Blisters and Roses

First things first: there will only be pictures of the roses, not the blister, or the mosquito bites. Those also happened. You're welcome, or sorry for the disappointment if you're some kind of creepy freak.

My neighbor is taking a vacation (or "going on holiday" if you prefer the British term) and asked me to water her houseplants and keep her lawn under some semblance of control. Many moons ago, I regularly did yard work for her before she retired. It was a good summer supplement to my meager earnings. I guess that prior work still carries some weight, or maybe she just knows my schedule is pretty open right now for odd jobs.

A fair bit has changed in her yard since when I used to mow it. Some old trees had been cut down. New trees and shrubs have been planted. There's a new perimeter fence. On the whole, the job remains basically the same.

One feature which has changed little is the rose bush near her deck. Before she owned this house, there was a sandbox. She had bought the rose in a boring plastic gallon flower pot, set it in a corner of that sandbox, and for some reason or another, she never got it planted anywhere else. Instead, the rose decided, "I like it right here," grew through the plastic, and established itself. It has grown ever since. It was in full bloom all these years later. Here are a couple pics I snapped with my phone, cropped to focus on the flowers.

I guess if there's a moral to this story, it's "be like that rosebush."

Well, there's another moral to this story, I guess. "Don't always power through discomfort."

Before that, more lighthearted stuff. I also watered her indoor plants. She has many. This is just one of them from some snapshots I took to remind myself what I needed to water as a sort of visual checklist.

On with the blister story. On Sunday, I rolled her push mower out of her shed and got to work. Just one pull on the cord got it roaring to life.

So far, so good.

I'm still trying to break in some new boots, and I wasn't too happy with how they felt, but I was stubborn and finished the front and side areas before deciding it was just too much discomfort to tackle the bigger back yard right away. I'm glad I stopped when I did. I walked (or limped) home and pulled my boots off to reveal a very red and swollen spot on my heel more than 1" square, and the top layer of skin was loose. This was a bad blister in the making, but it hadn't started filling with fluid.

It hasn't fully bubbled up, but a few areas inside the wider inflamed blister zone look worse than the rest. I had been keeping it covered with a large bandage just as some extra cushioning at night, and applying aloe and other topical treatments as needed. I even managed to finish mowing the back yard with different footwear and cautious steps on Monday, although favoring my foot with an awkward gait led to sore knees and hips, but last night was shortened by increasing discomfort and my heel felt hot. While writing this very post, part of the blister burst, and now it is covered with antibiotic ointment and a gauze pad, all loosely held in place with an elastic bandage.

And to top everything off, mosquitos somehow bit my elbow through my light long-sleeved work shirt along the way. Such is life. Bastard sky piranhas. No sunburn, though! If there's a third moral to this rambling story, it's wear sunscreen or cover your skin, because that life-giving glowing orb can be a nasty bitch, too.