Endings and beginnings

I don't usually talk about my own health in here, except on the rare dramatic occasions when I fall down and end in the hospital! but I do have continuing problems with my hands. A combo of arthritis, what my doctor calls normal wear and tear for an artist in her seventies doing hands-on nursing care for an invalid, and trigger thumb and finger, both thumbs and first two fingers on each hand.

What happens is that pressure, even moderate pressure, can cause them to lock up so that the fingers and thumb are frozen in place, and need help with the other hand to thaw them out, so to speak. But much worse is the pain in the thumbs, which is on some days almost disabling, since every move needs my thumbs.

So I've had to look at what I can delete from my life and what I need to preserve my hands for. In order to have HP continue to be at home, where he is very happy, doing well, and having a life, I need to be able to continue to attend him, including hooking and unhooking the lift morning and evening, fraught with pain when my hands are playing up, and all the dressing and turning and reaching and exercising and so on that he needs. So that has a priority. I really want us to continue to be together in our own home.

On other fronts, I have noticed much more trouble after an hour of tapestry making, so I have retired that for the moment at least, and have had to cut back on knitting, though I can do that for a while. The painting was fine, no pressure on holding a brush, etc., though the framing was not so fun, but that's done now. So painting can remain. And drawing. And printmaking. Spinning is done, I think. And carding. And unraveling sweaters! At least for now.

I'm doing various remedies short of the surgery that might be in my future if I'm unlucky. Including arnica pills, which are helpful, and hot and cold hand baths, and I suddenly realized, after being reminded about resistance exercises, that when I do my free weights, my hands tend to do better. So I've put that back into my life, too, tended to get left out of the day's work, considering all the other stuff needed around here.

Cooking is fine as long as I avoid picking up heavy stuff or my nemesis, a stack of dishes all at once.

So I've figured out the art and homecare and cooking side of life. But then there's music.

And one of the culprits in my hand pain is the flute. It's a silver instrument, heavy for my hands, needs to be held at a kind of unnatural angle, wonderful sound, heavenly to play, and has been a huge adventure. But I had to say good bye to it.

She left today to return to her owner, having given me a couple of years of great pleasure and exploration and self teaching and a door open to a whole new sound. It was wonderful, and now it has to end. I went through a similar wrench when I had to give up violin because my body just couldn't do it. That's how I came to playing recorder, in search of an instrument I could play forever.

So, on the ground that it hurts less if you do it fast, the bandaid approach, I quickly packed her and shipped her home. She will go to another person later this year, the owner tells me, so this is good. I would have had to give her up sooner or later, so it may as well be sooner, I guess.

It twere well to be done, twere well to be done quickly, or words to that effect, according to Will S., except I'm not planning a murder here. But it was very very reminiscent of saying goodbye to a beloved animal. A musical instrument you hold in your hands gets to have a relationship with you. I thanked her as I packed her in her case.

So that adventure is done, and I am telling myself it will make a place for the next one. That's what I'm telling myself.