I am going to make a prediction. Every once in a while I see hints of something from a variety of sources and put it all together. From there I can see what it might mean in the future. Well over the past few months I have been seeing evidence that a change is coming. Actually it is the possibility of a revival of something most people would say they hope never arises again. But I think it will. What is this feared thing coming back to life again? Well, I have this feeling that within the next six to twelve months there will be a huge revival of disco. Yes I said disco. That despised dance trend and lifestyle of the late 70’s and early 80s which was hugely popular although no one today would admit liking it.

Why a revival of disco? One simple answer is that it was fun. And it was. Today if you listen to people you would think that all the clubs must have been empty because everyone talks about how much they hated disco. But the truth is that the clubs were packed with people who couldn’t wait for the music to start so they could hit the dance floor.

I admit that I was one of those people who enjoyed disco. Maybe because it was the only time my boyfriend would actually get out on the dance floor with me. He hated to dance to rock ‘n roll for that meant he would have to stand by himself and move around on his own. But with disco you danced with a partner and you could easily learn some simple disco moves that allowed you to think you knew what you were doing. And when we weren’t on the dance floor we would watch the dancers to pick up some new steps for the next time we danced under that shimmering ball floating over the dance floor.

Then there was the clothing. OK, I hope that part of disco doesn’t make a comeback. Men, you can still enjoy disco without the polyester white suit or powder blue tux or worst of all the leisure suit. No, I sure don’t see any of that making a return. I don’t remember if there were any real fashion faux pas for the women, at least not in clothing. But oh the hair, there were a number of hair styles that were awful. Of course there was the big hair look that teased to death poufy look that a lot of the women wore especially women in NJ and NY. I admit I managed to avoid that look but I fell victim to the ultra curly, finger in the light socket look. I actually paid to get a permanent to give my hair this extreme kinked, curly look. What a disaster! Although it isn’t much worse than today’s popular style of taking a hank of hair from the front of their head and pulling it up and back to give a look like a groomed dog with this puffy hair right above the forehead.

Anyway, over the next six months I have a feeling that you’ll start to see more and more disco. And maybe there is some correlation between the economy and a silly fun dance like the disco. On the news today they talk about having the highest unemployment since the early eighties and economists are worried that we might have inflation just as we did back then. But 25-30 years ago when you were out on the dance floor twisting and turning to the loud happy music you could forget that you were broke or out of a job or barely making ends meet. So perhaps this nation needs a revival of disco. Maybe we could again use a silly dance and fun music to help make life seem a little bit brighter if only until that Last Dance.

My body and physical therapy simply don’t get along. You would think that by now I would have learned that every part of my body rebels if put through physical therapy (PT). Be it deep knee bends or relearning how to walk, my body either won’t comply or will take revenge if forced to do things like that. And yet I keep hoping and trying…

My first time with PT was in 2004 when my knee doctor wanted me to try it before considering knee surgery. I tried to tell everyone that it wouldn’t work but no one listened to me. So I went to a Rehab center where a nice therapist put me through a serious of knee exercises. My knee tried to comply until he asked me to do deep knee bends. Yeah right. Although deep knee bends and I had parted company years ago I nonetheless tried. That was on a Monday. When I returned on Wednesday I was using crutches because my knee had totally rebelled and no longer supported me at all. The therapist still was optimistic and had me do some easy stretching exercises. No surprise that it didn’t work. By Friday the therapist admitted defeat and sent me back to my surgeon who then immediately scheduled surgery. So that is Body 1 - Physical Therapy 0.

The next battle was in 2005 after I had extreme pain in my legs due to lower back problems. Again a surgeon had suggested PT as a possible way to avoid surgery. As this time I really didn’t want that risky back surgery I agreed that PT was important. Unfortunately my body didn’t get the message. Sure, the first week was good as I was able to do all the exercises and reps on the machines. But the second week I found that instead of being able to do more reps I couldn’t even do what I had done the week before. Then things got really scary when my legs started to collapse underneath me. After a few days of my legs getting weaker and weaker, my therapist ordered me back to my doctor where we realized that surgery was necessary as I was losing the ability to walk.    Body 2 - Physical Therapy 0.

Three months later in 2006 I returned to the same rehab facility and therapist. This time PT was to help me regain strength after having had the back surgery and months of bed rest. Ironically, I now had greater pain in my lower back than before the surgery when the pain had been in my legs. For three months I went to the PT facility 2-3 times each week and worked on their machines and did exercises on the mats. Before starting they measured the mobility in my back and after the three months measured me again. After all that sweat and pain and work there was no measurable change. A year later I was declared permanently disabled because of the constant pain in my lower back. {sigh} Body 3 -Physical Therapy 0.

