My Upcoming Spine Surgery

The Past – August-September 1997

Tuesday, 26 August 1997 – A typically selfish American driver decided, as usual, that her time was more important than anyone else's safety. She pulled her little red car past the point where there is now a stop sign before checking for traffic so my bike slammed into car before either of us could really see the other (I only remember seeing a flash of red to my left just before impact) and I sailed over it and landed on my helmeted head. I finally came to a stop about 30 feet away.

The force of the impact was enough to shatter my fourth thoracic vertebra. In order to keep my spine in shape while it healed and thus keep me from developing a hump, it was decided to fuse my first six thoracic vertebrae together by screwing two metal rods into them. The surgery took place on Tuesday, 4 September, exactly nine days after the accident.

Life went back mostly to usual for the first couple of years but I started to decline quickly when I went back to work in November of '99. During the BSU Spring Break Mission Trip to Chicago, Illinois in March 2000, we got to spend Thursday being tourists instead of working. My then-girlfriend (and now wife of more than eight years) and I wander around checking out museums (we're both history geeks) and generally having a great time. But being on my feet for most of the day made my pain levels sky rocket and they haven't gone down since.

In the fall of 2006, after being forced to shut down our game store because I could no longer physically do the job and because our savings had long since run dry, I took a job answering phones at ClientLogic (now known as Sitel). It was a fun job that I did fairly well. I really enjoyed helping people. But even talking to people via a phone headset while using a computer to answer their questions proved to be too much for me and I finally had to quit in October, before I even finished training. It was then that I decided that I finally needed to file for Disability.

The Present – April-May 2011

I've been living with those rods for nearly fourteen years now and the pain has become so excruciating that I can barely function. A couple of months ago I started asking around to see if Medicare/Medicaid would pay to have my rods removed and was told that, as long as the surgery was medically necessary and likely to help, Medicare would cover most of it and Medicaid the rest.

So, a few weeks ago, I told my nurse practitioner all of that and he referred me to Carolina Spine and Neurosurgery. They were very prompt – very. Since then I've met with the surgeon twice, had a CT scan, and am scheduled for surgery at 07:30 on Wednesday, 11 May 2011 at Mission Hospital in Asheville. That's right; in six days.

Any surgery, of course, poses risks ranging from unsightly scars to death from a stroke caused by a blood clot but this surgery has some other issues of its own. From the CT scan, Dr. Gooch is fairly certain that the fusion is in good shape but he can't know for certain until he actually looks at my spine. He cautioned me that if he does find a problem with the fusion then he'll have to put in new rods after removing the old ones but that the new ones will be smaller because they'll need to correct a smaller section of spine.

Because the vertebrae will have grown around the pedicle screws, he'll have to carve out the bone in order to extract the screws. Depending on how much bone he needs to remove, he may need to graft some marrow out of my hip.

Even if absolutely nothing goes wrong, there is still the chance that the surgery won't actually help and my pain will continue on as it has for the past thirteen years.

With all of that in mind, I'm still holding out hope that I'll be back to my old self in only a few months and might even reclaim my old job at Sitel. Your prayers will be greatly appreciated both for me and for Lura and everyone else who will be helping me during my recovery.

I'm also quite fond of greeting cards and still have all of the ones I was sent during the three months of my last convalescence. I probably won't know my room number until I get there on Wednesday but you can always send them to our home or pass them on to anyone in my family. Those of you who know me from Hillside Games can probably leave them there but I'll have to check with Nate and Amanda to make sure it's okay first.

I found this via my lovely wife's blog of randomness and she found it on Shiloh Walker's blog who found it at The Bookaholic Zone who got it from Storytime With Tonya & Friends which, as far as we can tell, seems to be the originator.

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Rules:

* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of this blog.
* Post a link along with your post back to this blog.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

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Every year since we were very young, Dad has gotten us each at least one book for Christmas.  They are rarely books we would buy for ourselves but are always books we enjoy.  One of those, from many years ago, is The Complete Murhpy's Law: A Definitive Collection, which is pretty much exactly what it sounds like.  As an example, here's sentence five from page 56:

DOW'S LAW: In a hierarchical organization, the higher the level, the greater the confusion.

