Getting Back On the Bike

This May, I rode a bike for the first time in 17 years.

You might say to me, “Wow, riding a bicycle. Colour me impressed. It’s not like my four-year-old niece goes off-road extreme mountain biking and punches cougars in the face when she encounters them out in the wilderness or my 80-year-old grandma is training for her 18^th triathlon and built her own bike out of the bamboo she cut down herself during her trip to Nepal or anything. Did you bust out your fanny pack for your epic trip around the Seawall?”

Okay, yes, I realize that I am living in the epicenter of the Active Westcoast Lifestyle and everyone and their dog rides a bike here. This, however, is a big deal to me because it’s literally the only thing I can do post-hip-replacement that I couldn’t do before. (Well, I have found a few extra uses besides bike riding for my newfound ability to straddle, but let’s not go into that).

I resisted posting about this for several months because the person who taught me how the ride a bike is someone I was casually dating at the time. It’s a long-standing opinion of mine that blogging about an ex (even a casual, short-term-relationship type ex) is a one-way ticket to AwkwardTown with stops along the way at AiringYourDirtyLaundryInAWayThatWillCauseYouShameVille and TheMinuteYouMentionDatingCreepersOnTheInternetAreImaginingYouFucking-opolis.

I’ve decided to blog about learning how to ride a bike, however, because so much of Young and Hip has chronicled my disappointment with my hip replacement. I often get emails asking me if I regret it, and I worry that I am talking people out of a life-altering surgery. But even though I’m over a year post-hip-replacement (and two years since the first one), my hip still swells up like the ass of a baboon in heat if I try to do such extreme sports as…deep water aerobics. Or walking down the street. Or sitting in a chair for longer than 20 minutes. I still walk with a cane. I can never play wheelchair basketball again. If I work out for more than a couple of days a week, I’m in constant pain. Over the past year, I’ve honestly struggled with the knowledge that this is as good as my hip will ever get.

But back to the bicycling. I met D. on an online dating site. I was immediately comfortable around him, which is astounding because usually on dates I talk like a crack-addicted LOLcat (“O HAI!!”) and knock things over with my elaborate hand gestures. A few weeks after we met, I mentioned that I wanted to learn how to ride a bike. I joked about getting adult training wheels so I wouldn’t fall and bring about Total Hip Replacement 3: Rise of the Prosthetic Fractures. D offered to teach me.

I assumed that he meant that we would rent a bike by the seawall and he would attempt to catch me if I looked to be veering towards certain death. But D. surprised me by researching how to safely teach an adult how to ride a bicycle. Thanks to a few websites and several Youtube videos of old Chinese ladies becoming confident cyclists, he came up with a plan. (Is it a bad sign that one of the nicer things a man has ever done for me involved Youtube videos of old Chinese ladies?)

And so, on one of those rare Spring days when it’s sunny in Vancouver and your Seasonal Affective Disorder calls in sick, D and I went to Stanley Park armed only with the wisdom of the internet. D’s method involved me coasting down a grassy hill first with my feet touching the ground to get a feel for the movement, then again with my feet up, then finally while pedaling. And it was….really easy. Though the writer in me died a little, I had to admit that the cliché is true: you really never forget.

This was a surprise because when I tried to ride a bike several years before the hip replacement, I couldn’t get my left leg on the pedals, it nearly got caught in the chain and A. (who was holding on to both me and the bike) and I ran into a tree. This time, however, I took off riding up a hill. Wobbly, yes. Slow, absolutely. Graceful, sure as hell not. I, however, felt like Lance Fucking Armstrong winning the Tour De Fuck You Hip Replacement Because That Shit Just Happened.

D. and I took a break for lunch and then he rented a bike and we rode together around the Seawall. Because of my lack of speed and the fact that I was wobbling more than Lindsey Lohan after a rough night, cyclists kept chiming at me. At first, I mistook this for a friendly salute, as if they were saying, “Greetings and salutations fellow cycling enthusiast! May your journey be safe and free of ass-chafing!”, but D. informed me that ringing your bell is actually cyclist speak for “fuck you.” (Well chime chime to you too, Vancouver bike commuters).

