My elbow is better. Thanks to all of you who wrote with concern. I can even play the piano again, as long as I don't attempt any ragtime. My left arm needs a little break for a while. It's still oddly swollen and hurts a wee bit, but the antibiotics are working magic. Speaking of antibiotics and their magic...
This elbow injury also led to a message from my childhood best friend whom I haven't seen in ages. She's a Registered Nurse now and doesn't live in Louisville. She had some insight into my weak elbow. Her last message to me said, in praise of antibiotics: "If this were the year 1800, this little elbow infection would/could have been the death of you."
So now I'm thinking about all the poor folks who died of an elbow infection. How horrible would that have been? I mean, they could have died of The Plague or The Consumption, you know, something romantic at least ... but an elbow infection? How do you write that on an epitaph?
Then I was imagining all the other illnesses in my life, -- there haven't been many, honestly -- and I wondered if something else would have gotten to me first. I'm 31. That's old for a few hundred years ago. I had a tooth abscess when I was 20 that might have killed me, I suppose. Although, then again, I only got it because I had my wisdom teeth removed, which I wouldn't have had done in the year 1800, so I don't think that counts. Can you die of chicken pox? I've had bronchitis a few times, but that was from playing in smoky bars, so again, I don't think I would have gotten that two hundred years ago.
I guess, if I were living in the year 1800, this elbow infection would, indeed, have been the death of me. Poor Troubador Brigid. Her elbow got the best of her.
This elbow injury also led to a message from my childhood best friend whom I haven't seen in ages. She's a Registered Nurse now and doesn't live in Louisville. She had some insight into my weak elbow. Her last message to me said, in praise of antibiotics: "If this were the year 1800, this little elbow infection would/could have been the death of you."
So now I'm thinking about all the poor folks who died of an elbow infection. How horrible would that have been? I mean, they could have died of The Plague or The Consumption, you know, something romantic at least ... but an elbow infection? How do you write that on an epitaph?
Then I was imagining all the other illnesses in my life, -- there haven't been many, honestly -- and I wondered if something else would have gotten to me first. I'm 31. That's old for a few hundred years ago. I had a tooth abscess when I was 20 that might have killed me, I suppose. Although, then again, I only got it because I had my wisdom teeth removed, which I wouldn't have had done in the year 1800, so I don't think that counts. Can you die of chicken pox? I've had bronchitis a few times, but that was from playing in smoky bars, so again, I don't think I would have gotten that two hundred years ago.
I guess, if I were living in the year 1800, this elbow infection would, indeed, have been the death of me. Poor Troubador Brigid. Her elbow got the best of her.
1 comments
I don't think they have them where you are going...
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