Winding up with a BANG!

I was feeling pretty good today. Began with helping to put together our homeless community newsletter, The Occasional Times. After this afternoon's WHEEL (homeless women's organizing group) we spent some time talking over the last year. Our organizer, Michele, had to push us to do it because we were all itching to get gone; I ended up grateful I stayed, it was a very rewarding exercise.

Big wins for the year on my personal list:

1. The publication of our book, Beloved Community: The Sisterhood of Homeless Women in Poetry.
   
   
2. Winning the addition of homeless people as a protected group in Seattle's Malicious Harassment Ordinance (by unanimous vote!).
   
   
3. We saved the Lora Lake Apartments from destruction.

I wound up at Real Change doing some research for WHEEL. Wes was there for the daily Sid-feeding. When Wes announced he was going up to Madison Market, I decided to tag along.

When we got off the bus at 17th & Madison, we jaywalked across the street, slanting downhill toward the market; so I guess you could say we brought it on ourselves. There was a ridge in the asphalt, running lengthwise with the traffic instead of crosswise like a speed-bump. We both tripped over it, almost simultaneously. Wes kept his long legs under him, lurching several steps and flapping "like a clipped-wing chicken trying to fly" as he described himself later. I with my little short legs only managed to avoid falling in the roadway itself. I went face down in the grass at the edge of the sidewalk and lay there while I took stock of how many places I hurt. When I heard Wes's distressed cry of "Oh, shit!" my first thought was, "Did we drop something in the road? Where are my glasses?" His reaction was instead triggered by turning back in relief after he avoided falling down, to find me lying face down and still!

I have only a small bit of bruising on one knee -- which is a miracle, considering how easily I bruise -- but I pulled muscles in my right shoulder badly and it hurt a LOT for the rest of the night. I'm actually writing this on the first, because no way was I using a keyboard last night! It only hurts a little bit now, though. I bought a cold can of rootbeer and kept running it across the sore spots all the way home!

On a bright note, my back feels ever so much better! I thought I had pulled a muscle lifting a worm bin, but maybe it was a slipped disc after all. When I got up from the ground last night, the pain seemed gone! At first I thought it might be just because my shoulder hurt so much worse, but the pain didn't come back as my shoulder pain faded, and my lower back has been more flexible, too.

I don't advise face-first falls as a remedy for lower-back pain, but I will take the serendipitous blessing. :) Sarah N. Dippity rides again!

Happy New Year, everyone!