For a variety of reasons, my daily running routine has been cut down to nil for the bulk of the year. It began in April with what I thought was a knee injury. I figured I’d give it time to heal and I’d be back to new in no time flat. But it’s not a knee injury. It is good old-fashioned arthritis.
In ways, I view this as a positive. It’s nothing serious. The ailment isn’t one someone with a medical degree wearing a white coat will say, “Hey, bud. You’re going to need to go under the knife and rack up a ten thousand dollar medical bill because ‘Murica” to which I would reply, “Yeah, not happening.”
There’s no cure for arthritis, which means you’re stuck with a dull wisdom tooth ache-like sensation in your joints and limbs with limited treatment options such as:
- rest
- ice
- corticosteroids
- NSAIDs
- creams
- gels
- braces
- wraps
- witchcraft
But cure? No cure. Which brings into focus my new reality: that it’ll never go away. Drats! Arthritis is like an unwelcome guest staying at your house you didn’t invite over yet you can’t kick out. They keep piling up their laundry on the floor and their dishes in the sink and you know they aren’t going to take the initiative so it’s on you. You even write them a nice note that rhymes like a poem and tape it to the sink and dishwasher. But still nothing.
Then you find the long hair they are intent on growing clogging up the shower drain, even though it’s obvious they are losing hair due to hereditary factors, so now you have to yank that nasty hunk and glob of funk out of the drain because the water is pooling up at your ankles in addition to washing their dirty dishes — or tossing their dishes in the trash, because, hey, not my dish.
I may have some unresolved anger with college roommates from twenty years ago.
Regardless, I’ve accepted the newfound reality of my right knee and now I’m back running. I’m like a newbie all over. It’s humbling. Truth be told, it’s kicking my behind. Running was becoming increasingly more difficult even before I took an extended break. But now, sweet mother of pearl, I’m clueless as to how I ever managed to run as far as I once ran and for the duration I did.
Who was that person who once knocked out eight-to-ten mile runs with relative ease in 97 degree weather and Virginia humidity so thick he had to peel his shirt away from his nips mid-run?
Where did he go?
It feels good though. I run more for the mental health benefits than the physical. Physical activity is important at my age, but how it affects me upstairs I find fascinating. If I go for a run, it’s hard to piss me off at any point in the day. I take what life throws at me in stride. I’m less likely to visualize knocking a motherf—er out on days I run.
The latter is always a plus, because as my dad once told me, “Son, once you’re over eighteen, fighting isn’t fighting any more. It’s assault and battery.”
Here’s to running with an arthritic knee and refusing, for as long as humanly possible, to be that middle age guy with the gigantic knee brace and soaked grey cut-off tee huffing and puffing for a tiny taste of oxygen on the sidewalk or side of the road.
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