How to render aquaintances speechless ...
Feb. 8th, 2010 05:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwyn_bywyd... be forced to use your walking stick.
This inevitably leads to "what have you done to yourself?" (the most common form of this question, I have discovered) Whereupon I reply that I haven't done anything it is 'just' the cfs*. And each time I do it, I hate that I sound somehow apologetic. What is the narrative behind what I'm saying? "I'm sorry to have worried you, casual acquaintance, but fear not, I haven't injured myself, it is merely a debilitating, chronic illness that I suffer all the time, but usually without having to trouble you by using a stick."?
And even though I've done this apologetic thing, and even though I have mostly been upbeat about it ("oh, I just got the balance wrong this week!" said in a blithe tone) I have completely screwed up the script that apparently exists for speaking to youngish people with a walking stick. One can just tell that their next question - after I revealed I had sprained my ankle in an amusing incident involving an aubergine - was going to be "and how long will you need the stick?" But no, I have to have a socially awkward open-ended relationship with a walking stick. Their next cue in the script evaporates before our very eyes, and we are left with "Um, well, hope you're feeling better soon." Which is well-intentioned, I feel certain.
But here is the dirty little secret, the one I work so hard not to reveal, so much more shocking than the priest saying "bloody" (which I did at last night's pot-luck dinner. Whoopsie) I won't be feeling better soon. I may not use the stick, (because, frankly, it is a pain only having one hand) but I won't be feeling 'normal'.
Whatever that is supposed to be.
In other news, strongly considering buying a range of sticks in the liturgical colours, so that if worst comes to worst, at least my stick will match the vestments.
* Lower-case for cfs is entirely intentional.
This inevitably leads to "what have you done to yourself?" (the most common form of this question, I have discovered) Whereupon I reply that I haven't done anything it is 'just' the cfs*. And each time I do it, I hate that I sound somehow apologetic. What is the narrative behind what I'm saying? "I'm sorry to have worried you, casual acquaintance, but fear not, I haven't injured myself, it is merely a debilitating, chronic illness that I suffer all the time, but usually without having to trouble you by using a stick."?
And even though I've done this apologetic thing, and even though I have mostly been upbeat about it ("oh, I just got the balance wrong this week!" said in a blithe tone) I have completely screwed up the script that apparently exists for speaking to youngish people with a walking stick. One can just tell that their next question - after I revealed I had sprained my ankle in an amusing incident involving an aubergine - was going to be "and how long will you need the stick?" But no, I have to have a socially awkward open-ended relationship with a walking stick. Their next cue in the script evaporates before our very eyes, and we are left with "Um, well, hope you're feeling better soon." Which is well-intentioned, I feel certain.
But here is the dirty little secret, the one I work so hard not to reveal, so much more shocking than the priest saying "bloody" (which I did at last night's pot-luck dinner. Whoopsie) I won't be feeling better soon. I may not use the stick, (because, frankly, it is a pain only having one hand) but I won't be feeling 'normal'.
Whatever that is supposed to be.
In other news, strongly considering buying a range of sticks in the liturgical colours, so that if worst comes to worst, at least my stick will match the vestments.
* Lower-case for cfs is entirely intentional.
