Now, I Get It!

“You’re slower than I am,” an elderly gentleman wearing oxygen tubes said with a sympathetic smile today at the grocery store. I haven’t gone out much wearing this splint on my leg, but today we had to have groceries. The parking lot was packed, since it is the first of the month, and most of their customers were seniors. We were told once that they are busier then since that’s when a lot of people get food stamps, government checks or paychecks.

As I was going into the store, a white-haired lady looked at my leg and said, “I remember those days!” Apparently she had gotten over whatever was wrong, so maybe I will, too. It was almost lunch time when we finished shopping, and since Howard would go to work right after we got home, he suggested we get a quick bite.

I never appreciated what handicapped or temporarily impaired people have to go through until I tried to get my unbendable knee under the table in a restaurant booth. When I sat down, the stiff splint stuck out in front of me in mid air. I could hardly make it reach to prop it on the opposite seat, and putting it in the seat of my booth was too awkward. I found that out the other day when my husband wanted to eat at a Mexican restaurant. Due to a center rod under the table I couldn’t get past, I had to cramp his space by resting my foot beside him on his seat.

Getting in and out of our small sedan is a feat in itself. Exiting the car earlier, I caught my foot, twisting my knee and almost falling. Ouch! I looked like the tin man, anyway, as I had put on my roomiest capris, which stretched tight over the splint and made it look as if I had gallon cans under there. I could sympathize anew with a woman I saw in a wheel chair in that store last winter who was wearing shorts in freezing weather. She explained she couldn’t get long pants over her cast.

I had to wear jeans shorts to the doctor’s office the other day so he could put the splint on, and I wear them around home, which is much easier, even if I do wind up with one black leg. The padding on the splint adds inches, and whether I wear it over or under jeans or slacks, my leg looks positively obese! Kind of like wearing something full to hide the fat, and ending up looking fatter than if you had worn something snug that showed your true size! I shudder to think how it will look with a dress! I guess I will find out next Sunday!

Paul said he gloried in his infirmities, because in his weakness he is strong in Christ. II Corinthians 12:5, 9,10. I may not be there yet, but I do have more empathy for the infirm, and the relative inactivity of recuperation gives me more time to reflect, pray, and appreciate His goodness. A blessing in disguise!