Soon, however, I was coasting down hills, picking up speed and wondering how long it had been since I’d gone fast. That’s the one thing I miss about sport, and it’s something that elliptical machines can’t replace: just going balls out fast. I will spare you any clichés of feeling free – nothing’s free in Vancouver, let’s be honest – but for the first time my long recovery felt over. I was ‘better.’ Sure, it wasn’t the better I expected or wanted, but even though my hip was swollen and my back was sore and my anti-ass was like “fuck off right here and now,” it seemed like a better I could live with.

I looked at D., who was flushed from pedaling and who had gone to all this effort to teach me how to do something he didn’t even enjoy, and at Stanley Park, which was being all picture-post-cardy, and I thought: Best. Date. Ever. And that feeling continued for several more weeks….until it didn’t. And then it was over. There’s a Gloria Steinem joke here somewhere.

After the breakup, I’ll admit that I spent a day or two sulkily listening to “Blood on the Tracks,” but it doesn’t take long to get over a six-week thing with someone you only saw a couple of times a week. And it’s even easier once you realize that that the only thing shittier than a breakup is being unable to date because you’re stuck in bed post-surgery injecting yourself with bloodthinners and groggily watching some reality TV show about the joys of home renovation.

Because – watch out people! Literary Device Alert! Here comes a very subtle metaphor because I am a fancy, fancy writer! – after two years of medical limbo, I am happy to be back on the dating bike, and the social life bike, and the getting the fuck on with my life bike. (That’s a lot of bikes. What’s the metaphorical equivalent of padded bike shorts?) And even though it means accepting the notion that the cane is here to stay, I’m happy that the Great Hip Replacement Debacle is receding into a small point in the rear view mirror. It’s nice to not to catch myself starting the bulk of my stories with, “So I was at physio and an old lady said…”

So even though it didn’t lead to happily ever after, I’m glad to have a story that begins with the phrase “So I was dating this guy and he taught me how to ride a bike,” even if it ends with the phrase “yes, grandma, I’m still single. No, I’m not a lesbian.” Because several weeks after D. and I broke up, I bought myself a bike. Her name is Dorothy Mantooth and right now I only ride her around the quiet streets in my neighbourhood because cars seem like huge metal dinosaurs chasing me, though I have delusions of becoming a Serious Biker Who Wears Spandex And Refuels With Those Energy Gels.

A few weeks ago, I rode around the Seawall again. I passed a gaggle of elderly ladies stopping every few seconds to take photos of birds. I passed a tourist couple who kept announcing Vancouver’s beauty every 3.8 seconds to one another. I even passed a pair of girls who looked mildly athletic. Granted, I got my ass handed to me by several middle-aged rollerbladers, but let’s go ahead and chalk this up to a solid victory.

So if you’re in the Vancouver area and you see a very tall girl on a white bike making the Seawall her bitch, that is me, and I’m passing on the left. Chime chime, motherbitches!

And if you’re not in Vancouver and you’ve had a hip replacement and are looking for a safe way to relearn how to ride a bike without falling, here is a video of me doing so on a very good day with a guy I was dating. If you want to do a drinking game to this clip, take a shot everytime I say “yay!”

Not Taking This Sitting Down

I apologize for the radio silence. I hope no one thought that I had been attacked by a gang of rogue physio oldsters agitated into a jealous rage over my progress at physio. (Don't worry. I keep a bag of lint-covered peppermints in my pocket for such an occasion). No, the reason for my absence is that even though my ass is pretty much still stuck in bed, the power of the internets means that I'm kept on my toes by work, socializing (hey, Skype counts as socializing) and various internships.

Right now, two things are keeping my bed's ass groove firmly indented:

1. The whole "brand, spanking new hip joint makes sitting and standing painful" thing, plus the fact that hip restrictions make doing cool things less cool (we all remember the sex manual, yes?).
2. I know very few people in Vancouver (or, at least, very few people who I can't guilt trip into coming to visit me), which gives me little-to-no incentive to put on clothing that did not come courtesy of my former national team's Nike sponsorship. (Hey, no one said that the 'it' in "Just Do It" couldn't refer to eating frozen grapes while watching Alton Brown teach you how to cook a perfect porterhouse steak). I mean, if you're going to spend 15 minutes wrestling your jeans on with a grabber, you should probably go somewhere better than "to the mall to look at clothing you cannot try on without the aforementioned grabber, thus filling you with the rage of small animals."

