It was the kind of pain that makes a 200-pound guy gasp even though he doesn't want anyone to hear it. Out of pride. But as I turned to get up from my chair in front of my computer, it hit me. It was like a glowing curl of barbed wire in the small of my back, forcing me to grasp at my desktop to keep me from falling. I didn't want my long-suffering wife to hear, and she didn't. I'm not prone to yelps of pain, but this one was a beaut. Uninvited, unprovoked, yet still there, burning into my body. That was Saturday, and now it's Sunday, a day that rendered me close to helpless as I skipped church and was too nauseated from the "discomfort" to eat with our community group having lunch here at our cottage. I ate Advil and it only bumped the pain back a little. Then, on the suggestion of one of my sisters in the Lord, I added red wine to the mix and the pain began to ebb. I fell into a recliner and read James Lee Burke for a while, dozed, had three more pain pills, finished the book, Black Cherry Blues.
Now I'm better and thinking about getting back to the gym tomorrow afternoon where I'll sling some significant weights around without a problem.
Pains lends perspective to our lives, and the absence of such lends even more. And gratitude. I've had days when I could pick up 440 pounds and times when I couldn't lift a pencil, like yesterday and Sunday morning. Cracks me up.