In 2007 my left knee went out on me. This time my knee doc didn’t even bother sending me to a therapist and went straight to surgery. However, he did have me go to PT to strengthen my knee after the surgery. I went to a different facility but upon going in for the first time I heard a familiar voice call my name. Turns out the therapist I had a year ago now worked at this new place. Great. My claim to fame is being known at all the rehab centers. As for the therapy it neither hurt nor helped my knee. So I’d call it a truce and would keep it at Body 3 - Physical Therapy 0.

Last month I underwent a 10 hour surgery on my right leg because of blood clots. The wonderful surgeon saved my leg but I still am hooked up to medical equipment and the muscles and tendons in my leg and foot were badly damaged. So once again I need Physical Therapy this time to help me relearn how to walk and to be able to move my foot properly. As I couldn’t drive, the therapist comes to my house and after the first week I noticed an improvement in my ability to walk and move my foot. But my leg and foot have experienced so much drama that they aren’t happy with me at all. After that first week of PT my foot began to swell up. It was just a little bit at first but over the next few days my foot got bigger and bigger and bigger and then my ankle and leg began to swell. I started to have flashbacks to that scene where Harry Potter made his nasty Aunt swell up like a big balloon.

To stop the swelling, my doctor now wants me to be flat on my back with my foot propped up way over my heart. So here I am lying down on my bed, lap top next to me and with my foot raised up on five pillows. Not exactly the most comfortable position but the swelling has gone down. As for the therapist, she still comes but instead of painful exercises she now is spending her time slowly stretching my foot and massaging my leg and foot tendons and muscles that had been affected by the surgery. That feels wonderful and my body is now getting exactly what it wanted. So I can’t help but wonder if PT has ever won out over what the body demands. Obviously for me that answer is no. Body 4 - Physical Therapy - 0

In the Sunshine State we often have problems of too much sun and not enough rain. In April we experienced draughts which in turn brought about wild fires. So when it started to rain in Central Florida on Sunday May 17 we breathed a sigh of relief.

We then woke up to rain on Monday and Tuesday never seeing the sun, a rare occurrence in this state. And the heavy rains continued on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. OK, so it rained a lot. No big deal. It was just rain, yes? We’ve lived through hurricanes and tornadoes. So what if it was torrential rain for five, six, seven days? It was still just rain, right?

Rain is a funny thing. When I lived in Vegas the town couldn’t handle if it rained even an eighth of an inch. But elsewhere, too little rain will help to create wild fires but too much rain and you had what we currently have - massive flooding. For eventually all this rain had no where to go. The east coast was especially hard hit with massive floods. People had to evacuate their homes when the floods filled their one-floor homes destroying first their cars in their driveways then their furniture and carpeting and anything else in its way. Schools were closed and evacuation shelters opened. The space shuttle had to land in California instead of here. And all because it rained.

So how much did it rain? I thought you would never ask. Ormond Beach, a town just north of Daytona, had the dubious honor of getting the most rain. Would you believe from Sunday May 17 to Saturday May 23 this town recorded 27.94 inches of rain! Daytona had 20.63 inches of rain and even my town in Central Florida had 13.39 inches. This is more rain then what we had from all three of the 2004 hurricanes combined! And this is just through Saturday. It has rained every day since then, too!

On Sunday our Governor applied to FEMA for federal help. In Daytona Beach alone, an estimated 1,000 homes and businesses were affected by the floods with about $55 million in damages. The paperwork for FEMA help was given to President Obama to sign on Sunday. And yet Obama has done nothing. What’s the delay? And why isn’t the media harassing Obama and FEMA for being slow to respond to this disaster? We need help now! And I do mean “we” as my part of my ceiling is wet and soggy from the torrential rains.

This is the same wet area that occurred due to Tropical Storm Fay last fall. After my insurance company looked at that earlier damage they said they would pay to fix my ceiling, but not my roof, claiming that my roof wasn’t damaged. I asked what if it happens again and was told they would come back out and fix my ceiling again. OK, once the federal government agrees with my Governor that my county is a federal disaster area I’ll call my insurance agent to come back. Meanwhile it’s supposed to rain every day this week and then next week we’ll be in hurricane season when the rains really get started! Anybody have an extra umbrella?

I am back! But instead of my usual tongue in cheek or sarcastic blog I would like to share this open letter.

Dear family,

I tried to thank each of you for all that you have done for me over the past month. But it seems as if all the members of my family have the same trouble in accepting thanks and gratitude. Perhaps if you had let me thank you then I wouldn’t have to resort to this open letter. So consider it your fault that I will now publicly tell the world how grateful I am to have such a wonderful, loving family.

