• Home
  • Melted and Molded
  • Apartment 3N
  • My Sister’s House
  • While She Is Away
  • The Last Father’s Day
  • Watch The Rack
  • The Gathering Place
  • Boy Meets Girl
  • Photographs and Memory
  • The Final Telling
  • Michael Calderwood

Thoughts From The Back Of The Room

Monthly Archives: January 2021

You Blockhead!

18 Monday Jan 2021

Posted by Michael Calderwood in Beautiful Cambria, Home, Humor, Satire, Words matter

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

aging, back pain, cranky guy

” I have a weak back,” I said.
“Since when?” she asked.
“About a week back.” I answered gleefully, delivering the punchline.

As an ungracefully aging man, I have come to accept the realities that dumb things happen while doing non-dumb stuff. Give us an example, you say?

While drying off after a shower, I reached just the wrong way, causing every nerve along my lower back to burst into a chorus of something in the key of F*#@!

A simple twist led to over a week of decreased mobility, a glaring reminder of how quickly normalcy can be replaced by dependency. I don’t do a good job of maintaining a civil tongue when in pain or otherwise compromised. My behavior, I am told, often falls squarely between Hickory and Dock. My sometimes colorful exclamations garner some shocked looks and, “Oh, you’re from New York” comments from my California neighbors. Sorry, New York, it can’t be helped.

Baby Steps

After a couple of immobile days, I decided it would be all right to accompany my bride on a quick trip into town, where we did the traditional circling of the post office followed by the always exciting Cookie Crock dash. Fifteen or so minutes of sitting in the car did my back no favors. As I struggled to wiggle /squirm /heave myself upright while keeping the car door from slamming into my shins, I felt the old familiar kettle start to boil. My already-confessed short fuse, combined with the re-aggravated back, caused me another round of jerkery.

“It hurts when I go like that.”
“So, don’t go like that.”

We had pre-determined that we would refill a handful of the plastic water bottles that had piled up in the trunk. This chore, which I usually handle alone, became a bit of a team sport. My wife was being super-efficient, scrubbing every surface within the refill zone with a disinfecting wipe. I just wanted to get the job done in my usual way, which generally involves an elbow, two hands, a couple of pockets to hold the bottle caps, and a boatload of coins to feed the beast. I suppose, in hindsight, I could have explained my method before we started, but I have it on good authority that my style of explanation often elevates me to a second level of obnoxious. Plus, you know, my back hurt.

ANYWAY – things quickly became undone, with bottles in the wrong places, caps falling to the ground, and me not having a boatload of coins. The saint had a few, plus a couple of singles that could be fed into the machine. Rather than being pleased that she was so well prepared, I kicked it up a notch, from jerkery to total hole-ness, snapping “give me the money.”

Witnesses

As I turned away, I noticed two young ladies nearing the store entrance. They stopped and stared, slightly alarmed at the sight of a masked, cranky old guy snarling “give me the money” at a genteel, grey-haired woman holding a change purse and an empty plastic bag. We continued filling the bottles, and I didn’t give a second thought to the poor girls who possibly thought they were witnessing some type of street crime. It was only later, having moved from cranky to mortified, did I reflect on what went down at water world. 

Mea Culprit

So, to the two young ladies, and anyone else who may have witnessed my whiny, irrational, presidential-level hissy fit – I apologize. But you know, my back hurt…

sawstars

I saw stars.

Share this:

  • Print
  • Email
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook

Like this:

Like Loading...

Subscribe

  • Entries (RSS)
  • Comments (RSS)

Archives

  • January 2023
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • April 2020
  • February 2020
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • January 2019
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • November 2017
  • May 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016

Categories

  • Art and Artists
  • Beautiful Cambria
    • Skate Park
  • Cal Fire
  • Cambria Fire Department
  • Cambria Healthcare District
  • Cambria Scarecrows
  • Cambria Schools
  • Catholic Faith
  • Clay Tiffany
  • Coast Unified School District
  • Communicating
  • Community Involvement
    • Cambria CCSD
    • Local politics
  • Dreams and Reality
  • Educating a Community
  • Emergency Preparedness
  • Emergency Services
  • Fordham University
  • Friendship
  • Funerals And Tradition
  • Glendora
  • Home
  • Homelessness
  • Humor
  • Living Our Values
  • Local Journalism
  • Measure A-18
  • Measure G-22
  • music
  • Music and Art
  • Parcel Tax
  • Perserverence
  • Photography and Memory
  • Prop 218 Rate Increase
  • PROS Commision
  • Public Access Cable
  • Satire
  • Searching for Cambria's Reality
  • Social Media
  • Social Responsibility
  • Tolentine
  • Treasured Finds
  • Uncategorized
  • unity Broadcasts
  • Unusual Community Access Hosts
  • Words matter

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • Thoughts From The Back Of The Room
    • Join 64 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Thoughts From The Back Of The Room
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

    %d bloggers like this: