The Old Blog in the Desert

Sometimes rough days make the best days.

Up early, I had to take care of a broken newspaper box. While unloading it, the thing, being lighter than I thought, came off the bed of my truck faster than I could move and fell on my left leg, knocking me to the ground.

With no one around to help me get the damn thing off me, I ended up using my right foot and rolling it off me. At that point, the pain was pretty sharp, and I thought I had snapped my ankle.

Turns out that I simply gashed my leg, ripped a sock, and tore my bib overalls. As for the ankle, bruised and swollen but not broken.

I toughed it out by putting the paper box where it was intended to be.

Tomorrow, I plan to sit down and stitch the rip in my pants. The sock is going in the trash as soon as I get ready for bed.

Then I went into Virginia City, taking some copies of a newspaper story to a woman whose father passed away a couple of months ago. She was recuperating from surgery at the time and never got to see the article written about the funeral.

I thought she was going to cry, she said she was so happy.

Next, I attended an intimate concert at a local cafe. The singer, who I got to interview, was great.

I found it hard not to feel a bit of a kinship with her when she sang a song about swimming in the Eel River, which is near where I grew up, and having the “smell of the river in my hair.”

Hours later, I still have that one line hanging around in my head.

Then, of course, I got to see a couple of friends and meet a couple of strangers that I can now call friends. I’m ready now for the next journey in my life of story-telling and photo-taking, which will be about the V&T Railroad.

And to think, it all started with a newspaper box falling on me.