On the shelf

I hope to wear real shoes this week. That's after being on the shelf for more than two weeks now with an ego-induced ankle injury. One of those things, like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football, that you knew wasn't going to have a favorable outcome.

I don't take well to being injured. And semi-hobbling on a fat ankle, almost doubling-over in pain to hot-foot it across the Giant parking lot or turning sharp while cutting the grass, well... sucks.

This past Saturday I got in about a half-mile open water swim, while we were beached, hanging out on Jamaica Point, out on the boat. That accounts for the only real physical activity I've logged since the snap-crackle-pop of the ankle.

The hope is that it's a learning experience. The hope is that this time on the shelf reminds me not to try to kick the football. Charlie Brown had trouble with that lesson. But no one really wants to be Charlie Brown. And no one really wants a gimpy ankle, particularly when their (my) motivation for running, for longboarding, for biking, was just starting to crank with possibilities this summer.

Note to self: learn, motherfuc#$r.

Timing is an wily bastage. While I bide my shelf time, I've been reading Chuck Palahniuk's "Rant." In my reading encounters Palahniuk and maybe Tom Robbins each have a way of making you think about how you experience your life and what some alternatives are to how the rest of society accepts a shared reality by assumption.

I'm pretty well with Palahniuk and Robbins. I tend to be someone who likes to experience things for myself, even prior to shelf time. But taking a seat on the sideline hammers that point home.

I gotta watch out for kicking footballs. Next time it's held out there, I'm kicking Lucy.