The ice was particularly treacherous up here last winter, and it seemed as if the freeze/thaw cycle continued for months. Our driveway was a skating rink for a good deal of the winter, and while I often wore grips over my winter boots when I took Jasper out for her walks, one fateful morning in January, I neglected to put them on. I have to put them on outside the house as they can mar the floor. Sure enough, that was the day I slipped on the ice and fell. You wouldn’t think a 16-pound miniature Schnauzer could cause an accident like that, but walking down the steep portion of our driveway – the only place TO walk last winter – she pulled me just hard enough to yank my feet out from under me, and down I went, hard onto my right shoulder. That is the same shoulder on which I’d had surgery performed over thirty years ago. I knew I had sustained some trauma, but it didn’t hurt all that much, and I didn’t pay a lot of attention to it at the time. Within a week, when the injury had not healed and the strength in my right arm was severely compromised, I saw my doctor and began to go for physiotherapy. With no improvement after six weeks, and after an X-Ray and an MRI, it became apparent that the injury requires surgery.
Originally, my surgery was scheduled for August 29th, less than a month after I had my appointment with the surgeon. The problem with this, apart from the fact that I didn’t want to cut the boating season short, is that it likely means I will not play the guitar for several months. I’m done with the Tree Ring Tuesday performances, which were a lot of fun by the way, but I’m furiously recording songs while I still have Juan Barbosa at my disposal. He did a wonderful job with my first album of songs and now we’ve begun to record songs for a second album. After I have two albums under my belt, I hope to persuade some of the local musicians to cover my songs in a third album. I have lined up some musicians and want to strike while the iron is at least luke warm. Last week, Shauna arranged to bump my surgery back to October 24th, so I will have a little more lead time to get some of these songs “in the can.” While I do not delude myself into thinking this is in any way important to anyone but me, I have come this far and I want to finish what I started. Then I can move on to my next hobby: upholstering couches with squirrel fur.
My last Tree Ring Tuesday performance of this summer was held last week at "Seven Main Café" in Huntsville, where I was joined by a fellow singer/songwriter, Michael “Lopez” Phillips. One of our G-d-daughters, Lindsay Watson, drove all the way up from Toronto to surprise me with her attendance, and that made me extremely happy. I think she genuinely enjoyed hearing me perform. Ever my promoter and biggest fan, Shauna was out in the street before we began, handing out fliers and urging people to attend the free concert. As I said before, Tuesdays are a hard sell, but we’ve managed to attract some audiences. I could not “hear the crickets” at the end of each song. It is my aspiration to somehow promote and sponsor our local community of musicians, young and old. We’ve got great talent up here in the GWN, and Hunter’s Bay Radio, our community radio station, is committed to giving these artists a voice. I will pay local musicians to produce and cover my songs. As well, I intend to contribute to the local organizations that promote young musicians in the area, and help them to learn their craft. Music heals! Sadly, it does not repair torn rotator cuffs.
Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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