? Do I flounce? Do I strut? No, no, and not without pulling a muscle.
So while the disability-studies buff in me is interested in this guy's conflation of disability and sexuality, all the rest of me thinks, holy shit people. Watch a fucking episode of "Glee." Like, what cultural markers is this guy picking up on? The fact that I am wearing women's jeans...because I happen to be a woman? The fact that I was wearing a toque with a pom pom on top? Because that's not the garb of a stereotypical gay man. That's the garb of a stereotypical lumberjack. I believe the term you're searching for, you homophobic motherf*cker, is "cripple" or "overachieving bitch who thinks she's so great." Discrimination: ur doin it wrong.
I would have happily mentioned this to my hate-mongering friend face-to-face, had he the cojones to speak to me directly. (Actually, it would have probably turned out to be cane-to-face or knee-to-groin). But, of course, men like that thrive on shouting things from car windows and speeding away. Which is why they rarely get a good look at the people they're hating on.
Okay, I wouldn't know. Usually, the comments I get on the street fall within the spectrum of "damn, girl, you're TALL" and "Hey, sweetheart. What's wrong with your legs? Want me to teach you how to spread them?" I do get cat calls, but they're literally from my cat and therefore have the subtext of "feed me now before I slice you." Well, today the boys of Champaign-Urbana took their harassment game to a whole new level. I got my first cat call. Cat call...homophobic epithet...to-may-to, to-mah-to.
Last night, I was walking to a friend's birthday party. Incidentally, the party had a "Crazy Hat" theme and I was decked out in an orange-and-blue toque (knit cap for you Americans) complete with a pom pom on top. In the dark, I kind of resembled "Where's Waldo?" (I'm not sure if this played into what happened or not). Also, I wasn't using my cane, so I was in full swamp-creature lurch mode. Inconspicuous as always.
As I neared the apartment, a silver Camry-Accord-Tercel-mid-level-manager-or-accountant-type car drove past me and slowed down. The passenger rolled down the window, leaned out, and informed me that I was a (wait for it...wait for it...) "fucking faggot." Now, I tend to assume that if someone's yelling at me from their car, they must know me, so my first reaction before I processed what he said was to wave and I had a moment of "wait...no...this isn't a friendly yell...Abort wave! Abort wave!" Too late. I half-waved and the guy (further enraged by my gesture) yelled, "Fuck you. You're fucking weird." In retrospect, what I heard as "fucking weird" was probably "fucking queer." Oh, men of Champaign-Urbana. You really know how to make a girl feel special.
Now, I've received my fair share of "hey, mister! You can't go in that washroom," which comes with the territory when you're six-foot-two, have shortish hair and live in a climate that often requires you to bundle yourself in warm clothing to the point where it's impossible to tell whether you're a male, a female, or the Michelin Man. These comments, however, are given in the spirit of misunderstanding and the commenter is usually way more embarrassed than I am, especially when I choose to smile politely and point out that I am the proud owner of a lady garden.
So yes, in the eyes of the frat-boy-gang-rapists-in-training crowd, I am a "fucking faggot/queer/weirdo." Which is kind of embarrassing on their part. Obviously, homeboy in the small-penis-mobile needs to go back to Hate-Based Stereotyping 101. There must be some sort of remedial class he could take to help him properly identify markers of otherness and respond with the correct slur for the situation.
Because, Lord knows I walk like a lot of things...Gary Busey on the season premiere of "Celebrity Rehab with Doctor Drew," Jack Nicholson at the end of The Shining, pretty much any Frankenstein/swamp creature/alien in a 1950s B movie, but I do not walk like a stereotypical gay man. I mean, haven't these assholes seen "Will and Grace?" Do I sashay? Do I flounce? Do I strut? No, no, and not without pulling a muscle.
So while the disability-studies buff in me is interested in this guy's conflation of disability and sexuality, all the rest of me thinks, holy shit people. Watch a fucking episode of "Glee." Like, what cultural markers is this guy picking up on? The fact that I am wearing women's jeans...because I happen to be a woman? The fact that I was wearing a toque with a pom pom on top? Because that's not the garb of a stereotypical gay man. That's the garb of a stereotypical lumberjack. I believe the term you're searching for, you homophobic motherf*cker, is "cripple" or "overachieving bitch who thinks she's so great." Discrimination: ur doin it wrong.
I would have happily mentioned this to my hate-mongering friend face-to-face, had he the cojones to speak to me directly. (Actually, it would have probably turned out to be cane-to-face or knee-to-groin). But, of course, men like that thrive on shouting things from car windows and speeding away. Which is why they rarely get a good look at the people they're hating on.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Backstory (Hip-story?)
