Tomorrow I Walk

I am on the cusp, the space between what is and what will be; the space of what is and what is promised. Here, there is hope for what might come my way. The thing with hope, sometimes what is promised doesn’t come to be. Sometimes life stalls out and we’re left holding the bag of some forlorn and sad-looking hope. Disappointment tends to follow.

And yet, tomorrow, August 4th, is the day I can weight bear, putting my full weight on my right leg, allowing me to practice this walking thing that I have not be allowed to do for the last ten weeks. Tonight, I will roll myself to the side of the bed and in the morning I will spurn this wheelchair with all the disdain I can muster at 6 AM and start walking.

Despite this date of freedom, this hallowed Tuesday, I don’t know if I can walk at all or for any distance or amount of time. I have been sitting for for ten weeks. I have a recollection of how to walk, but will my body be able to do it? Will my decrepit joints remember what to do? Will there be tolerable pain or something more of a show-stopper?

I hide my excitement, a hedging of my optimism, for all the what-ifs that are lurking. I know this is no way to live, but I have a desire to keep myself safe, to not put myself or my hope too far out on this promised limb of freedom, my previous disappointments overshadowing what might be mine tomorrow. And so I hedge and dream together, a coalescing of potential heartbreak and the brightness of what might be.

It is in this sweet spot, here in the in-between of heartbreak and big wants that really gets me. It is as if I am experiencing the feelings of hope. I feel exuberant at my first steps tomorrow morning, walking from bed to chair. There is wondering at what I’ll be able to do. There is excitement at the thought of looking my Sweet Wife in her eyes, at the same level, and participating in a vertical hug. There is delight in knowing I can try to go up and down a hill. There is joy at knowing I can go for a walk and end up some place different than where I am now. These are the details of of an anticipation in my tomorrow and I love these details almost as much as the thing itself. It’s as if there is a vibration in my chest, in my rib cage and into my stomach, that pulls forward, yearning for what is to come.

And I treasure how this feels.

Vacations. Christmases. Presents. My favorite meal. New Lego. Coming home after being gone. Seeing the Sweet Wife. Long runs in beautiful places. With these and other moments I get this vibration, this anticipation for what is coming.

Having put in a number of miles in lonely and beautiful places, I don’t often take my legs for granted. I do appreciate them. And yet, until I’ve had to sit for the last ten weeks, I didn’t fully know the depths of the gratitude one might have for this exquisite body, for its ability to just walk.

I feel fortunate. It’s easy to pass this off as lucky and perhaps that’s all that this is. Another of fortunate’s definitions is a bit more specific: “receiving unexpected good things.” This feels closer to what all of this feels like. Because it all feels like grace, something beyond what I could have earned or merited, almost as if I am favored to be given this life, another chance at this living. Fortunate.

It is with these brighter emotions, not discounting the difficulty of the last days and weeks, or perhaps it is because of these difficult days, that I get to be here, with a hope and a brightness for tomorrow.

And so tomorrow, I’ll walk, or at least I’ll try. I may fall. I may have pain in my unused joints and muscles. I may cry or fatigue or crumple, but I’ll be walking.

And no matter what, if all goes well during this sleep, it will be tomorrow and the gifts of the day will be given. I will be here to receive them all, maybe even on two feet.