I vaguely remember calling my brother to tell him that I had been admitted to the hospital on Wednesday April 15th. The next 7-10 days are basically a complete blank. The first few days of this blackout I was told that I went through tests which I don’t remember although I do vaguely recall dealing with unimaginable pain. This was not new for me. Since Dec. 2007 I continuously complained of a cold foot, blue toes and horrific calf pain. Yet neither the hospital nor doctor I had been seeing had found the massive blood clots in my right leg. Now, eighteen months later the clots had destroyed two of my three arteries and saving my leg was very touch and go. This time, though, I was in a good hospital and I had a wonderful surgeon who started operating at 8pm on a Friday night and didn’t finish until 6am the next morning! Luckily through his skill and my family’s prayers I woke up in ICU in pain, but with both legs attached.

I truly have the best family in the world. While I went through tests, surgery and initial recovery, I later learned that my family was scrambling to make arrangements. I entered the hospital late Weds, had surgery Fri-Sat and my mother, who lives in TX, was by my bedside on Sunday! She must have been a whirlwind, dropping everything to fly out with just a few days notice. Pretty impressive but even more so when I mention that she is 81 years old! And what is even more impressive is that, even though she no longer likes to drive on highways or drive someone else’s car, for the next week she nonetheless got in my car and drove on the highway to get to my hospital. Although I wasn’t always coherent when she saw me, I truly appreciated that my Mom was there. I may have had my 51st birthday four days after the surgery but there still is something comforting to having your mom by your side when you are that injured. Mom, I wasn’t able to get you a Mother’s Day card this year but just know that I am very grateful for everything you did but most of all for simply being there.

After three weeks of being in the hospital I was next moved to a “rehab”center. The doctor wanted me someplace where the nurses were trained to change the dressing of this fancy wound vac on my leg and that also had a Physical Therapy clinic to help me relearn how to walk. I heard “rehab” and imagined something like the Betty Ford clinic or one of those rehab places all the celebrities go to. Wrong. It turned out to be a nursing home, circa 1970. I had an 88 year old roommate, a hand crank bed, no phone, truly gross food and surly aides. No surprise that my brother, who drove me there, knew I was upset. But unbeknownst to me, that evening my family was again calling each other and talking about my distress over the nursing home so that the next morning my phone continuously rang with each of them calling to cheer me up.

Two days after I landed in this nursing home, my big sister arrived. She hates hospitals and even admitted to feeling a bit light headed the first time she came to my nursing home. Yet she overcame her fears and was wonderful. I worked out with the Physical Therapists in the morning and then she would arrive around noon with much needed food as I refused to eat what they served! She also brought clean clothes so that I was finally out of that damned hospital gown. She even was able to arrange for us to use the facility’s small beauty salon so that my sister could then wash my hair. Pure heaven as this was the first time it was washed in over 10 days! Sis, I know how much you hate anything medical so I am especially grateful for your bedside visits each day. Your help and simply your company every afternoon kept me relatively sane in that depressing place. Thanks so much!

After a very tedious weekend by myself, I was more than ready to go home. Mid afternoon on Monday I received a much anticipated call - my oldest sister had landed from TX and would be there in an hour. Now unlike our other sister, this one is a nurse and thrives on all the medical stuff. Once she arrived I didn’t give her much time to catch her breath before I sent her out to talk to the nurse and director. She could talk their language plus she wasn’t shy about doing whatever it would take to get me out of there. Thanks to her help we broke out of that nursing home and for the first time in over a month I slept in my own bed. Yeah!

For the next five days I had my very own RN to take care of me. She drove me to doctor’s appointments where she and the docs would talk way over my head and then she would explain it later to me. She also did grocery runs, cooked and completed getting my house set up for me. I am finding that I appreciate her help even more now that she is gone and I am having to do everything myself! How lucky could I be to have my own personal nurse who took such good care of me!

And throughout all of this there was my brother. I live in a 2-story townhouse a master bedroom suites on each floor. I had taken the upstairs for my bedroom while the downstairs was a guest bedroom and library, with up to 400 books overflowing the bookshelves. As I can now barely walk much less climb steps my brother arranged for movers to reverse the bedrooms so that all my bedroom furniture is now downstairs. But before the movers came, he boxed up all 400+ books by himself! He also made numerous airport runs as our Mom and sisters were flying in and out. He took care of my bills and helped me with my mail. Now with our sisters and Mom back in their own homes, I probably will be calling more on my brother for help as I still can’t drive or move around very steadily. I’ll try not to bother him too much but it is comforting to know that he is only a few minutes away. Mike, you are a terrific brother who was there for me this past month and I can’t begin to tell you how much I appreciate all you have done for me.

