Walking Spirit

First of all, if you've been reading the comments from last week my Cousins are making me out to be a speed demon. On Saturday I drove to Brown County for my Cousin Denny's funeral. This proved to be quite a test of my ability to control the car with the hand controls as we were on many curvy roads. Colleen followed us back to Indianapolis. My Sister was in the car behind us and Colleen was behind them. For the record, I followed the speed limit the majority of the time. Occasionally I bumped it up to five miles over on the straight aways. My Mother can support this as she could see the digital speedometer in my car the entire way. (see the picture that shows my point of view)

Driving again has been a wonderful release. I've driven myself to work, Pilates, the funeral, and today to the hospital to support a friend and his family while he was in surgery. (quite a role reversal) I also drove to IUPUI where I spoke to a class about my journey from the accident till now. It was a great group of students who made me feel welcome from the moment I arrived. They asked some intelligent questions and were engaged with me the entire time. The last question that was asked was "what makes me happiest now"?

The answer was walking, working on the blog (which includes reading comments), and talking to others about the accident and where I am now (especially other amputees who are just starting down this path). What I left out was driving and listening to music while I drive. The independence that has come in the past week has been tremendously refreshing. On Monday night I went to the pharmacy on my own to pick up a prescription. Today I went to get a haircut. Simple things, yes, but they're things that I needed help with a week ago. I guess the short answer to "what makes me happiest now?" is living. Hope you enjoy the pictures!