Last week I had surgery on my right knee, a complete reconstruction. I temporarily live on the first floor now with twin bed in the living room. Disrupting flow of the house....grateful it is not a hospital bed.
Such a bother, so I try to think of activities I can do, books I can read and movies I can watch. But with the pain or the spaciness from the painkillers my attention is greatly compromised. I am the center of attention I try to make the bed less obvious with an Indian block print tapestry and a plethora of throw pillows. How exotic!
To comfort myself I remember people before me who had a stretch with convalescence. My mother when she was 9 was in bed for a good part of year with Pneumonia. Her Mother treated her as a delicate flower to the rest of her days. the pinnacle example of convalescence was Freida Kahlo, who spent most of her life in bed, where painted such beautiful self portraits that read like her autobiography.
I feel grateful of mine is brief and I well be active physically in my own recovery. I think of movies watched that had great characters in bed, but I am not the young girl who twisted her ankle in a rainstorm on the moors. I dream of scenes where there are billowing silk curtains in a Palazzo,in Italy or of Mrs. Wilcox in the country english cottage called Howard's End...The list could go on, laying about in your bed has a very romantic role in our literature and in films.
Am I that romantic figure on my bed? Reading my iPad from social and news sites? Or is it the Vicodin playing games with me.
Nah I am just this middle-aged Mother..........
then....
'Good morning Lady Grantham" my husband greets me this morning handing me my coffee.....
I love that man!
