The Patient Speaks!

Thought I’d give you all a good belly laugh as sometimes that’s the best way to perk up and forget your troubles and pain for at least a moment or two.  There will be no comments about pain or preaching about your responsibility in this article.  Just good, clean laughter.  The following story is absolutely true.  Wife and I still chuckle about it and hopefully you will too!

On our recent vacation, we took a train from London to the Cotswold area of western England with a plan to enjoy some of the Public Footpaths the area is famous for.  Unlike the USA, the United Kingdom is peppered with trails throughout the countryside that the public, as long as they stick to the posted path, are allowed to use.  The trails, or Public Footpaths as the British say, many times cut right through private property.  Sheep, cow and horse pastures are common.  There are companies you can hire to transport your luggage from town to town while you walk across the countryside.  We chose to base ourselves at a specific Bed & Breakfast as we only had two days to walk.

We got out to Moreton-in-Marsh about 11:30am on a Tuesday, walked over to the B&B, got all settled and wouldn’t you know it – as soon as we turned the corner into the High Street, there was a street market. I cried with fear, wife cried with happiness.  As many times as we’ve been to Moreton, we’ve never encountered the market.  Apparently, it takes place every Tuesday of the year, Christmas & New Years the only non-weather exceptions. We ate our lunch by visiting the street vendors which, just like in the USA, normally have the best hot dogs, etc.  Next, visited the Town Council’s office of tourism and obtained the appropriate footpath maps and guides and set off.  Now the funny bit – feel free to laugh at any time.

Being city folk born and bred, imagine our trepidation when the marked path took us through an occupied cow pasture.  That would rarely, if ever, happen in the USA because the landowner would be terrified of liability and litigation.  Since the map was very clear, and the gate to the pasture was clearly marked with a specific placard, we knew we were in the right spot.  Plus we could see the gate at the opposite end of the pasture just where the map said it would be.  Oh, “occupied” as in a herd of cows. Anyway, we figured if we kept to ourselves with no sudden moves or outbursts, the cows would ignore us.  Wrong.

The herd of approximately 50 cows was all the way across the field.  Of course, as soon as we got to the middle – between the two gates and therefore past the point of no return – the cows all of a sudden decided watching us wasn’t enough and decided to investigate “up close and personal”.  My genteel and formal upbringing forbids me from telling you what both wife and I said out loud when the situation dawned on us.  The herd surrounded us in a tight circle and just stood there, looking (or glaring) at us. Amazing how large a cow is when you are not safe in your car whizzing by at 55mph.  It was like a cartoon.  When we took a step forward, the whole herd would move a step in unison forward, sideways or back depending upon their position in the circle.  Again, being city folk, we had no idea of what proper cow pasture etiquette was.  So we just kept walking toward the gate which looked ever so small on the horizon.  And the cows kept moving (or is that moo-ving?) in unison.  As we approached the gate, which was an elevated “V” in the fence and an amusing story in its own right, the cows directly in front of us parted just enough so we could access the crossing.  Apparently they had messed with tourists before!   When safely on the other side (we hadn’t realized we were in yet another occupied cow pasture), we turned to get a photograph and all the cows were pressed up against the fence with a look in their eyes such as “Hey! Where ya goin’?”

When we got back to Moreton-in-Marsh, we got a table in the local pub next to the fire and laughed and laughed.  Then I told wife that, as hard as we were laughing, imagine how hard the farmer and his wife were laughing as they watched the two city tourists from their kitchen with binoculars.  Wife snorted Diet Coke out her nose.  I managed to savor every last drop of my pint of Guinness.  The next day, we took the local bus to the picturesque town of Bourton-on-the-Water and did a five mile loop with much the same experience.

In all seriousness, we had such a good time walking the Public Footpaths, we plan on doing it again.  With all the guffawing and belly-laughs we did, we temporarily forgot all our 55+ years of aches and pains, all the worries at home, all the pressures of whatever and simply rejoiced in life.  Are you laughing at/with us?  GOOD!

So there I was, riding the Piccadilly branch of the London Undergound when I spotted a short article in the METRO newspaper entitled “Tune In”.  The first sentence is what caught my eye: “Listening to music can reduce chronic pain and depression by up to 25 percent, according to new research”.  It goes on to say there were tests done by having people listen to an hour’s worth of music every day and attributed the info to the Journal of Advanced Nursing.  The test subjects, as a whole, reported improved physical and psychological symptoms.  Amazing what you can learn on the Tube, or any other public transit system, eh?!

As I thought about my own experiences over the years – OK, decades – I half agreed and half disagreed with the article.  Then I narrowed it down further to what type of chronic pain I was challenged with at the moment.  For my headache, neither Bach, Strauss or Mozart would do any better for me than acid rock.  When it’s headache time it is “leave me alone” and turn out the lights.  Arthritis (primarily hands and neck) is a different story.  When I am sitting in my overstuffed leather chair listening to my favorite music of the moment, I get lost in the sounds and temporarily forget about my discomfort.  When the music is done, I may feel “better” enough to tackle the lawn mowing or my household chore of the week.

So there it is, then.  Next time your significant other glares at you with that “you’re lazy, bone-idle and a couch potato” accusatory laser stare, you can reply that you have engaged in a published method of physical recuperation that will allow you to actually “think” about doing the chores.  Nobody said it was scientifically proven, but it was published!