An Idiot's Adventure in Stubbornness.

My body is pretty great about telling me when it has reached its limit. In my healthy days I could continue to push past the warning and still function. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case. When my body says it's done, it means I have approximately two minutes to sit or end up in a heap on the floor. It might happen after I've unloaded just half of the dishwasher or I might find myself having to sit and do breathing exercises in the grocery store parking lot to keep the pain at bay. I've learned the hard way that ignoring one of these warnings results in extreme pain for the rest of the day, if not multiple days. Even though I know all this, my stubborn brain will sometimes ignore it in favor of continuing whatever it is I'm doing. In short, I am an idiot.

The other day I had an adventure in ridiculousness. I was heading out to help with a beach cleanup effort but when I arrived there was nowhere to park. After driving around a few times I finally decided to park alongside the road. Everything looked fine but since my brain doesn't work anymore, I forgot to take into account that it had rained the day before and it had rained a lot. As soon as I pulled over I knew I had made a terrible mistake. The right side of my car immediately began to sink. The grass turned into a soppy muddy mess. I couldn't help but laugh as it was just so typical of me and my car to end up in some silly predicament.

I told myself I was brilliant for having worn rubber boots, exited the car, and got to work collecting small limbs from fallen trees. I stuffed them under my tires and gave it another go but I couldn't get any traction as the branches just sank into the mud too. As luck would have it, I was parked across from a State Parks maintenance shop and someone happened to be there working. I asked if I could borrow a few pieces of wood to try to get my car unstuck but in true Park Ranger fashion he insisted on helping me. He took the front tire and I worked on the back but forward or backward, it made no difference; I was stuck.

Just as we were about to give up, a lady who had passed in her jeep turned around and asked if I needed a pull. Ranger Ted ran back to his shop to loan us a chain and after a couple tries, some wood under the tires, me giving it gas in reverse, Tracy pulling with her Jeep, and Ted pushing from the front, we were finally able to get my car out. If I could've made a cake appear out of thin air I would've thrown them both a party, not just for helping dig me out but also for lying through their teeth about how it happens all the time.

At that point a little voice told me to put my ass back in the car and head home. I, of course, told the voice to shut up. After all, I had driven all the way out there and spent 45 minutes digging my car out of a mud hole, there was no way in hell I wasn't following through. That was on Sunday. As I'm writing this it's Wednesday evening and I've barely left the couch in that time except to hobble around in pain. I'm wondering just how thick I am and exactly how many times my body is going to have to beat me into submission before a little of this stubbornness wears off.