I try not to multi-task too much and just focus on the job at hand, but... the best laid plans go astray.
A friend recently reminded me that I needed to slow down and stop stressing. I had aged. They had aged. They moved slower and things were better now. I should move slower and things would be better.
Hmmm...
Now I have a big lump on my silly head, stars in my eyes and I suspect I was teleported back to another century.
Living in a little old RV comes with some old fashioned lifestyle techniques that isn't common to many Americans. Dishes washed by hand, laundry hang dried, freezer and refrigerator manually defrosted, food cooked from scratch, living out of small water tank, dumping sewer (what fun!). It all sounds so simple but takes time and effort.
I turned off the refrigerator/freezer. My RV fridge is a small Dometic 2 door arrangement, the freezer on top, the refrigerator on the bottom. I emptied the freezer, transferring the shoebox of ice to the top shelf of the refrigerator. The two items in the freezer, I piled on top of the ice, then closed the refrigerator door.
I opened the freezer door which doesn't quite open 180 degrees like the newfangled models do, so mine sticks out in the tiny hallway. I laid out microfiber towels in the bottom of the freezer to catch the dripping water.
Next I planned to take Harley dog for a walk while simultaneously doing my volunteer workamping chores around the lake park. Oops, that's multi-tasking. But it works out fine.
Most times.
Next I found myself locked outside the RV without the dog leash. Harley was jumping for joy on his tether, waiting for an equipment change so we could ramble around the park. However, I had forgotten to gulp down a bunch of water. Rather than carry water, I try to tank up before the walk, so I don't dehydrate in the summer heat. I am already carrying dog leash, keys, trash bucket, litter picker-upper tool, brochure bag, park literature, parking fee notices, note pad, cell phone, camera, pen, prescription glasses and I forget what else. I manage to carry all this because my clothes don't have pockets, which is a bit maddening at times.
Sounds simple.
Unlock door.
Climb 3 steps inside.
Drink water.
Find dog leash.
Step outside.
Lock door.
Leash up a jumping bean of an excited dog.
Head out on foot and paw.
While we were gone, the freezer would defrost. When we came back, I could mop it out, turn it on and call it a done deal. Whee!
Somehow I managed to spill water all over the floor.
Such a klutz some days.
(Most days!)
How can a glass of water spilled on the floor resemble three gallons?
I threw the dish towel on the mess, which did little to soak up the water, then bolted four or five steps for my bed in the rear of the tiny wheel estate where there was sun dried laundry waiting to be folded including microfiber rags. (These things do magic, quickly soaking up water and dirt, while mopping the floor.) I was mine over and over so I always have a few clean ones ready. It saves me a bundle on paper towel costs, being that I live in a motorhome where the utilities are included in the rent or workamping.
I turned around to take five steps back to the kitchen, tossing my clean microfiber rags on the floor with the intention of rapidly mopping with my foot. Old injuries make it hard and very painful for me to climb down on the floor, so I've become quite proficient at mopping with one or both feet. Actually when I was in physical therapy years back learning to walk again without canes, cranes and walkers, this was one of the suggested home exercises, learning to do things with my feet.
There just isn't room for a mop in my motorhome, so I let the microfiber rags do the work. Then I can wash them in my
compact washing machine to use over and over again. The microfiber rags are like a magnet attracting dirt and water.
But I came zipping down the hallway, in a big hurry and THWACK.
I saw STARS.
I saw BLACK.
I saw clouds.
I saw the inside of my brain.
The pain was excruciating, I was flailing for the phone thinking I should call someone to come rescue my doggy before I passed right out. Or worse.
BANG.
Someone turned out the lights.
Dang bang it, I was SURE it was daylight last I checked.
But the angels swooped in from somewhere refusing to let me fly away with them. They made me stay firmly planted on planet earth.
Well, we never went on the walk. I never reached anyone on the phone until much later. By then I was babbling like a fool, probably incoherent, but at least I was alive and my confused doggy was with me, alive too. I had dripping ice running down my face. I was trying to deaden the pain. I didn't want to call an ambulance because I wasn't sure they would even come without advance payment. Doctors are fussy these days about up front payment for everything. If I even coaxed an ambulance out here, they might drag me away without my doggy and I would be so super stressed worrying about his welfare, well, I just didn't want that.
I dislike hospitals, especially emergency rooms where you are pretty much ignored while they wait to see if you will just hurry up and die before they have to attend to you. Well, I guess you can tell, I have had very bad experiences with emergency rooms. I've landed in emergency rooms a few times, and it was never good.
Well, I take that back, I might have had very good service back in the 70's in an emergency room in a very small town that saved my silly life. It seems everyone was so nice to me. I don't remember arriving there or what they did. My mother rushed to the emergency room but she was an hour or more away plus it had taken an hour or so before someone called her. She told me later that when she arrived, my face was covered in blood, but I was yabbering at the doctors trying to fix me up "Don't let the blood get on my clothes, I have to go to work! Hurry up. I can't be late!" She said the doctors said I had been muttering that over and over for hours.
I know a few days later, someone took me to see my car and it was destroyed including the steering wheel I broke with my face. I had on a seat belt, but the car was so old, it didn't have a shoulder harness, just a lap belt. Thank goodness I had that on, it prevented me from going through the windshield.
It also proved a theory that many folks had said to my face before that accident "You are HARD HEADED!"
Back to the future...
On this day, whatever day that was recently, I apparently slammed full speed ahead into the sharp corner of the freezer door, while looking down at the spilled water on the floor I was going to mop up.
I have a lump the size of a football on my head beyond the hair line, so I can't really see it unless I shave my head, and that sounds too painful. Brushing my hair is pure torture, so I am looking a tad frazzled, like I stuck my head in an electric socket.
Awhile back I saw a refillable old fashioned ice bag for injuries on sale for $1 and I didn't buy it. Not like ME to ever have any accidents. Better save that $1 for something important...
Yet, thinking about it now, the angels were probably leading me to stare at that $1 ice bag, because they knew what kind of fool I am. If only I had paid attention...
At least that is how it feels.
Like a football.
The thing on top of my head.
It's probably the size of a golf ball chopped in half.
My head is shrinking.
My brain fell out.
What happened to that hard head of mine?
Did somebody switch out heads when I wasn't looking?
Recently someone told me on the phone "When you're over the hill, you're head goes soft."
And what hill would THAT be?
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