I hear my friends talk of their families; of being estranged from their siblings and how their elderly parents refuse to do much of anything. I have always appreciated my family but this experience makes me even more grateful. We may live far apart and in many ways we live very different lives yet the bond we have to each other is amazingly strong.

Mom and siblings, I don’t say this much but I hope y’all know how much I love you. And I can’t begin to thank you for this past month. Yes I am grateful for the clean clothes, the rearrangement of my house, the trips to the doctors but I am more thankful simply for the fact that you were there for me. I am humbled by the knowledge that all of you interrupted your busy lives and left your own families to be with me. And what could have been a very depressing and stressful time instead was filled with laughter, love and friendship. So thank you family. You truly are the best.

Have you ever known someone who you weren’t sure if you wanted to shake some sense into them or if you wanted to shake their hand in admiration. Someone who has done something so outrageous that it simply takes your breath away and if it wasn’t somebody you knew you would be in awe of their adventures. But since it is someone you know and love you instead find yourself holding your breath until their lunacy, er, adventure is over.

That person is my niece. No one quite understands where my sister’s daughter gets her adventurous spirit. Her stubbornness, willfulness and determination to do what she has set out to do, well, yes, that does run in the family. But her love of the outdoors and her hiking, camping and roughing isn’t something many of us have done since Girl Scouts.

Her travels started off relatively normal. Shortly after graduating from college she went back to New Zealand where she had earlier spent a semester. Other than her constant bungee jumping from mountain cliffs that was a basically tame trip.

Her next adventure became more nerve wracking for those at home. She and my sister, her Mom, flew to Italy where they spent two weeks. OK that was nice. But after my sister left, my niece took off for Croatia where she spent two weeks hiking by herself throughout Eastern Europe! Her journey took her through Slovenia, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Budapest and other unpronounceable cities and villages. She wrote of spending nights in small shepard’s huts scattered around mountain paths for hikers to use overnight. Once she shared a hut with a group where everyone spoke different languages. Other times she would spend the night alone in a hut on some mountain trail where no one knew where she was. Oh yeah, her family back home was nervous about that trip!

She safely returned from that adventure when six months later she headed off for Peru. Luckily that was only a month long trip. Reality then set in and so for the next year she worked in a real job where she saved every cent. She would need it for her next most awesome adventure. She quit her job in December knowing that next fall she would be attending graduate school. This left her half a year to live out her most exciting and longest adventure yet. And where did she go this time? Would you believe - Asia.

My idiotic niece decided to spend five months hiking through Asia! She started off by flying to Delhi. She didn’t seem to care for India and after seeing the major tourist attractions including the Taj as shown to the right. She cut short her stay and headed for Napal where she then took off for small villages in the countryside. She went on a canoe ride down a river teaming with wildlife (crocodiles, monkeys, peacocks etc.). Then she switched from a canoe to an elephant who kept throwing her off his back and on a long drop into the river!

In Kathmandu she again hiked up mountains where she took breathtaking photos like the one on the right where you could even see Mount Everest in the background. Wow. It really was spectacular. Along the way, she met two other twenty something women who were also planning on hiking up the mountains and so she spent a few days with them. Surprisingly, all three were redheads. I would have loved to see the reaction of the people in these small villages in Napal who rarely see one redhead much less three woman with bright red hair!

From the serenity of a mountain village she next flew to the people filled Bangkok. During the flight she befriended an English speaking journalist and his wife. So upon arriving in Bangkok she ended up going with them to visit the expats in a Bangkok prison!

Yes, you read that correctly. Now can you see why we want to shake her? Who goes off with complete strangers to a Bangkok jail? Is she nuts? After that she then saw the sights that tourists are supposed to visit there. Much better. After Bangkok, my niece took off for Laos, which is where she was last weekend. When I asked my sister why her daughter went to Laos I was told it has a lot of pristine forests and jungles with a lot of wildlife. Apparently so as my nieces’s latest adventure was to take a tour where you hiked for hours then zip lined from tree to tree (as shown in the picture) even spending nights in huge tree houses over looking the jungle. Ok, that sounded cool.
I have no idea where she is right now. All I know is that she won’t return home until her brother’s graduation in May. So three more months in Asia where I think she even plans to hike through Vietnam! South Vietnam, I hope, but with my niece, who knows?

My sister says she won’t be at peace until her daughter returns. Who could blame her? I still haven’t decided if my niece is the most courageous person I know or the most naïve. At least this time she has a cell phone to call home occasionally. She is also finding internet cafes along the way where she is writing of her adventures in her own blog. And adventures they are, definitely something to remember for your whole life with plenty of stories to someday tell her children. But as nerve racking as it is for us back home, I still can’t help but brag about my adventurous, wonderful, risk taking niece. What an amazing life she is living!