The Final Few Weeks of 2009
My life continues to be a series of dramatic highs and lows. After spending most of November working on my dissertation proposal, I spent the first week of December in Chula Vista coaching a para camp. The camp was a bit of a disaster for me. I was hit by a truck on Tuesday. No major injuries as I was able to stay upright despite the truck going at least 50mph. Two days later I crashed my bike (endo-ed over the handle bars on a descent at 35mph) and spent the night in the hospital. I was in major pain and on a lot of drugs as you can see. I broke my collarbone into three pieces (had surgery the following week in CO), fractured three lumbar vertebrae, and had a bad concussion (my helmet cracked into three pieces). My dad also said I had "chipmunk syndrome" because my face was so swollen. Fortunately, I do not remember the crash and my body is healing well. I am not allowed to ride the road until February but am doing really easy trainer rides as of last week.

Another bummer of last month was that Cosby lost his fight to lung cancer. This picture was taken over Thanksgiving when he was still doing pretty well. He detoriated pretty quickly in the weeks following and my family had to say goodbye to our dog of 12 years.

However, just as cancer was trumped by First Descents (cancer camp) and winning two national titles, the harshness of the past month was trumped as well. I met Eric at para camp (he was piloting a tandem) and he has been a huge part of my life ever since. He is my perfect match and I gurantee you will be seeing him on my posts in the future. So, my life continues to follow Dickens' Tale of Two Cities quote: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." But the best of times always trump the worst and I would not trade one good thing to suffer less during the hard times. The blessings always outweigh the suffering.