Timmons Back And Wandering Around
Notes scribbled on the back of an EKG printout . . .
* * *
TO PARAPHRASE the late Jerry Garcia, what a long and strange trip it’s been . . . although I’m relatively certain we’re talking two very different kind of trips.
The short answer to the question so many of you have asked is that I am recovering nicely from the heart attack and ensuing quadruple bypass surgery. It sounds trite, but I really am getting a little better each day. Without going into the gory details, the (rather large) incision is healing and so are the smaller ones. My chest feels like it was cracked open like a lobster tail on a Friday night at Joe’s Crab Shack. But that, too, is healing.
While I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemies, it has been an eye-opening experience for me. To say it’s been life changing is an understatement. I have started losing weight again, thanks to an avoidance of sugars and salts. My sincere hope and goal is that I won’t fall off that wagon like I did once before (if trainers Denise or Tonya see this, I will try harder this time – promise!).
At the risk of being repetitive, please bear with me while I once again say thank you. It has simply been overwhelming – and more than a little humbling – as to how many of you have reached out, and continue to do so. I appreciate you reading the babblings of a newspaper vagabond more than I can possibly say.
* * *
AS YOU probably guessed, the recovery comes with instructions not to drive. I didn’t think much about that until I found myself being chauffeured everywhere we go. I got to figuring and I think this is the longest stretch of not driving for me since I started back in 1972. Funny how little things like that make a difference. It also made me think of parents and in-laws who lost their own abilities to drive. Puts everything in a whole different perspective.
* * *
ONE OF the fun parts of this has been the grandpups. As some of you know, we have seven (soon to be eight), six of them boys and all under the age of 11. Just below my “zipper” scar on my chest are three horizontal holes from where the drainage tubes were. I may have hinted to the little ones that Grandpa got shot by a machine gun and for a quarter they could see the holes. My wife and daughters just shake their heads.
* * *
GOOD GOSH, is there anything of quality on TV anymore? If so, I haven’t found it and I’ve been looking. A lot!
* * *
CHECK THAT. The Chosen is a series that is pretty outstanding. Come and see.
* * *
WHILE WHAT is happening in Ukraine is awful, it’s been nice to see young people around the U.S. showing their support for President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. We haven’t seen a big show of patriotism out of them before, so perhaps this is a step in the right direction. It’s also good that they are seeing the Soviet Bear in the same light many of us long have.
Peace is a precious commodity and keeping it, as is so dramatically evident, requires strength and vigilance. Let’s hope that our society keeps that in mind.
– Two cents, which is about how much Timmons said his columns are worth, appears periodically on Wednesdays in The Paper. Timmons is the publisher of The Paper and can be contacted at ttimmons@thepaper24-7.com