Wednesday, July 2, 2008

In which I resolve to stop doing stupid things, without resolve

One year and two months ago, I tore the ACL in the right knee (I use the spanish body part construction--the knee is no more mine than the tree or the idea...I don't really know what that means, but I like the idea that ownership is impossible and unnecessary...or that even though we may have the illusion that we can freely will the bodies around, they are controlled by the greater and invisible forces of history in the broadest most evolutionary sense...).  Three days ago, I was at my friends' camp on beautiful Chazy Lake.  We've been having a summer of intense rain and thunder storms punctuating a culturally standard summer of warm breezes, sunshine, and impossibly crisp and puffy clouds, and three days ago was no different.  I drank beer.  I rode a standup jet ski, my first jet ski experience of any kind.  I rode on an inflatable chair (tube?) pulled behind a motorboat.
The last got me in trouble.  Of course, with cute girls in the boat and a confusing compulsion to do things I know are bad for me, I challenged the captain to throw me from the tube.  He couldn't.  Those who know me will remark on my almost divine strength, balance, and grace.  On my last run, I hubristically released my hands, plugged my nose, and waited to be thrown to the emerald surface at 25 miles an hour.  When I hit the water, I twisted the left knee.
I should say that this day was also the last of my health coverage.
I can't say that I've torn anything, or that this latest injury will ever require surgery, as the symptoms are much less intense than the verified and surgered tear.
I will say that I've learned that should I want to continue having adventures on one level, I need to give up adventures of another.  
I don't know what my resolution to end my stupidity will look like.  No more drunken tree climbing?  No more running down mountains?  Now that I think of it, my problem may just be motors...and (for Kurd) gas...
So...hoping and praying that I have not hurt the left knee seriously, I will try to try to remember that my future movement may depend on my current caution.

1 comment:

Kurd said...

So were you still covered by insurance for this day, or was the previous day your last day, leaving you uncovered? I used to go snowboarding without insurance, and it did moderate my behavior, turning me into a boring, cautious loser.

Regardless, you do bring up an interesting point: do you avoid short-term immediate excitement in exchange for the potential of long-term future excitement? Is that any way to live one's life? Zeno would say that there is only this moment, and that the Seth a second from now is a wholly new and separate Seth. But Zeno was an idiot, since future Seth would still feel past Seth's pain, even though he is a different entity.

In regards to your brief aside about the philosophic implications of the Spanish language, I find the concept quite charming. If I don't fully belong to myself, I feel much less culpable for my actions. Which means I don't feel so bad when I do stupid things. So neither should you.