When I started "Young and Hip" in August, my motivations for doing so went a little something like this: "Well, damn. I have been stuck in bed for six weeks and I'm bored as fuck and if I have to watch one more happy-people-buying-houses reality TV show I'm going to punch a hole through the wall, which would likely lead to a broken hand and render me even gimpier, so why don't I start a hip-replacement blog to keep my family and friends up to date about my progress (read: to complain to someone other than my mom) and possibly give some other young people having hip replacements a head's up that this shit is not all sunshine, lollipops and rainbows? That should keep me occupied for a few weeks until my hip magically gets better."
Well, it's late March and my blog has been going strong for 7 months and is nearly 400 pages long when put in a word processor (concision: you're doing it wrong). Lately, I've been getting emails along the lines of, "Hey, love your blog. That part where you talk about your detached ass and compare your walking to a heroin-addicted Phantom of the Opera: LOLZ! But, uh, what exactly happened to you?" (In fairness, people who have known me for my whole life are asking the same question).
So, here, for those of you who are just tuning in, is the story of What Exactly Happened to Me:
When I was 11, thanks to a freak inner-tubing accident and probably some DNA-based wonkiness, I slipped the growth plate on my left hip. It was pinned back on, the pins caused avascular necrosis (which translates rather dramatically into "bone death"), the pins were taken out, my adolescence got an extra serving of awkwardness thanks to a bright-blue half-body cast that stuck my legs out at 45-degree angles and meant that anything I wore on my lower body had to have snaps up the side like a baby onesie. (You'd think such easy-access underwear would have made me a hit with all the gentlemen, but you'd be wrong). The ensuing years were filled with crutches, canes, wheelchairs, arm-crutches and me growing to over 6 feet tall, but long story short: after 15 years of avascular necrosis, my femoral head basically began to look like Mickey Rourke's face.
While all this was going on, I was busily playing wheelchair basketball (I was on the national team from 2001 to 2007 and won two World Championship golds and a Paralympic bronze), getting degrees in Creative Writing and History at the University of Victoria, writing and publishing a novel called "Post," then doing my MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Illinois so that I could play wheelchair basketball with the U of I varsity team. Oh, and I also make ridiculously intricate cakes.
In November 2007, a few days before my 25th birthday, my hip decided it was fed up with me subjecting it to hours of wheelchair basketball, ill-advised attempts at hiking (though, granted, "hiking" in the midwest is more like "strolling up small hills with grand names like The Eagle's Peak"), and generally running it into the ground. My hip tried to quit me by either popping out or hooking itself on my femoral head, (doctors never did figure out exactly what it was doing), and I basically re-enacted that scene from "The Exorcist" (puking! Shaking! Leg twisted at sickening angles impossible to recreate by people who are not in the circus!). Over the next 18 months, it became clear that my hip was Just Not That Into Me because it was straying more than Tiger Woods in Las Vegas. There was only one thing to do: become a cyborg.
On June 23rd, 2009, I headed into the O.R. to become to proud owner of a Freaky Cyborg Hip. I was so confident that my hip replacement would go well that I had booked a cake-making gig for a week after the surgery, since everyone had told me that "they get you up and walking the same day! My 95-year-old grandpa waltzed out of the hospital after only 3 days and has had a successful career as an extreme sky-diver ever since! It was the best decision I ever made!"
Yeah, not so much. I was awake during the surgery (I actually got to see my femoral head after it was taken out), but when the epidural wore off, it became clear that something had gone terribly awry. I couldn't move my leg. I couldn't walk without inching my toes along the floor. My doctor went on vacation, I was stuck in the hospital, and no one could figure out why my Freaky Cyborg Hip decided to take a long nap.
To make another long story short (you can see how this blog got to be 500 pages), my original surgeon sort of dumped me after they discovered that my gluteus medius was detached, which was causing part of my problem. My new surgeon found out that my left leg is two inches too short and that my socket is probably loose. It also turns out that I am like the medical equivalent of Stonehenge because no one can figure out exactly why I'm still having so much trouble (maybe I'm crazy! Maybe the screwed-up-ness of the rest of the hip is preventing even working muscles from operating! Maybe evil trolls have cast a spell on me! Maybe my Freaky Cyborg Hip is too busy plotting to take over Tokyo to bother with that whole "walking" thing!)
I'm going to be having surgery this summer, but for now I'm living in Urbana, Illinois (I have friends here and the rent is super cheap) until America breaks up with me and sends me back to my native Vancouver. When I'm not blogging about my hip replacement, I work as a Communications Consultant, enjoy creative writing and am mildly-to-moderately obsessed with Canadian indie rocker Dan Bejar.
And now you know.
Well, it's late March and my blog has been going strong for 7 months and is nearly 400 pages long when put in a word processor (concision: you're doing it wrong). Lately, I've been getting emails along the lines of, "Hey, love your blog. That part where you talk about your detached ass and compare your walking to a heroin-addicted Phantom of the Opera: LOLZ! But, uh, what exactly happened to you?" (In fairness, people who have known me for my whole life are asking the same question).
So, here, for those of you who are just tuning in, is the story of What Exactly Happened to Me:
When I was 11, thanks to a freak inner-tubing accident and probably some DNA-based wonkiness, I slipped the growth plate on my left hip. It was pinned back on, the pins caused avascular necrosis (which translates rather dramatically into "bone death"), the pins were taken out, my adolescence got an extra serving of awkwardness thanks to a bright-blue half-body cast that stuck my legs out at 45-degree angles and meant that anything I wore on my lower body had to have snaps up the side like a baby onesie. (You'd think such easy-access underwear would have made me a hit with all the gentlemen, but you'd be wrong). The ensuing years were filled with crutches, canes, wheelchairs, arm-crutches and me growing to over 6 feet tall, but long story short: after 15 years of avascular necrosis, my femoral head basically began to look like Mickey Rourke's face.
While all this was going on, I was busily playing wheelchair basketball (I was on the national team from 2001 to 2007 and won two World Championship golds and a Paralympic bronze), getting degrees in Creative Writing and History at the University of Victoria, writing and publishing a novel called "Post," then doing my MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Illinois so that I could play wheelchair basketball with the U of I varsity team. Oh, and I also make ridiculously intricate cakes.
In November 2007, a few days before my 25th birthday, my hip decided it was fed up with me subjecting it to hours of wheelchair basketball, ill-advised attempts at hiking (though, granted, "hiking" in the midwest is more like "strolling up small hills with grand names like The Eagle's Peak"), and generally running it into the ground. My hip tried to quit me by either popping out or hooking itself on my femoral head, (doctors never did figure out exactly what it was doing), and I basically re-enacted that scene from "The Exorcist" (puking! Shaking! Leg twisted at sickening angles impossible to recreate by people who are not in the circus!). Over the next 18 months, it became clear that my hip was Just Not That Into Me because it was straying more than Tiger Woods in Las Vegas. There was only one thing to do: become a cyborg.
On June 23rd, 2009, I headed into the O.R. to become to proud owner of a Freaky Cyborg Hip. I was so confident that my hip replacement would go well that I had booked a cake-making gig for a week after the surgery, since everyone had told me that "they get you up and walking the same day! My 95-year-old grandpa waltzed out of the hospital after only 3 days and has had a successful career as an extreme sky-diver ever since! It was the best decision I ever made!"
Yeah, not so much. I was awake during the surgery (I actually got to see my femoral head after it was taken out), but when the epidural wore off, it became clear that something had gone terribly awry. I couldn't move my leg. I couldn't walk without inching my toes along the floor. My doctor went on vacation, I was stuck in the hospital, and no one could figure out why my Freaky Cyborg Hip decided to take a long nap.
To make another long story short (you can see how this blog got to be 500 pages), my original surgeon sort of dumped me after they discovered that my gluteus medius was detached, which was causing part of my problem. My new surgeon found out that my left leg is two inches too short and that my socket is probably loose. It also turns out that I am like the medical equivalent of Stonehenge because no one can figure out exactly why I'm still having so much trouble (maybe I'm crazy! Maybe the screwed-up-ness of the rest of the hip is preventing even working muscles from operating! Maybe evil trolls have cast a spell on me! Maybe my Freaky Cyborg Hip is too busy plotting to take over Tokyo to bother with that whole "walking" thing!)
I'm going to be having surgery this summer, but for now I'm living in Urbana, Illinois (I have friends here and the rent is super cheap) until America breaks up with me and sends me back to my native Vancouver. When I'm not blogging about my hip replacement, I work as a Communications Consultant, enjoy creative writing and am mildly-to-moderately obsessed with Canadian indie rocker Dan Bejar.
And now you know.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Balancing On One Wounded Wing/ Circling the Edge of the Neverending
It's been nearly a week since I sustained my wrist injury and, yes ladies and gentlemen, I'm already pulling out melancholy New Pornographers' lyrics to capture my mood. If this keeps up, you're going to find me writing rhyming poetry about the state of my soul in my "Emily the Strange" notebook that I got on sale from Hot Topic (My heart is red/ my soul is black/ I walk like a zombie/ addicted to crack).