The Friday 56

I found this via my lovely wife's blog of randomness and she found it on Shiloh Walker's blog who found it at The Bookaholic Zone who got it from Storytime With Tonya & Friends which, as far as we can tell, seems to be the originator.

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Rules:

* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of this blog.
* Post a link along with your post back to this blog.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

---

Since most of reading is done on the Sony PRS-505 my wife got me two Christmases ago, I don't always have a physical book on hand for this.  But one of my near-future projects is to apply the bookmarks from my well-worn copy of Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (my favorite of his books) that Memaw bought for me many years ago to my digital copy so I can quickly find my favorite quotes.  Thus I actually have a non-electronic non-gaming book close at hand for a change.  So without further ado, here is my Friday 56 of Connecticut Yankee:

I could have given my own sect the preference and made everybody a Presbyterian without any trouble, but that would have been to affront a law of human nature: spiritual wants and instincts are as various in the human family as are physical appetites, complexions, and features, and man is only at his best, morally, when he is equipped with the religious garment whose color and shape and size most nicely accommodate themselves to the spiritual complexion, angularities, and stature of the individual who wears it; and besides I was afraid of the united Church; it makes a mighty power, the mightiest conceivable, and then when it by and by gets into selfish hands, as it is always bound to do, it means death to human liberty, and paralysis to human thought.

Wow.  And I thought my sentences were long.  It just makes it that much funnier later when he comments on Sandy's "horizonless transcontinental sentences" (page 148 in my unabridged Aerie edition).

Street Fighter Comes to HeroClix

The following comes from "News from the Alliance Games Open House" on HeroClix.com:

"We’re adding the Street Fighter property to the HeroClix product line. The game will be fully compatible with HeroClix. We’re considering new product configurations for the property. More news on this in the coming months."

There just aren't enough words in the English language to show how excited that makes me.

Acuvue's Questionable New Product

I just saw a commercial for one of the most environmentally-unfriendly products I've ever seen: Acuvue 1*Day contact lenses.  Even though I personally use disposable contact lenses due to allergies, those last me six months as long as I take care of them.  I feel bad enough about throwing away my contacts and the packaging from the new ones twice a year.  The thought of producing that waste 365 times a year is appalling.

It's astounding that in this day of environmental awareness and companies going green, that any corporation could even consider such a wasteful product.  Get it together, Acuvue, and stop trying to destroy the Earth.

Gamers With Heart

The following is cross-posted on my other blog, WNC Heroclix, and I'm forwarding it on behalf of GameHearts:

GameHearts is a public benefit nonprofit organization committed to providing alternative forms of entertainment to adult members of the Kalispell area for the purpose of promoting adult sobriety. The program achieves its directive by providing free and low cost gaming activities in a supervised non-alcoholic, sober environment, along with access to gaming accessories that are provided without cost to the participants. In fact, beginning players can learn and obtain free gaming materials solely for playing.

The primary games that the program uses are tabletop customizable games, such as card and miniature games (CCGs and CMGs), though there is also a strong interest in promoting role playing games (RPGs), as well. GameHearts is working toward the betterment of our region through encouraging alternative gaming activities amongst participants on Friday and Saturday nights, as opposed to frequenting bars and casinos in the area, as well as to inspire decision making and problem solving abilities by teaching and promoting educational and strategic games and activities, using CCGs, CMGs and RPGs as alternative entertainment.

GameHearts does more than promote just sobriety though – it opens up an entirely new facet of the population to these kinds of educational and interactive games. People who would otherwise never know what a game like Magic, for instance, was really about now get free exposure to the game, complete with lessons and a beginning deck. Without an initial investment to begin playing, our participants have little obstacles in playing and interacting with other players. Since GameHearts is primarily a nonprofit, the bulk of our participants eventually find they need to purchase materials we simply do not have, since we are not interested in maintaining a full service retail business. As such, GameHearts also helps boost the overall market shares of the industry by introducing new and motivated players into the environment.

