Our first official day of fall was Saturday last week – Sept. 23 will also always have a secondary meaning to me besides ushering in my favorite season.
While I’m appreciating the lack of 100-plus-degree weather days, I could really go for a bigger drop in temperatures as long as we get some nice, gentle rain.
Plus, we’ve just got to make it to the end of hurricane season on Nov. 30 – though experts say we could have cyclones or hurricanes after that date.
I’m still mostly optimistic that we’ll make it through fairly unscathed this year.
The downside to that is that forecasters are expecting a wet and cold winter, but we’ll have to wait and see.
I just wish Mother Nature would get with the program so I can stop worrying about my legs sticking to mom’s leather seats while it’s over 94 degrees outside!
It’s still a struggle to enjoy outside events while the sun is out, too.
But, I’m overall still grateful that we’re passed that summer hump of an unbearable and quite frankly dangerous portion of hot temperatures.
In the meantime, the start of autumn also marks an actual year since my broken leg experience.
It’s also a little weird for me since I’m still running into folks I haven’t seen in a year, too.
I find it sort of surreal to have someone asking me for updates on my right leg but I’m grateful
for their concern and sympathy.
By now, I’ve managed to have a condensed story to relay to whomever asks for it and it seems to go over fairly well.
And I’m pretty sure I’m either weird or insane, but I do get a strange sort of amusement out of watching them cringe in horror when they see my surgery scars.
Even then, it’s not like I have many huge life-altering experiences to recount, but, I do try to put a positive spin on this one still.
After all, technically I’m not completely done with my healing journey and still have a sprinkling of hard days amongst the easy ones.
Plus, there are things that I’m just going to have to live with from now on and while I’ve mostly accepted them on the face of things, I’m not looking forward to any bitterly cold and wet winter days.
My orthopedic doctor was right though, I can feel when there’s a dip in temperatures or an increase in barometric pressure and humidity.
In fact, the last brief “cool” front that swung by us over a week ago sent plenty of pain through my ankle joint to my toes and kept me awake waiting for relief.
If I’m honest, it actually woke me up out of a dead sleep and I spent well over an hour waiting for ibuprofen to kick in so I could get my last few hours of rest.
Still, it’s a far cry better than where I was the year before – unsure of if I’d ever be able to walk again and in the worst pain of my life.
Overall, I’ve made adjustments and am trying to prepare myself for the rest of this year as best as I can – that’s the best I can hope for, I think.
