The Hillhouse

This current episode with my back going out hasn’t wrapped itself up as tidily as it always had in the past. Normally after about a week I’d be back to my old self. Not so this time; I am left with a constant, low grade pain which still makes getting in and out of chairs something of an event. Having been given so very many recommendations by folks to visit a chiropractor, I finally made an appointment to see one this week. Chiropractors have always been sort of a mystery to me – I see their signs all over; quaint little offices in small, once residential houses, practices tucked away in obscure strip malls, nestled in between insurance agencies and tax preparers’ offices in dingy, outdated buildings… seeming, in my eyes at any rate, to be perched on the perimeter of the ‘real’ medical community, doing who-knows-what in those out-of-the-way little offices, a laying on of hands, grotesque crackling sounds emanating from the patient at the final torturous alignment…

In this moment I still see a chiropractor’s office as a strange, mysterious nether world floating somewhere between Western and Eastern medicine and having something of a cult-ish quality to it. This interpretation is all of my own doing, I know, and I’m not even sure why I feel this way. It might stem from my mom. She is the queen of back problems. I asked her if she’d ever been to one. She told me that she hadn’t, and it was precisely because she was concerned it might be a painful and unpleasant experience. I seem to remember her nay-saying the profession a time or two in my growing up, so maybe that’s it… So I admit it, I don’t get it yet – but obviously many, many people do get it; they do know how important a good chiropractor is. In two days’ time I’ll have a new perspective on it. I’m hoping it will be the start of something good. At least I’m being proactive. Yeah, and I’ll also do some crunches once I’m able. This whole thing has me a little more concerned about keeping myself in shape, healthy and pain free. From here forward I’m going to have to be much more mindful of how I use my body.

My immediate goal is to recover my strength enough to make a 1000 mile car trip in July with Elihu. He’s yet to meet some relatives – and he and I have yet to ever take a vacation in fact. Vacations weren’t something my family ever did when I was growing up, nor did I ever do so with my husband (we traveled along with the concerts and festivals. Lovely as it was, it was never a true vacation. Early sound checks and late night jam sessions do not a vacation make). This summer, Elihu is nine and I believe a fine age in which to meet his relatives, take his first dip in the Atlantic, meet some other folks with Achromatopsia – and finally see that big city downstate that he’s heard so much about. ! (As a musician I played NYC fairly frequently – and that was when I was living in Chicago. Now I actually live in New York – but I still haven’t been there. In fact, I haven’t been to the city since Elihu was born. Having kids sure does change all that.)

I need to get myself well and strong, because, as you see, I have an important trip to make. One I do not intend to back out of. Lead on, to the chiropractor’s…