The Pain Of The Last

Rolling through the countryside was fun just a year ago. In the time on this Earth one is given, that's an important thing to find and experience: a way to make a fun living. They say if you can find work that you enjoy doing, you never work a day in your life. And that was the case. It didn't feel like work.

The best part of the job was that it combined two things. The first, my love for driving. To get behind the wheel of a vehicle, be able to go nearly anywhere, and have that time on the open road, is the ultimate way to clear your head. There's no feeling of freedom that's more freeing than when you're on the road, the music blaring, and for those minutes, or even hours, you're the only one in control of your future.

The second part was not getting hit or shot at, or having to fight with humans. That had gotten old years ago. When you're young, that life falls into the category of excitement, thrills, and daring. It helps to boost that masculine bravado that my generation grew up with in the 80s, watching the greats like Stallone, Swarzenneger, and Willis as they lit up the big screen with explosion porn and their one-man approach to saving the day. But then you get older, and you start to realize, no matter how many fights or how many times you're in danger, it doesn't end.

So, my new life of peacefully existing in the world of man was what I had come to love and enjoy. But it wasn't without problems. Life had proven to be complicated, and sometimes, more than even that little boy inside me, the one craving to be Superman, could take.

"Is that so?" asks the therapist, urging me to go on.

"It is," I assured her.

As I explained, I always knew there was going to come a day when it would happen. I'd been warned a couple of years ago, and I thought I had more time. But time isn't always our friend, and sometimes, it sneaks up on us faster than we realize. My reckoning was upon me; I just didn't see it coming.

It came in with a heatwave, the week before. The multiple days of building heat were making it rough in the badlands, and no matter how hard I thought I could push myself, apparently, it was meant to break me. Little did I know, the very things that were helping to keep me going also were taking down my tolerance to intense heat.

Little by little, the heat was proving to be too much, and the resulting dehydration from the intense conditions pushed me over the edge.

"Why now?" I had questioned.

"So, what happened that pushed it this far?" she asked.

The truth was, I'd been hiding things. I'd hidden the pain of the past. My body had been through hell, from bullets to being stabbed, to the hundreds of hand-to-hand combat situations I'd been in. As time went on, I'd noticed that arthritis and the ghosts of the past were creeping up behind me a little quicker than I expected.

"But I always lived by the DFQ motto, long before it was in a movie," I explained.

"DFQ?"

"Don't fucking quit."

The therapist chuckled with derision, I'm sure, being unimpressed by the stubbornness it exemplifies. It was something that was instilled into my generation. It sort of came along with other sayings, like "never give up, never surrender." It also might have been a sign that we were all dropped on our heads too much as kids, but I can't remember.

"But it started to change, my body."

I explained how it had been that way for a while. The prolonged exposure to the chemicals, the elevated level of pain in the badlands, and the decline I had noticed in my abilities. Over the course of a few months, I'd noticed it was tearing me down. There was a clear road sign ahead, flashing even when my eyes closed, very visible in the dark of night.

And, as I explained to her, it was in that moment that I knew it was coming at me.

"So, after two plus years of pushing yourself at full steam, having faced years of this unwinnable fight, you found yourself at the moment you realized you weren't on a sustainable path."

She gets it! It was a real Eureka moment. She understood what I was going through.

The last call I was on, I was lucky enough for it to have been a minor incident. Fortunately, there was no excitement. There was no real danger due to the circumstances. And I survived it.

"I was on a site, doing a job out on US 67, and things hit the breaking point. My legs got weak. I couldn't get through the rough terrain. And sadly, I lost my balance and couldn't stay on my feet without help. Fortunately, a couple of guys from a different company helped me stand up and get to my truck."

"Yes," she sighed. "And that's where you're at with things. You need a new path, one that allows you to focus on what's important. You have done what you could, more than anyone could ask. Now, you're at a crossroads."

And my therapist was right. That needed to be my last call, on that road. It wasn't for a lack of trying, or enjoying the ride. The past's icy hand was catching up, and my body was talking to me.

"In the meantime, is it finally time for you to slow down?" she asked.

I agreed, albeit reluctantly; it was time to accept the road I was on could no longer be. So, as our session was ending, I called my boss and told him the truth. The cancer was catching up with me, and as much as I hated to say it, it was time to stand down and accept that I was disabled.