Factor #1 is still in play. Those of you who are familiar with my neverending battle against my anti-ass know that I have never liked sitting. I like it even less after someone recently chiseled out my hip's ball and socket and used power tools to install a new one. Here's how I sit:

1. Lug around an ass cushion 4 times the size of your laptop, which is great fun when you're still walking on crutches.
   
2. Lay the ass cushion on a chair, though the fact that it is bigger than the surface of the chair will almost guarantee that it will fall off at some point in time.
3. Try to lower yourself (without breaking hip precautions!) on to the chair. When the ass cushion falls off or slides out from under you, you will not be able to adjust it without breaking hip restrictions or reaching for your grabber. Since you do not want to ask someone to reach between your legs and give your ass cushion a good yank, you will settle for riding a four-inch-thick square of foam side saddle.
   
4. Perch on the terribly askew ass cushion with your bad leg stuck out and your back jammed against the backrest so that the bones of your spine are bruised, requiring you to stick one hand behind your back between your spine and your backrest, like Napoleon in reverse.
   
5. Realize that you look like some sort of broken life-sized marionette.
   
6. Or like a contestant on America's Top Geriatric Model. (The only people who sit worse than I do are models in fashion magazines. I suspect they, too, are plagued by the scourge of ass bruising).
7. Or like some sort of gout-stricken king after feasting on an entire roast pig and swilling jugs of mead.
   

You can therefore see why it takes a lot more than boredom to get me out of the house.

This week, however, I've finally received the motivation I need to leave the comfort of my room: my friend S., who recently moved to Vancouver from Australia to do a four-month internship. She was staying at my place for awhile and I'm assuming that she did not move halfway around the world to get the grand tour of my favourite daytime reality TV shows. It was time to put on my big girl pants and head out into the real world.

S. moving to Vancouver, by the way, is all part of my master plan. See, I have a great many talents: picking things up with the toes on my right foot (they are like monkey toes!); making French buttercream; injecting business correspondence with the appropriate dash of "You Attitude." The list goes on. But meeting new people? Not really a strong suite. Nine times out of 10, I will knock something over with my elaborate hand gestures and the person will assume I have a meth addiction. Solution: Bring all my old friends to Vancouver! (Are you listening, people of Champaign-Urbana?)

Granted, S. and I did spend a significant amount of time watching Dexter re-runs online. But I also went on my first real post-surgical excursion....to the Richmond Night Market. Why I thought that I should take my first non-physio-or-doctor-related trip at a place jammed with thousands of jostling and shoving people, many of whom are carrying squid on pointy sticks, I don't know. I do know, however, that I was able to maneuver past the stalls that specialize in handmade false eyelashes, past the accupuncturist who boasted of his ability to cure "Human Pain," past the snake exhibit and the rows of LED-lighted T-shirts that light up in time to music, past the stand after stand carrying delicious dim-sum goodness and potato chips on sticks. I tasted victory and it tasted like chocolate-pudding bubble tea!

The next day, I even went to my friend T's house with S. (and my ass cushion) to eat a delicious dinner and fawn over her cats. For ages I've had a standing appointment with my bed and suddenly I've sprung back into action. Make way, real world. I'm slowly creeping my way back towards you.

It's the Final Countdown...No, Just Kidding, Psyche!

For the past few months, I've been preparing to move back to Vancouver. (Well, okay, preparing mentally, since I haven't really done the whole "packing" thing yet, even though my dad comes to get my car tomorrow). I had wrapped my mind around the fact that I would leave Champaign on June 14th, then have surgery on June 24th. You know how advent calendars give you a little chocolate every day until Christmas? Well, I had a little surgery advent calendar in my mind, except instead of getting chocolate, all I got was iron pills and an overwhelming sense of dread.

