Aches and Pains

I suppose that's about the last thing anyone might be interested in reading about, but right now it's the first thing that's on my mind. Day and night. Standing, sitting, or lying. Aches and pains, and in this drought I can't even blame the rainy weather.

It comes with the territory, I say, without wanting to believe that. Oldtimer's Rule: the more candles on the birthday cake, the more pills in the medicine chest. The absolute worst part is when we (by whom I mean those like myself who are in their seventh decade, or more) start the litany of our medical wounds and woes, the response usually begins with something like, "Well, at your age..." Thanks a lot.


All this is prelude to the sad story of my hamstring muscles. There are three of them on each leg, connecting the knee to the pelvis, and while doing some striding I managed to tear one or more of them pretty badly. Major league hurt. But I tried to do as I was told: stay off your feet, give the muscles a chance to rest, pop ibuprofen for the inevitable pain. Eventually it got well, or at least I thought it did. So I eased back into my walking program.

Too early, I guess, because I managed to tear it again, this time much more painfully. Even lying in bed, trying to sleep, the pain was excruciating. I discovered that everyone seems to have an opinion on this kind of injury, opinions they are not reluctant to share,... but they don't work. Some people said to apply heat, others said ice was the answer. Some people said to elevate the leg, others said to walk gently around the house. Talked to three M.D.s, and they didn't have any more of a clue than the drugstore pill-pusher. Time, and Mother Nature, it seemed to me, was the best course.

Then a neighbor, and also a runner, told me of a massage therapist here who specialized in sports injuries and who did therapeutic deep tissue massage on sore muscles. Massage therapist? I think not. Let them do their voodoo on someone else, but please keep their oily hands off my bod.

The more I thought about it, though, and the longer it continued to hurt, that option began to look more and more attractive, so I finally called my friend's recommended guy. What he said made sense, and I was beginning to be desperate, so a few days ago I made my way to his shopping center office and got a half hour treatment. It was somewhat painful, but not nearly as painful as the leg had been doing nothing, and a few hours after he finished the pain had nearly gone. What relief! I've made another appointment to continue the process tomorrow.

It still hurts, but I know the muscle will heal if I give it time. This go-round I'm going to let several months pass by before putting stress on it again, and when I do I'll be more conscious about stretching the hamstring before starting to walk. The last thing I want is to go through this experience again, plus I know that my muscles aren't what they used to be. After all, I remind my self, at my age...



P.S. You wondered about the cat? Just a picture that caught my eye as I endured my recuperation, for the cat is doing hamstring stretches!

40 Homes In 40 Days

I'm not sure how I ever get roped into these situations; inability to say the other "N" word, I suppose. But some months ago I agreed to help develop a program with Habitat For Humanity International through which East Carolina Episcopalians (and others) would build 40 homes in 40 days during Lent, 2008. In central Mexico. In a village so remote our overnight accommodations are in another town, 30 minutes away. Where no one speaks my Mother Tongue. And don't even think about cell phones. What's really strange is that I can't wait!

This past weekend was spent in lovely south Georgia, the international headquarters of Habitat for Humanity where we (35 of us) were introduced to the task of taking a group of gringos to Mexico and to countries all around the world. Several things struck me about this experience.

One is that most of the people there for the Team Leader training were going (literally) all over the world, into many countries I'd never heard of and couldn't spell, let alone find on a map. How about Kyrgystan or Burundi? These two and nearly a hundred more are the countries were Habitat For Humanity's international program, called Global Village, sends people. I was meeting over the weekend with the folks whose responsibility it was to get these hundreds of volunteers located around the globe, engage for a few weeks in home building, and then get them home again, all done inexpensively and safely. It boggles the mind.

Then when our team of 20 or so volunteers arrive "in country" (to use the jargon), we discover that we aren't building houses, but homes. And the people who will live in that home are working with us, spending their "sweat equity" on their new home and their neighbor's home, too. That's one of the reasons that Habitat is so successful: we don't build a house for someone, we build a home WITH someone.

Nor is this a handout. All these new homeowners not only help build their new homes, they pay for them, too. They're given 15 year interest free loans, and as they repay the money isused to build more homes! (That's the mortgage period in the US; I'm not sure what it is in Mexico or other countries, but the principle is always the same: a handup, not a handout.)

Another secret of Habitat's success is that it always maintains its single focus on its mission, which is to build safe, affordable homes for those living in sub-standard (to be generous) housing. Habitat doesn't try to change the culture of racism or eliminate poverty or preach Christianity. They just build homes. That singleness of purpose is one of their keys to success.

This is one of those homes where a family in our Mexican village had been living. I don't know if you can see it unless you enlarge the picture, but there are no windows. And inside there is a dirt floor and no plumbing. I'm not sure how many are in this family, but they all live here:



Into this situation the homeowners worked with Habitat to build this 526 square foot home, two bedrooms, kitchen, and a bath, for their family. Here's what it looked like as it was being built:



And that's the payday for Habitat volunteers. I'll never forget the story of a site where Ann and I were building in Maine, and the homeowner asked us why they were cutting holes in the wall. Those would be the windows, we explained, whereupon she burst into tears. "I've never had a home with windows", she sobbed. We all had to wipe a fleck of dust or something from our own eyes.

