Today Tucker is just one month from a year old.  He is still learning, but he is a great dog and true friend.  Tucker has made the last month so much more tolerable.  We’re hopefully going to take him and a few of his dog buddies out to the country today to let them run crazy through the fields.

I say I’m 4 weeks old because yesterday was 4 weeks since I crashed and fractured my skull. This past 4 weeks has been pretty strange.  Like maybe the strangest 4 weeks in my adult live.  I think I learned a bunch of stuff that I didn’t know about the human body that I never would have known, but the stuff I learned is only important to people not firing exactly right.  That is an understatement in many ways.

This past week I’ve been getting better.  A lot compared to the first three weeks.  I say that, but things are in turmoil enough, at least in flux, that it morphs on an hourly basis during the day.

Yesterday I woke up feeling the best I’d felt.  I wasn’t too dizzy and wasn’t much nauseated at all.  That was until about noon, then I started a slow descent.  By midnight, I wasn’t really able to lay horizontal to sleep, spinning like crazy anytime I got close to flat enough to sleep.  So, I didn’t sleep much compared to the last three nights.

This sleep thing is super important.  The more I can sleep, the better I’ve been feeling.  I think my head has really gotten closer to normal, but my ears are still so jacked up that the off-balance, spinning isn’t great.  The headaches aren’t nearly as bad as they were just 5 days ago. So if they keep improving like this past week, I should be alright sometime before Thanksgiving there.  Or at least Christmas.

Man, I write that and think, how can I be okay with that time frame.  Christmas is a month and a half away.  I think that is so long, but in the TBI time frame, it is pretty quick.  I haven’t really got that schedule totally absorbed.

I write all this, but this is just life.  I had a pretty bad crash and the results could had been much worse.  As usual, I feel lucky really.

On a sadder note here, I got contacted by my old Raleigh team mate, Mark Frise last night and he told me that his father, Bob, had passed away yesterday.

I’ve know Mr. Frise since I first started racing bikes.  Mark and Greg Demgen came down to Lawrence Kansas for the 2nd race I ever did.  They were riding for the Big 4, a trucking company that Mr. Frise owned.  I was only 14 and the last guy to stay with them.  The race was only 20 miles and about 10 miles in, they just said something and dropped me instantly.  I finished 3rd.

I raced against those two guys, along with Jeff Bradley, and a slew of other super talented young guys the next three years.  It was the reason I progressed.  Once Greg Lemond started hanging out in the midwest, it got just that much better.  There is no way I would have been nearly as good without this competition.

I went up to Lacrosse Wisconsin and stayed with Mark and his family a few times.  I’d never ridden my bike anywhere with such unbelievable climbs.  Mark and Greg Demgen took me out on rides that completely hooked me on the sport.  Greg Lemonds wife Kathy, is from Lacrosse too.  I saw her father, who was an allergy doctor, early in my career.

Mr. Frise always looked out for me.  He knew my situation and was super nice and helpful during those early years.  He took Mark and I up to Canada for the Tour de l’Abitibi, which Mark won overall.  My first trip out of the country to race my bike.  Actually, the first time I raced my bike over 2 days in a row.  I still have one of Mark’s leader’s jerseys from that race.  It is wool, of course.  Embroidered.  It is a jersey I cherish.

Mark’s dad mainly treated me like another one of his kids.   And his mom did the same.  She washed my clothes and fed me, which wasn’t an easy thing back in those days.   I was fortunate to have friends, then team mates, with such great parents.  It was the only way I got to progress to this point of my life.

I guess I’m to the age where my friend’s parents are close to the end of their lives.  It was an honor to have known Bob Frise.  I feel for Mark and his sisters and mother. Life is so unfair many times.

I’ll find some photos and post them later today.

Tucker is super obedient most of the time. Here he is waiting to jump out of the van and run into the fields as fast as he can.

As soon as I say it’s okay, he jumps and is gone.

An Instagram post from Mark’s son today.

1978 Junior National Team
Top L-R: Ed Burke, Jeff Bradley, Mark Frise, Ron Kiefel, Lee Ziff, Bill Humphries. Eddy B
Bottom L-R: Thurlow Rogers, Greg Demgen, Greg Lemond, Bob Bergdahl, Chris Carmichael.

You know, these days are really dragging along.  I’m too tired, or dizzy, to do much more than just sit.  And even though I’m sleeping some, I’m awake way more than I should be, so the days are longer than usual.  I wouldn’t normally mind that, but when I’m too under the weather to do anything productive, then the extra time seems valueless, even though maybe it just a short time, I’ll appreciate it.

Yesterday was Tucker’s 11 month birthday.  He loves running around in the fields that even though it isn’t too great for my energy levels, I’m doing it.  We end up walking a ways, which has to be good for me.  I’m walking pretty slowly, still having a balance issue.  It’s getting better, but it is still bad.

We ate dinner at the Walberg’s house.  It is just two blocks from mine, so it was another short walk.  It is fall here in Kansas now, the evening are cool.  I’m not eating much yet.  I’m not sure what that is all about.  Left over from Seattle, Keith and Catherine make pretty complicated and great meals at night.  This was the same.  It was super.

Yesterday I got a lot of emails.  I looked at some of them, which is kind of a first.  I still have nearly a 1000 I haven’t read.  I’m not sure when I’m going to go through those.  I can’t image doing it now.

I realize that so many of the emails are super uplifting and super nice.  I have to say that I am surprised how many people I don’t really know have reached out with their knowledge and encouragement.  Surprised might not be the right word.  Humbled might be more appropriate.

People I haven’t talked to or seen for years have sent me notes.  Even more is the gifts.  I can’t believe how many packages have come.  Bike tires, books on tapes, Omaha steaks, music, you name it, I have it now.

I have been thinking back upon this whole episode.  I don’t think I appreciated how jacked up I was at first.  I have been recreating the first few days I spent in the intensive care and now realize I don’t have an ability to remember much.  I don’t think I was out of commission.  I think my head hurt so badly that I didn’t have any extra energy to do anything other than try to deal with the pain.  Or throw up.

I have super good friends.  A lot of them.  They were by my side from the second I was laying on the road to leaving the hospital nearly a week later.  Again, at the time I don’t think I appreciated them enough because of my inability to do it at the time.

Joseph Schmalz rode over from Lawrence yesterday to see me.  That was super nice.  He ended up staying over an hour.  I hope he got back before it was dark.  He is racing Kansas State Cylcocross Championships in Kansas City today.  He was hurt pretty good in Hotter than Hell a couple months ago, so is just back into shape.  He should do fine today.  I wish him luck.

Okay, it’s all baby steps.  I’ve been riding the trainer everyday the past week.  Pitiful resistance and pitiful heart rate.  Even though, I feel a ton better just doing something even though it sometimes is a chore getting on it.  When I’m done, I feel the best I’ve felt all day.

I hope to go out to the country again this afternoon.  Bill has been bringing his English Setter too.  I think Catherine is going to come today and bring Jason, a pocket Pomeranian.  Jason is great, but not really a field dog.  He does try though.

These walks are the highlights of my day. At least I can do them somewhat.  It is better than sitting in a chair moping.

Kansas has locust trees. I hate these things. More than once, I’ve impaled myself on these.

Tucker runs continuously. He comes back and checks on us pretty often, but he has things to do.

There is worse things to do than walking around out in the country letting your dog play.