This morning, however, my world was rocked when I received a phone call from my surgeon's office letting me know that my surgery has been bumped to July 28th. It was like opening that last day of your advent calendar expecting a huge-ass chocolate Santa and instead finding a little piece of paper that said, "Christmas has been moved to January 27th. In lieu of chocolate Santa, please accept another month of anticipation and mall Christmas carols." Wrong and unnatural!

On one hand, I was disappointed. Leaving Champaign has actually been really hard for me, but I've had my goodbye party, said farewell to most of my friends, and reconciled myself to ripping off that big bandaid known as "the last four years of my life." I've spent weeks full of emo-ness mentally reenacting that scene from Thorton Wilder's "Our Town" where the chick is a ghost and is lamenting all the things she'll miss about earth ("Goodbye world! Goodbye to clocks ticking and my butternut tree...and Mama's sunflowers...food and coffee...and new-ironed dresses and hot baths..." ), except instead of clocks ticking and butternut trees, it was more like cheap bourbon, barbeque, $250 rent and fireflies. (I freaking love fireflies. They don't have them in Vancouver). I was mentally prepared to leave and I wanted to get the ass-reattachment show on the road.

On the other hand, however, I recognized an opportunity to cling harder to America. Even though my bags were packed, my apartment was sublet (subletted?), my dad was flying down to get my car and my cat had her own little kitty airplane ticket, I didn't have to leave. I could go up to Canada for a week for pre-op appointments and work-related stuff, (I'm off to Montreal soon for a tournament), then come back down for a whole month of rekindling my turbulent romance with the old U. S. of A. America and I could have one of those relationships where it's like "Oh, darling, I know we broke up because you cheated on me with my sister, but let's get back together because I'm lonely and have daddy issues, even though we both know that this will end badly. Turbulent relationships give my humdrum existence meaning!" You know, those people for whom the Facebook status "it's complicated" was invented.

Some might say, "But Arley. Aren't you just prolonging the inevitable? Why don't you just get it over with, move back to Vancouver and begin the chapter of your life entitled 'The Part Where Arley Goes to Concerts By Herself and Tries to Appear Both Receptive to New Friendships And Repellent to Drug Dealers/ Fetishists/ Men Who Believe "So, What's Wrong With You?" is an Acceptable Pick-Up Line'' Wouldn't that be the mature thing to do?" To you, I say: hells no. I have spent at least six months of the past year in bed (or at physio, being out-run by 95-year-olds, which is worse) and I am about to spend another god-knows-how-long doing roughly the same thing. I'm in a "months of bedrest" sandwich and I fully intend to make the filling of that sandwich be as exciting, entertaining and meaningful as possible. And if that means traveling back to Champaign for an extra month of seeing the people I care about...well....so be it.

Yes, it looks like I'm going to have to rebook my ticket on the Struggletown Express. The new plan is that I'm leaving Mika with A., going back to Canada for a week or so, (which will involve a trip to Montreal), then returning to Champaign for a month of couch-surfing, BBQ-eating, and hearing the phrase "hey, didn't you leave here a while ago?" from random people on the street. Because, hey, if my life wasn't relentlessly complicated, I wouldn't have anything to blog about.

Always Late But Worth the Wait

If all had gone according to plan, I would have been back to Champaign in late July and would right now be rocking out with a perfect new hip doing something rugged and outdoorsy. (Okay, this is a lie. It's cold as fuck in Champaign, so I'd probably be laying on someone's couch wearing mittens indoors and drinking whiskey to 'warm myself.') Well, obviously things didn't go according to plan and I've spent hundreds of pages on this blog detailing the trainwreck that was my hip replacement. On Monday, however, I will finally declare mission accomplished (well, not mission accomplished with the hip, but still) and get my ass back to Champaign-Urbana. Better practice your evacuation plan because Hurricane Arley is officially in the forecast.

Yes, I am 7 months behind schedule, and yes I only have a few months before America will break up with me, (unless, you know, there are any intelligent, hot-in-an-unconventional-way American men out there dying to pop the question to a girl who can write a great simile and bake a mean whipped-cream pound cake), but I have played sports long enough to know that quitters never win and winners never quit, that success delayed is not success denied, and that you miss 100% of the shots you don't take (or, in this case, the 100% of the parties you weren't around for because you were too busy watching "The First 48 Hours" in your bedroom in Vancouver). Yes, for the record, that was an 124-word sentence. It's not just my fainting that makes me Victorian-esque.

