{"id":5635,"date":"2022-10-24T18:27:54","date_gmt":"2022-10-24T16:27:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/?p=5635"},"modified":"2022-12-26T12:11:44","modified_gmt":"2022-12-26T11:11:44","slug":"the-unfairness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/?p=5635","title":{"rendered":"The Unfairness"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I was once walking through the park when an old man abruptly shouted \u2018the unfairness!\u2019 He was sitting on a bench and I thought perhaps a robin had pooped on him. Also, no. The man was in standard old guy in the park gear (trench coat, high top sneakers, pants). So I was naturally frightened. I walked away briskly and never thought about him again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is, until today. I made the monumental mistake of sneezing while I was getting out of bed this morning and I somehow gave myself spina bifida. See, this was a problem and not for the reasons you think. The four minutes after I get out of bed in the morning are reserved for my knees to learn how to work again. Throwing my back out at the same time just wasn\u2019t going to do. I slouched towards the bathroom like Quasimodo and was muttering in what can liberally be described as \u2018tongues\u2019. Just as I sat down I said \u2018so unfair\u2019. The rest of my time in the bathroom was spent in quiet reflection, well, it was once my tablet died and I had to stop looking at Reddit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s not that people don\u2019t warn you about all the bad things that happen when you get near fifty, they tell you all the time. It\u2019s just that you never think it\u2019s going to happen to you. I am not, at the age of 48, a walking clich\u00e9. I am nostalgic. A McDonalds commercial from the 1980s can bring me to tears. I would give anything to be at a Little League post-season pizza party. Various parts of my body have elected to stop working. My knees and back revolt against me so often there\u2019s no way they\u2019re not in cahoots. What the fuck is with my heel? I went 46 years without thinking about my heel, and now they pervade my every day. I get an abrupt ringing in my ear that I\u2019m pretty sure prewarns a hernia. Or a haemorrhage. Or a nose bleed. A hernia, haemorrhage, and a nose bleed are some of the various things I\u2019m fairly certain I\u2019m suffering from or about to be suffering from. It joins a long list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have medicine for everything. Should sudden onset heartburn, hemorrhoids, acid reflux, headache, or jock itch overtake you while visiting my house, I got you covered. I am that guy. I can fall asleep at a traffic light. Then there’s the things I accidentally slip into conversations. The greatest geriatric hits: When I was your age, Listen young man, I may be old, but the alternative is being in a vase on your mantle, Back when I was young, and on and on and on. I am a walking talking clich\u00e9. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The thing is, I don\u2019t feel old. I feel good. Yes, my hangovers last more than 72 hours. Yes, it takes me a week to recover from a workout. Yes, my heels take turns not working. But I feel good. Ish. Oh well. Could be worse. At  least I have my health. Ish.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was once walking through the park when an old man abruptly shouted \u2018the unfairness!\u2019 He was sitting on a bench and I thought perhaps a robin had pooped on him. Also, no. The man was in standard old guy in the park gear (trench coat, high top sneakers, pants). So I was naturally frightened. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5636,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/damiengaleone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Maes_Old_Woman_Dozing.jpg?fit=770%2C1025&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1EvEu-1sT","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5635"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5635\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5637,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5635\/revisions\/5637"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}