The Boy in the Plastic Bauble

I took a walk in the park today. Being out right now "in my condition" is difficult and odd, but pushing myself a bit I find is necessary for recovery and mental health. Pushing too much, I also discovered, is not.

I wrote before how walking in the city with headphones on somehow makes me feel invisible in that cool "I am an international bon vivant/spy wearing a cloaking device and I am all powerful because there is a cool song in my head and you can't see me" way. Walking with Bell's palsy and vertigo ALSO ads that invisibility, but NOT in a cool way. I feel removed from society, and so withdrawn that carriages might kick up mud in my face as I stand there looking out my one good eye. And dogs might lift their legs on my legs and children may wipe chocolate off their hands onto me as if I were wet grass.

I thought the roads were clear of snow, and they were, but there was some ice on the path which is kryptonite to a vertigo-infested boy. In Rainman fashion I figure out how to get past it. My brain struggles to reboot itself. When other people are on the path I cannot breeze right by them as I have in my New Yorker way in the past. I must defer and plod slowly behind as passing is too difficult. I feel I may fall off the edge of the world. Hard to explain.

Even though I am invisible, there is life out there all around and it still brings me joy though I feel I cannot touch it or taste it as I want. But I can feel the cold on my face and hear the joy in the air. There was a guy playing sax in the tundra of the park and people on a bridge and ducks on a frozen pond. Such LIFE!! I cannot believe people hide in their apartments when there is magic all around for the price of a muddy trouser hem.