I recovered from the painful shoe incident a day or so after I arrived home from Canada and was soon back into my usual, fairly active routine. Last week, I worked outdoors three days running and felt that my stamina had improved since last summer, when I first ventured into the unfamiliar world of yard and garden maintenance. Maybe the work was less demanding this year, because Bob and I are sharing it. Early last spring, I was on my own as Bob recovered from knee replacement surgery.
Anyway, I felt pretty good, and good about myself, until Saturday night when I couldn't sleep. As Bob drifted off, pain returned to my right leg, radiating from my shin down to my toes and up through the femur. I soon ached all over as I sometimes do with what I usually think of as some kind of MS pain syndrome.
A few hours later, the leg was so painful that I self-diagnosed osteosarcoma and mentally put my affairs in order. After a fitful sleep, I rose before 6:00 a.m. on Sunday morning and we attended early Mass. Yesterday, we took the day off and by evening I felt surprisingly well. I slept great and woke up ready to pick up my shovel.
As I turned the soil in one of the back gardens, I realized that the shin pain was the result of stepping on the shovel to give myself some leverage. I revised my diagnosis to muscle strain complicated by hypochondria.