Of course, being a charitable organization, GameHearts is always looking for donations of excess cards, figures, rulebooks and other gaming accessories to use in teaching and promoting these games, though also for any other collectible genre material that can be used for fund raising. Additionally,since gamers are a largely diverse and wide-spread community,the program relies upon inter-community associations and contacts to aid it in advertising the program's existence and its needs to those whom GameHearts' staff alone may not be able to contact. Essentially, any gamer, collector, retailer or manufacturer who may acquire excess materials from these kinds of games represent potential contributors to the program, and it is the program's hope that individuals within the gaming community will help in soliciting the program's efforts to other sources. And the more support the program receives, the greater the service it can provide.

Donations made to the program are tax deductible, since they are made to a community benefit nonprofit organization. The IRS allows for up to 50% of donations fair market value as tax credit. GameHearts assesses the value of each donation and issues receipts upon request for this purpose. The only requirements for donations is that the material not be worn, as these materials are considered “marked” in game play, and that individual donations not exceed $5,000 each (a rule of the IRS, not GameHearts itself). Otherwise, any gaming material is accepted and assessed, regardless of its rarity (ie, commons, uncommons, rares, etc.) or the game from which it comes.

For further information about GameHearts and the service we provide, please feel free to visit the program's website at:  http://GameHearts.org/

Thank you for taking the time to review the GameHearts program, and it is hoped that anyone reading this information will both assist in our efforts and help spread the word to others who may also share an interest in supporting GameHearts' cause.

God Will Find You

Father John Powell, a professor at Loyola University in Chicago, writes about a student in his Theology of Faith class named Tommy:

"Some twelve years ago, I stood watching my university students file into the classroom for our first session in the Theology of Faith.

That was the day I first saw Tommy. My eyes and my mind both blinked. He was combing his long flaxen hair, which hung six inches below his shoulders. It was the first time I had ever seen a boy with hair that long. I guess it was just coming into fashion then. I know in my mind that it isn't what's on your head but what's in it that counts; but on that day I was unprepared and my emotions flipped. I immediately filed Tommy under 'S' for strange... Very strange.

Tommy turned out to be the 'atheist in residence' in my Theology of Faith course. He constantly objected to, smirked at, or whined about the possibility of an unconditionally loving Father/God. We lived with each other in relative peace for one semester, although I admit he was for me at times a serious pain in the back pew.

When he came up at the end of the course to turn in his final exam, he asked in a cynical tone, 'Do you think I'll ever find God?'

I decided instantly on a little shock therapy. 'No!' I said very emphatically.

'Why not,' he responded, 'I thought that was the product you were pushing.'

I let him get five steps from the classroom door and then called out, 'Tommy! I don 't think you'll ever find Him, but I am absolutely certain that He will find you!' He shrugged a little and left my class and my life.

I felt slightly disappointed at the thought that he had missed my clever line -- He will find you! At least I thought it was clever.

Later I heard that Tommy had graduated, and I was duly grateful.

Then a sad report came. I heard that Tommy had terminal cancer. Before I could search him out, he came to see me.

When he walked into my office, his body was very badly wasted and the long hair had all fallen out as a result of chemotherapy. But his eyes were bright and his voice was firm, for the first time, I believe.

'Tommy, I've thought about you so often; I hear you are sick,' I blurted out.

'Oh, yes, very sick. I have cancer in both lungs. It's a matter of weeks...'

'Can you talk about it, Tom?' I asked.

'Sure, what would you like to know?' he replied

'What's it like to be only twenty-four and dying?

'Well, it could be worse.

'Like what?

'Well, like being fifty and having no values or ideals, like being fifty and thinking that booze, seducing women, and making money are the real biggies in life..'

I began to look through my mental file cabinet under 'S' where I had filed Tommy as strange. (It seems as though everybody I try to reject by classification, God sends back into my life to educate me.)

