Once I came home from surgery I had 48 hours without a shower. Then I could take a large bandage off and wrap my shoulder in plastic and shower without getting my shoulder wet.....My wife is a saint. Two days ago, I got my stitches out. Now I can shoulder without getting wrapped in plastic. I got to go out of the house for lunch for the first time in over a week. the air was nice, though the car movement made my arm ache.
I'm now taking percaset (sp?) for the pain. It hurts less constantly now. Last night our little shit head dog, Matilda, jumped up and barked at nothing outside. But she did so, right beside me as I was laid up on the couch with my ice pack machine on my shoulder. the suddenness and loudness of it scared me and made my body jerk. I've never encountered so much pain, so fast and so thoroughly. My entire body arched with searing pain and I could only see red and white. Apparently I cured the dog quite a bit but all I could think to do was get out of the situation. Out from the eyes of my wife. I got up and hustled into the bedroom, alone. Hustle. Not run. Running isn't available to me right now. Hardly anything is, it seems. I write 95% of these blogs on my dictation app on my phone and then email them to myself so I can paste them here.
I lay there on the bed saying "please don't let this fuck up my arm" over and over and over and over, with my teeth clinched and tears forced down. After around 5-10 minutes (or an hour in my time) the pain subsided and I could rejoin my wife in the den. Two pills later, I sat with a hot tea and ice pack and we watched the Avengers together.
Throughout the day I worked a little here and there on, again, larger paper. this time, the 11x17 water color pad by Moleskine. More room. More I can move my arm instead of just my left hand. So, over the course of the day, coming back and forth, I worked up this portrait of my father.
I'm working on a few more pieces this size now.
I miss the consistency and reliability of my right hand so much. But the left does one thing, it takes the availability of "style" away. No way can I stop and think of "how do I want to portray this?" It's now "just get it down". This experience is already teaching me things.
I still hate Matilda.
2 comments:
You are amazing, man!...A true giant!!!
Marshall Arisman is a big fan of doing things to make you loose control of your mark making. (using twings, combs, etc. I gotta say as a natural "leftie" I'd take your non-dominate drawings any day. Hope you recover fast and kick your dog for me.
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