I only have about 3 months in Champaign, but I plan to make them a good three months. That's not to say, however, that I'm not ambivalent about the situation; (ambivalence is another one of my talents, along with the similes and the pound cake). I've been in Vancouver full-time (not counting a few expeditions to Champaign) since June 13th. I've settled into a groove living with my parents (not the best on the old ego, I like hanging with my parents and man a homecooked meal and clean laundry is nice), hanging out with the few friends I have here, and enjoying the fact that it was 52 degrees in Vancouver today and will stay in this range all week. (On a completely unrelated note: you know all those Pat Robertson type guys who were all "God hates Haiti and sent it an earthquake?" Why has no one said "God hates the Olympics and He's taking back His snow?" I mean, this has been the warmest winter on record in Vancouver by a long shot and you've got to think that maybe God just isn't a downhill skiing fan).

I digress. The point is that I will miss everyone in Vancouver, and I know it would be better for my job if I stayed in the true North strong and free. And there is a certain logic to the thought that since I'm going to have to live in Vancouver eventually, I should suck it up, put on my big girl rain slicker and acclimatize. The other part of me (the one who missed the Frog Eyes concert because I had no one to go with, the one who tries to find books in a library that won't let you take out Borges' "Book of Imaginary Beings" because it is shelved in the reference section along with the quotable quotes books, the one misses the sunshine and snow of a Midwestern winter and thinks that if she has to drive home in the rain at 5 p.m. in heavy traffic while that "New York" song plays on the radio one more time she will literally lose it), says "fuck it."

The fuck-it part of me argues that this summer, I'm going to have a major surgery and things are going to be pretty crappy. When things were crappy last time around, I kept thinking of the time that A. and I went hiking and how I got dehydrated and later drunk on one beer at The Black Dog. Or that time when Bridie, Shelley, Tiff, and some others got drunk and somehow silly string was involved. Or that Easter dinner I held where my car broke down and I sliced my thumb open and there was a minor grease fire and I bought (and then ate) too much candy. I think I need a few more moments of doing cool shit with people I care about but won't get to see after I get my maple-leaf-waving ass deported.

It's not that Champaign's better than Vancouver, it's just that right now I associate Vancouver with "bad hip replacement and ass-groove worn in my bed" and I associate Champaign with "place of awesomeness and social-butterfly-ness and kick-ass books to read." Neither of these associations are correct, but that isn't going to stop me. I need a break from talking endlessly about my hip replacement and everyone around me needs a break from me being all emo. Everyone wins!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like...Craziness!

Another day, another cookie recipe, and the holiday baking bender express continues full steam ahead all the way to Crazytown. Yes, I took the advice of those of you who commented on my last post and decided to go ahead and make the X-ray-themed Christmas cookies for Dr. SecondOpinion. The cookies are a Mexican-hot-chocolate sugar cookie (chocolate plus cinnamon = delicious!), but unfortunately I had to decorate them with phony icing because buttercream doesn't hold up well enough that you can pipe with it and royal icing is a pain to make.

Now, there are a couple of ways that Dr. SecondOpinion could react to these cookies:

1. He will be touched by the magical spirit of the holiday season and decide to re-attach my anti-ass immediately. There will be no need, however, because my Freaky Cyborg Hip will be feeling so festive that it will have magically healed itself. Then we will all hold hands, sway in a circle and sing that happy friendship song from "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas." (And what happened next? Well in New West they say, that Arley's half-broken ass grew two sizes that day.")
   
2. He will think I'm batshit crazy, say, "Thanks....cookies in the shape of X-rays....exactly what I always dreamed of having in my life....Listen, I've got to run but I'll call you soon." Then, he will pull a Dr. ___ Ninja stealth move and disappear into the sunset, never to be heard from again.
3. He will think, "Damn, homegirl has way too much time on her hands, possibly because her current state of gimpiness prevents her from leading a fulfilling life, and I should therefore operate as soon as possible to prevent her from making me a life-sized human skeleton out of candy canes out of sheer boredom."
4. (Most likely). He will say, "Gee. Thanks for the cookies." He will eat them. Nothing more than this will happen because if you're going to bribe someone, you should damn well pick a better incentive than chocolate-cinnamon cookies that resemble X-rays. I guess I will just have to give them in the spirit of the season, instead of the spirit of "please-fix-my-hip-I-will-do-anything-literally-anything-please."
   

