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Two Fridays ago, I got the go-ahead from my doctor to start wearing a regular shoe and get back into walking like a normal human being instead of the clumping, bumbling boot-wearing boy that in itself was a huge improvement over the clanking, creaking crutch-goer immediately following my Achilles tendon surgery. This happy news was eclipsed, however, by the news that with my newly recovered mobility, I would have to go back up to the plant site and play catchup on everything I missed in the previous 2.5 months.

Well, now I’m back up here in Minnesota, and even though the weather is wonderful and the countryside is beautiful, I’m not really enjoying it.  I’ve got my head down and blinders on trying to get caught up on everything that has changed so I can get back to being a useful contributor to the plant startup effort, and between that and the fact that my wife is once again forced to take care of our kids all by herself, I’m feeling sort of down. Writing has been one of the last things on my mind lately, even though I enjoy it when I sit down and do it. At least this time around I get to go home a lot more often, and I’m restricted to 60 hours a week of work, so it shouldn’t be quite so frenzied up here once I finally get caught up. Hopefully, at that point I’ll get back to blogging more often, or at least on a semi-regular basis.

Or at least pretty close to it – Friday I had my followup with the doctor, and he gave me the go-ahead to ditch the crutches and start hobbling around on my now-mended leg! I still am carrying one crutch around with me, but I’m trying to keep my weight off it and only use it when my leg gets extra tired.  Of course, I still have to wear the big, bulky, black boot, but only for another 3 weeks and after that, I truly am free, as it’ll be back to regular shoes, being able to walk barefoot, etc.  And just in time for summer, too!

I still will have a long recovery period. No ladder climbing for another 2 months, and who knows when I’ll be able to do high-impact stuff like running again. But just being able to walk unassisted seems like enough of a treat for me, now. You never realize how much you take walking unassisted for granted until you can’t do it!

This is it – tomorrow’s my Achilles tendon surgery, and afterward I begin the long, drawn-out road to recovery and being able to walk/skip/run again with my kids.  I’m actually looking forward to it, for that reason.  My only concern is the silly one that I have used to title this post – I’d rather my surgeon didn’t go cuttin’ where he’s not supposed to!

So anyway, since they’re putting me all the way under tomorrow (along with a local for the more severe pain when I awake) I’m assuming tomorrow and the next day are a complete wash.  If I actually come out of a daze enough to get around, I’m probably not going to be in any kind of mental state for writing anything.  We’ll see how I’m doing by the weekend, but don’t be surprised if I just spend some time to recover and come back at you on Monday of next week.