The Unbionic Man (Or How 43 Is the New 86)

It’s snap, crackle, pop, without the fun. It’s twist and shout, without the dancing. It’s wham bam, without the thank you, ma’am.

It’s the soreness that comes with 43 years of accumulated knocks and nicks, pulls and falls, but with none of the athletic prowess, and nowhere near any of the athletic glory.

Let’s take a look at the pie chart (Ex. 1):

As you can see, Ouch and Ugh now have a majority on how I feel.

How did this happen? Like this:

Left foot: I’ve played one-on-one basketball approximately four times. The final time, I twisted my foot and fractured it. Very common injury, had a cast on for awhile, feels perfect compared to my …

Right foot: A few years ago, I suffered a stress fracture while walking around Yorkdale Mall in Toronto. As I said, I’m no athlete, but to my credit the mall was quite busy that day.

The foot turned a yellowish blue when I got home, then back to pasty. I didn’t bother going to the doctor. I wasn’t ready for a stop-going-to-the-mall diagnosis.

Earlier this spring, my right foot failed me again. I was walking south down Egerton on my way home after a bit of gluggery at Palasad North. There was a fire truck coming east along York, approaching the York-Egerton intersection.

Although I had the Don’t Walk sign, I absolutely had to cross York before that fire truck got to the intersection. I’m sure I don’t have to explain how important it was not to have to wait the 20 seconds before the light changed.

With a burst of stumble, I achieved my goal. I crossed the street before the fire truck, but wiped out on the other side, banging up my right foot and landing face down on the sidewalk.

The firefighters, concerned, beeped twice as they drove by.

Left shoulder: Fell hard on the stairs one morning letting my dog Molly out, jamming my arm violently over my head. Not even any gluggery involved, I was just half asleep. I was supposed to go to physiotherapy, but I cancelled it. By the time you take off work, pay for parking, wait for your appointment … is it really worth it? My shoulder healed in about 11 months, so I think we know who won that battle.

Right arm

What I call my Frankenstein arm. Ol’ Frankie requires his own subsections.

Upper arm and shoulder: Tendinitis in the biceps and triceps, and a tight shoulder from years of squeezing a phone against it while taking scores as a sportswriter. Most of my career as a sportswriter occurred before the headset era.

Elbow: Bone chips. I regularly extend my arm to snap, crackle, and pop them.

Forearm: More tendinitis, which I usually treat at the bar by placing a cold beer on my forearm. Some people mistakenly assume I’m on intravenous.

Wrist: That old fan favourite, carpal tunnel syndrome!

Hand: I have a cyst bumpy thing that limits my mobility and gets sore when I type. In writing this post, I’d say I’ve stopped about 40 times to massage it.

A few years ago, I had surgery to clean it up, but the doctor didn’t get all of it. I didn’t care — he told me after the surgery that I had really big muscles in my hand.

That is without a doubt the highlight of my athletic career, even topping the time a dentist said that I brush my teeth “with a vengeance.”