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12:35 p.m. - Friday, May. 14, 2004
MsLeslie's Legs Kick Her Ass

I dragged myself home from three weeks in Thailand in the most wee hours of yesterday morning. My first thought on turning into the crowded parking lot of my apartment complex was only to wonder what it was about this place that keeps me in Mississippi. It�s only the place where my stuff is and I�m beginning yet again to hate my stuff.

On this third trip to the land of smiles and smiling pickpockets, I finally got personal with the land and its people. I traveled alone for the first time, using the trains and the bus system. I went far north, through countryside identical to the canopied jungles and red footpaths of Vietnam. On one day, I even enjoyed a lunch of fatty river fish and sweet strawberry wine on the banks of the Mekong River, looking across to Laos on the other side. There were demons in the north, but I seem to have kicked their asses.

In the end, it was my own body that defeated me. Even before I left the USA, both of my knees had been giving me a lot of pain. I knew it was arthritis and I knew there was little I could do to gain relief but I was determined to make the trip anyway, if for no other reason than that I had given my word to accompany an acquaintance who had never been to Thailand and to hold her hand for a few days after her surgery there.

My knees were excruciating every day of the three weeks. I hoped that exercising them and walking about might help them to improve, but they only got worse. Eventually, I had to seek medical assistance at the hospital in Chiang Rai, where the orthopedist only told me what I already knew and then prescribed strong medicine for the inflammation and pain so I might be able to stand the long trip home.

Later in my trip, I found myself checking into a hospital in Bangkok for three days in bed, trying to get control of the agonizing pain. By then I was concerned about the twenty some-odd hours in the air, but even more concerned with how I would move myself along the mile or so of airport corridors I would encounter before I arrived in New Orleans.

On the morning of my flight, I found I could barely make it from my room through the lobby and out to the waiting shuttle. I was leaning on my luggage, the walls, and anything else I could find to try to keep my weight off of my hot and swollen joints. I knew then I would never make it.

So, when I finally arrived at the airport and a young man directed me to the proper line and asked for my passport and ticket information, with tears barely contained, I told him I was injured and asked if the airport could provide wheelchair service. My knees, during my final moments in Thailand, had kicked my own ass.

For the first time since I had left Fitzsimmons Army Hospital in early 1969, I was dependant on someone other than myself. I felt that as a huge defeat, yet without the chairs and the chair pushers that wheeled me halfway around the world, I know I would never have been able to make the journey.

Now I�m home. My knees are no better, but at least I suffer in a familiar environment, with no need to worry about where I�ll be tomorrow. I have an appointment for Monday to see what can be done about these rebellious knees. At the moment, I only know I won�t live with this pain. I refuse to do it.

I also know I�ll never return to Thailand as a tourist. If an when I find the answer to my knee problem, I�ll only ever go back as a semi-resident. Four weeks isn�t enough time. I�m going to plan on no less than ninety days, most of which will be spent in the golden triangle area. Incredibly, I felt safer there than I do here.

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