Sunday, March 10, 2013

"Repelled, held by the Church" (March, 2013)

I sent the following letter to the Los Angeles Times (not published).

Gale Holland ("Repelled, held by the Church", March 1, 2013) asks herself why she remains a Catholic. She implies, but avoids confronting the biggest answer: brainwashing since birth. Religion drilled into children amounts to one more type of child abuse.

My broken fibula

My broken fibula

During our tour of Chiapas, while in San Cristobal, I had a touch of diarrhea. One night, in a strange hotel room, where it was too cold, and where I didn't turn on any light because I didn't want to wake Victor, I got up to go to the bathroom, and apparently fell down.

The next thing I remember is coming to in the hospital hours later! According to Victor, I was non-responsive after I fell. I don't know if I was knocked out from the fall or from pain, or just went back to sleep, or what. With help from the hotel staff, Victor called an ambulance and got me to a hospital.

The hospital said I had no apparent head injury, but my blood tests showed a bit of salmonella, which probably explains the diarrhea.

I felt fine except for a sore lower right leg. (Since I had been out nearly the whole time, no one even knew my leg hurt, and the hospital never looked at it.) Victor said that my leg was in a very awkward position when he found me. I found that I could stand and walk. I figured it was some sort of sprain.

For the remaining days in Chiapas and then back in Yucatán, I couldn't walk more than ten minutes without stopping to sit down and massaging my shin. After holding up our tour group that way one day, I gave up most walking for the rest of the time in Chiapas.

Back in L.A., whenever it was warm enough, I tried to return to a reduced version of my exercise walks. My leg started to feel a bit better, but a week later, I was concerned because it was still damn sore. I decided to get it looked at, and found that I had broken my fibula! I haven't had a broken bone since I broke my collarbone when I was a toddler. (Hmmm. That was (apparently) also falling out of bed. Maybe I should never leave my bed!)

The radiologist who looked at the X-rays (the image above) wrote, "There is some periosteal suggesting healing." The orthopedic surgeon said that because of the healing that was underway and since I had been walking for two weeks since the injury, I didn't need crutches or a cast (whew!). He said I should stop whenever I felt pain, and we made a follow-up appointment in six weeks. That was this past week, and new X-rays showed more new bone growth, and the doctor said I was doing fine and didn't need to come in again.

I'm pretty much back to normal now, including my hiking. And just in time for warmer weather, too.

Chiapas, Jan. 2013

Victor and Rodney trying on traditional native clothes in Zinacantan.

Sumidero Canyon

Victor and I spent a week in Chiapas. (More photos here.) Most of this was a tour that included Sumidero Canyon, San Cristobal, Agua Azul, Palenque, and more. Neither of us had been there before. Other than deep fog one morning that made the lakes nearly invisible, the weather mostly cooperated.

The only real problem was my accident that kept me from seeing much of Palenque!

Yucatán, Winter 2012-2013

Colorful houses in Merida. (More here.)

This winter, I spent 6½ weeks in Mexico with Victor. Of course, he had to work most days, so I was on my own a lot. As last year, I spent the time on the computer, reading, and walking. While walking, I started taking snapshots of some of the colorful houses.

I love staying drier and warmer in Yucatán than in L.A. in December and January. I love exploring the city on foot. I love that Animaya is about a 20-minute walk away. And, of course, I love spending time with Victor.

On Sundays, we would head toward Progreso and visit Victor's family.

We also spent one week in Chiapas.