One example of several: my father managed to completely sever his achilles tendon (he was passing a heavy packet of roofing shingles up to someone on the roof, and pushed so hard that his achilles tore). He waited three days to go in – apparently the folks in the ER couldn’t believe that he was able to walk, much less that he was walking around for three days first. I think he finally went in because it was his left foot and he couldn’t drive his (manual transmission) truck and so was forced to use his wife’s car.

The injury I suffered that you were referring to occurred years before it actually became a big problem. I was walking fast on the boards we used as a walkway for the mobile home we then lived in and my left foot slipped and twisted underneath me. I did go to a doctor in Woodburn (despite your dad’s protests) and had it x-rayed and the guy said there was too much bruising so he couldn’t tell if I had a break or not. He wrapped my poor swollen foot in an Ace bandage, told me to get some crutches, and that was it.

Several years later, I developed a lump at that spot and it became terribly painful to walk. I mostly sat around with my foot propped up. Finally, I went to an orthopedic surgeon, who x-rayed and found that I had broken a piece off of one of the bones in my foot. He said that material had calcified over it. I had surgery to remove the offending bone chip and calcification. I was on crutches for a while after that, while it healed, but I was fine after a few weeks.

Virginia and her girls (Gwen, especially, I think) may remember that time because they took some of my laundry to do and came back wearing Steve’s overalls and maybe some clothes of mine. They were funny!

I don’t care much for going to doctors, it’s true. I’m very glad that I can e-mail mine at Kaiser if needed, although unfortunately my internal medicine doctor is going on maternity leave soon. Anyway, I consider them a necessity if a person is ill or hurt.