'But what I really came to see you about,' Tom said, 'is something you said to me on the last day of class.' (He remembered!) He continued, 'I asked you if you thought I would ever find God and you said, 'No!' which surprised me. Then you said, 'But He will find you..' I thought about that a lot, even though my search for God was hardly intense at that time. (My clever line. He thought about that a lot!)

'But when the doctors removed a lump from my groin and told me that it was malignant, that's when I got serious about locating God.. And when the malignancy spread into my vital organs, I really began banging bloody fists against the bronze doors of heaven.. But God did not come out. In fact, nothing happened. Did you ever try anything for a long time with great effort and with no success? You get psychologically glutted, fed up with trying. And then you quit.

'Well, one day I woke up, and instead of throwing a few more futile appeals over that high brick wall to a God who may be or may not be there, I just quit. I decided that I didn't really care about God, about an afterlife, or anything like that. I decided to spend what time I had left doing something more profitable. I thought about you and your class and I remembered something else you had said: 'The essential sadness is to go through life without loving. But it would be almost equally sad to go through life and leave this world without ever telling those you loved that you had loved them.''

'So, I began with the hardest one, my Dad.. He was reading the newspaper when I approached him.. 'Dad'.

'Yes, what?' he asked without lowering the newspaper.

'Dad, I would like to talk with you.'

'Well, talk.

'I mean . It's really important.'

The newspaper came down three slow inches. 'What is it?'

'Dad, I love you, I just wanted you to know that.' Tom smiled at me and said it with obvious satisfaction, as though he felt a warm and secret joy flowing inside of him. 'The newspaper fluttered to the floor. Then my father did two things I could never remember him ever doing before. He cried and he hugged me. We talked all night, even though he had to go to work the next morning. It felt so good to be close to my father, to see his tears, to feel his hug, to hear him say that he loved me..'

'It was easier with my mother and little brother. They cried with me, too, and we hugged each other, and started saying real nice things to each other. We shared the things we had been keeping secret for so many years.

'I was only sorry about one thing --- that I had waited so long. Here I was, just beginning to open up to all the people I had actually been close to.

'Then, one day I turned around and God was there. He didn't come to me when I pleaded with Him. I guess I was like an animal trainer holding out a hoop, 'C'mon, jump through. C'mon, I'll give you three days, three weeks.''

'Apparently God does things in His own way and at His own hour. But the important thing is that He was there. He found me! You were right. He found me even after I stopped looking for Him.'

'Tommy,' I practically gasped, 'I think you are saying something very important and much more universal than you realize. To me, at least, you are saying that the surest way to find God is not to make Him a private possession, a problem solver, or an instant consolation in time of need, but rather by opening to love. You know, the Apostle John said that. He said: 'God is love, and anyone who lives in love is living with God and God is living in him.'

Tom, could I ask you a favor? You know, when I had you in class you were a real pain. But (laughingly) you can make it all up to me now. Would you come into my present Theology of Faith course and tell them what you have just told me? If I told them the same thing it would not be half as effective as if you were to tell it.

'Oooh.. I was ready for you, but I don't know if I'm ready for your class.'

'Tom, think about it. If and when you are ready, give me a call.'

In a few days Tom called, said he was ready for the class, that he wanted to do that for God and for me. So we scheduled a date. However, he never made it. He had another appointment, far more important than the one with me and my class.

Of course, his life was not really ended by his death, only changed. He made the great step from faith into vision. He found a life far more beautiful than the eye of man has ever seen or
The ear of man has ever heard or the mind of man has ever imagined.

Before he died, we talked one last time.

'I'm not going to make it to your class,' he said.

'I know, Tom.'

'Will you tell them for me? Will you tell the whole world for me?'

I will, Tom. I'll tell them. I'll do my best.'

So, to all of you who have been kind enough to read this simple story about God's love, thank you for listening. And to you, Tommy, somewhere in the sunlit, verdant hills of heaven --- I told them, Tommy, as best I could.

If this story means anything to you, please pass it on to a friend or two. It is a true story and is not enhanced for publicity purposes.

With thanks,
Rev. John Powell, Professor
Loyola University , Chicago