This week I am learning to live life from a different angle. My sad, damaged plantar fascias are having trouble healing, so I have been told by the doctor to help the process by using them as minimally as possible.
This means I now must try to live my life from the seated position. Working as a secretary makes the workday fairly stationary - I am taking advantage of the term "desk job." Sleeping happens to also be a predominately sedentary activity, save those prone to sleep-walking, which, fortunately I am not. Unfortunately, the third thing I give my life to (aside from working and sleeping), does not easily oblige itself to restful positions -- meal preparation.
In the kitchen countertops are built for someone to use while standing, making them about 1.5 feet too high. This means that as I try to do the dirty dishes from a seated position, I am knocking other items into the sink (so far, nothing has been broken). When I try to cut baked chicken off the bone my arms become achy and my progress is slow. Maybe I could kneel, but there is only so much pressure that knee joints will take before they too join the force of dysfunctional body parts.
So I sit in my chair in the kitchen and manuever my body every which way to reach what I need. At least in a small kitchen I can reach the stove, 90% of our cabinets, our fridge and our sink without moving the lower half of my body, or the chair.
Nonetheless (despite the mostly easy-reaches of our little kitchen), I can no longer cook alone. I cannot reach the spices, I cannot move quickly, I cannot run and leap to hit the smoke alarm when the eggs start burning. It is now a team effort -- Alex is learning to cook. While he struggles to get over his fear of raw meat, I am doing my part by taking over dish-duty, a task I can attend to comfortably (no matter how many innocent bystanders I knock into the sink).
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