That story's been repeated, in one way or another, by over a million new homeowners all over the world. Perhaps when I get back I'll have some more pictures, and if you'd like to see more of this trip you can check out Habitat's story and mine at http://www.habitat.org/cd/gv/participant/participant.aspx?pid=14917913.

I'm ready to go now!

"Herbie" revisited

Well, there it is folks, the latest addition to the family: a new Bug convertible. New, at any rate, to me; actually it's a 2007 model that's now officially a year old, but it's new to me and that's what counts. Don't you like the "Herbie" face out front?

Its predecessor, also a Bug convertible from the 2004 era, had 50,000 miles on it, and I faced the decision of trading in the old one while it still had some value, or keeping it until the wheels fell off. That's the original no-brainer, in my opinion. So I sat down with my friendly VW salesman, had it approved by the family color administrator, and drove home in the new Triple White Beetle Convertible. (It's "triple white", should you be wondering, because the paint is white, the seats are white, and the convertible top cover is...well...white. Triple white.)

There's another difference other than color between this new Bug and the last one, which was gray (excuse me, "platinum"). I really preferred one with manual transmission, a stick shift, but they don't make them any more with the options I wanted, so the new machine has the perfect compromise: I get it both ways! The transmission can be in a smooth automatic mode, or by simply flipping the arm over a notch, presto: six speed manual. How good is that? It's almost an Anglican "via media" gadget.

Speaking of which, I need to mention its gadgets, for it has a few, much to my satisfaction. I have never met a button or a switch I didn't like, and which didn't immediately fill me with the overwhelming urge to press or flip or turn without the slightest clue as to the potential result. That's obviously an obsession which has caused some problems in the past, and I own being completely powerless in that respect. I can't resist.





Now, some of you, with more sophisticated vehicles, will find these gadgets old hat, but bear with me: they're new to me! Like the button, with a five-level switch, which immediately puts heat to the seats. Two buttons, actually, his and hers. The bun warmer, we call it. It's also a nice heating pad for sore muscles, and I really don't know how I ever got along without it.

Likewise the automatic convertible top which opens and closes at the flip of a switch. I'll sometimes be waiting at a long traffic light, and open or close it just for the hell of it! And it has not just a radio but a regular entertainment center: AM and FM radio, both satellite radio formats (XM is my favorite, but Sirius is a reasonable back-up), plus a sound system and speaker set-up which will outshout any boom-box on the road (after I take my hearing aids out).

As you can tell, I'm tickled with the new ride, and look forward to enjoying it. I have to drive to Americus, GA for a meeting later this week, and so I'm ready to hit the road. (That is, by the way, the reason for the day early posting of this week's blog.)

Ice Cream Social

On a beautiful Sunday afternoon we had a party at our house. More specifically, we had an Ice Cream Social in our backyard, and if it hadn't been for the fact that we skipped the home made ice cream and bought a case of Breyers, it would have been "An Olde Fashioned Ice Cream Social".

It was the second annual such affair, inviting everyone in the neighborhood to join us. We had a goodly crowd, plenty of ice cream to go around, and an opportunity to begin to get to know the new neighbors. (A couple of people, graciously polite, brought bottles of wine, whether for us or the guests we'll never know. Our son will be the grateful beneficiary of their largesse.)

This place has turned into quite a diverse community, more than we had expected. One of our mild apprehensions, in fact, when we moved in here, is that it would be mostly, if not entirely, older people just like ourselves, and we knew we didn't want that. What we have gotten instead is a wonderful cross section of ages and life styles, a variety of ethnic, racial and geographic backgrounds, infants in strollers, kids on bikes, young people learning to drive,...the whole shebang.



There was one interesting hitch. Interesting to us, anyway. Even though we had a nice turn-out, and several couldn't come but phoned in their "regrets", there were a whole lot of folks who, for one reason or another, just chose not to come. It turned out, as I talked to those who had come to the party, that their neighbors had asked them about it, for they "wondered what we wanted"! They had, apparently, never been invited to a social by people they didn't know, and assumed it was some sort of Tupperware party (or worse!). One family (Northern Americans) said they "never heard of such a thing", and stayed home!

Ann's theory, which makes sense, is that the people in our immediate area, those whose homes were built and moved into last year, were there again just as they were for the first social. Those who live several blocks away, farther removed from us physically, may have felt quite differently about the invitation and comfortably ignored it. Makes sense.




But all who did come had a good time, even the little ones, usually the scourge of any party, who managed to enjoy themselves with more than overdoses of ice cream. They also discovered Ann's "hidey hole", the little nook back in the farthest corner of the yard where she installed small chairs around a small table, both just the right size for grandchildren who want some privacy. In this case it wasn't grandchildren but nice neighborhood children who needed some seclusion from grown-ups who just stand around and talk. They had a grand time too, and were the last to leave.

I suspect, all things considered, we'll do it again next year. If you like, we'll put you on the invitation list.