Another end, this time for me

[Facade in El Rito. This is how I feel after three months in Santa Fe.] Today was my last free day before the final day, and I got up at 6:15am so that I could land in the ER at 7am. I saw a doctor 3.5 hours later, a young, pretty, ponytailed blonde, who was very kind. She kept my feet on her knees (I was sitting higher than her) the whole time, which moved me. Usually, I feel like doctors try to touch you as little as possible and then push their chairs away. Basically, I'm fine. It's just a sloooow process of healing, partly because I never really rested it that much.

[Chimney Rock, Ghost Ranch. I wish I could have made it up but didn't have the time on my first visit and didn't have my full foot strength on my second.] I left the hospital a free woman, and then proceeded to do laundry, clean my studio, pack up one box to ship, and make a huge pot of noodles. I took my manuscript copies to the library to shred and my box to the post office and my heart to the place where it could breathe a little bit. I am very happy to be heading home soon. Not necessarily a HOME, but a geographic home (the east), and the home I have been building for the last few years: being a teacher. It takes more energy than almost anything else I have done in my life, but it feels good like the endorphin high after a sweaty workout (except it's my brain doing most of the sweating).

The shoe (or just even a sole) never got done this month, but I let that go. Lots of things happened that I wasn't able to predict, and those things would have derailed any normal human. Which is what I happen to be. But I finally decided to graduate to being a grown-up and booked an airport hotel room for tomorrow night--Santa Fe is not the kind of town that takes well to airport transportation outside of a limited time frame. So tomorrow will be my last day, open studios and all.