The bottom line is that my wrist still hurts and my wrist splint is starting to get that swampy cast smell and because I can't walk with my cane, I have to do the zombie-lurch around town, and twice today people have stared at me aghast and asked, "What happened to you?" When I responded that I'd injured my arm playing basketball, they looked at me with this expression that said, "No, I mean...in life." Of course, the zombie-walking has thrown off my back and my shoulders and I am basically one red-hot ball of cranky.
You'd think I'd be able to take this shit in stride (well, maybe "stride" is too graceful a word to describe what I do). I mean, last summer someone cut the ball of my hip off, replaced it with another one, but (whoops) forgot to reattach my ass. After that, you'd think a little wrist sprain would be par for the course: like, "lay it on me, life! A sprained wrist? That's all you've got? A few short months ago, I watched in an opium-induced haze as my surgeon showed me the detached ball of my femoral head." (That concision I was hoping I would learn from this wrist injury? Not so much).
Instead, however, one little sprain has earned me a first-class ticket on a fast train to Whiny-ville. Turns out, my right arm is a pretty useful appendage. In addition to that cane-carrying, it also helps me do the 8 hours a day of typing my job requires, as well all those life skills like dish washing and driving and being able to walk down the street without people thinking you were involved in some horrific car accident. Oh, right arm. I will never take you for granted again.
To make matters worse, for some reason this week I keep getting introduced to new people (and really awesome people at that) and let's just say that I am not exactly making a good impression. You want to know what doesn't exactly make all the gentlemen swoon? The whole "please to meet you, allow me to lurch forward in your general direction to shake your hand, then realize that I cannot shake your hand because my hand is in a splint and so stare nervously at the few inches of space between us" routine. When you add this to the fact that meeting new people is not exactly my strong suite and it tends to exacerbate my normal elaborate-hand-gesturing, train-of-thought-losing, over-caffeinated-ness....yeah, not the greatest of impressions.
So, if you met me this week, allow me to offer this message: "Please to meet you. I would like to clarify that I am not, in fact, a meth addict and that it is possible for me to speak actual words that make sense. I hope that you will find that when you get to know me, I'm not as ridiculous as I first present myself. Can we please find some way to blame this on my sore wrist/ damaged hip? Sincerely, Arley."
Now if only I could get that printed on a business card.
The bottom line is that my wrist still hurts and my wrist splint is starting to get that swampy cast smell and because I can't walk with my cane, I have to do the zombie-lurch around town, and twice today people have stared at me aghast and asked, "What happened to you?" When I responded that I'd injured my arm playing basketball, they looked at me with this expression that said, "No, I mean...in life." Of course, the zombie-walking has thrown off my back and my shoulders and I am basically one red-hot ball of cranky.
You'd think I'd be able to take this shit in stride (well, maybe "stride" is too graceful a word to describe what I do). I mean, last summer someone cut the ball of my hip off, replaced it with another one, but (whoops) forgot to reattach my ass. After that, you'd think a little wrist sprain would be par for the course: like, "lay it on me, life! A sprained wrist? That's all you've got? A few short months ago, I watched in an opium-induced haze as my surgeon showed me the detached ball of my femoral head." (That concision I was hoping I would learn from this wrist injury? Not so much).
Instead, however, one little sprain has earned me a first-class ticket on a fast train to Whiny-ville. Turns out, my right arm is a pretty useful appendage. In addition to that cane-carrying, it also helps me do the 8 hours a day of typing my job requires, as well all those life skills like dish washing and driving and being able to walk down the street without people thinking you were involved in some horrific car accident. Oh, right arm. I will never take you for granted again.
To make matters worse, for some reason this week I keep getting introduced to new people (and really awesome people at that) and let's just say that I am not exactly making a good impression. You want to know what doesn't exactly make all the gentlemen swoon? The whole "please to meet you, allow me to lurch forward in your general direction to shake your hand, then realize that I cannot shake your hand because my hand is in a splint and so stare nervously at the few inches of space between us" routine. When you add this to the fact that meeting new people is not exactly my strong suite and it tends to exacerbate my normal elaborate-hand-gesturing, train-of-thought-losing, over-caffeinated-ness....yeah, not the greatest of impressions.
So, if you met me this week, allow me to offer this message: "Please to meet you. I would like to clarify that I am not, in fact, a meth addict and that it is possible for me to speak actual words that make sense. I hope that you will find that when you get to know me, I'm not as ridiculous as I first present myself. Can we please find some way to blame this on my sore wrist/ damaged hip? Sincerely, Arley."
Now if only I could get that printed on a business card.
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