Oh well. Whatever way it works out, at the very least I burned off some pre-appointment jitters. The more I bake, the less I compose extensive lists of questions that I will not get the time to ask. Everyone wins!

So, yes, over here in ArleyLand, the Christmas festivities are continuing fast and furious. Last night, I had a special Christmas dinner with Steph and 18 other people. Suffice to say that I have eaten my weight in turkey and all the fixin's. I have learned a valuable lesson and it involves the necessity of brining poultry; (hey, I'lll take life lessons wherever I find 'em).

So, yes, here I am modeling an oven mitt on the day of the big dinner and accidentally looking like I'm smacking my dad on the ass. Whoops! I've also posted some pictures of the X-ray cookies.

My Heart Is Made of Gravy

Well, it's Thanksgiving in Canada and you know what that means: look for me in roughly 5 hours face down in a plate of gravy, suffering from some kind of sugar coma induced by eating three bags of candy corn and some cheesecake and some pie and some....God, I love eating. Thanksgiving also means that I will have that line from a Pavement song that goes "my heart is made of gray! Vee!" stuck in my head for the next three weeks. (What? You don't associate a day of thanks with an 80's indie rock band?)

Anyhow, despite all of the various medical melodramas in my life, I have a lot to be thankful for. I'm thankful for my family who have put up with me and only occasionally (okay, daily) make fun of me for my walk by calling me "Igor," for my friends who have tolerated the fact that I'm rarely in one place, for A., who continues to provide a good home for Mika. I'm thankful for the physios who are working to help me walk again. I'm thankful for the fact that my parents just paid hundreds of dollars to take our poor old kitty Mr. Chubbz to the emergency vet since he's come down with a bad case of the kitty 'flu. I'm thankful to L-Cro who taught me last night how to mix catfood with warm water and feed Mr. Chubbz via oral syringe when he was at death's door (though, frankly, I could have done without watery cat food all over my pants and claw marks all up my thighs because Mr. Chubbz, even when he's too weak to raise his head, is never too weak to cut a bitch down). I am the luckiest six-foot-two, crazy-haired, tip-toe-shuffling Canadian who ever shuffled this earth.

And, of course, I am also thankful for the fact that I'm Canadian (even if it means that I will never fulfill my dream of living in Berkeley). I'm incredibly lucky that being born a mere 30-minute drive on the right side of the border means that I'm not filing for medical bankruptcy, that I'm not wracked with guilt as my parents figure out a way to pay for my bills, and that I'm not having to decide "do I REALLY need that nerve test? Do I REALLY need that MRI?" After all, the only thing worse than getting electrified needles jabbed in your ass is paying thousands of dollars for the privilege of getting electrified needles jabbed in your ass.

I have actually had a lot of experience with doctors on both sides of the border. I've seen some great American doctors; (anyone who has avascular necrosis should see Dr. Mont in Baltimore. I've been to dozens of surgeons and Dr. Mont is the only one who actually viewed me as a whole person, as opposed to just a bad hip). I have, however, waited months and paid hundreds of dollars to see an awful surgeon (who shall remain nameless) who refused to look at my X-rays or MRIs and even told me that I didn't have avascular necrosis ("no, sweetheart. *pat pat* You have arthritis") because he knew I wasn't a straightforward "give the 50-year-old lawyer a new hip, improve his golf game and collect your $60,000" case.

This time last year, I was complaining about the fact that I had to pay both Canadian and American taxes on the paltry $15,000 I was making as a grad student. Well, those taxes were a good investment because I've enjoyed some fantastic medical care since I had my hip replaced and I didn't have to take a job I hate just for medical coverage or refinance my home to get it. Whatever happens with my hip, at least I won't have a case of buyer's remorse because, hey, you can't really complain about something you got for free.