Good morning, world.
Life has a strange sense of timing.
Here I am with another ankle surgery approaching, sitting in a rehab bed with a metal framework bolted into my lower right leg, my white hair and beard growing increasingly long and wild, and my laptop open beside me.
And somehow, I’m still building.
I’ve been tweaking code, developing websites, designing some great logos, and working out as much as my present circumstances allow.
It is probably a good thing ChatGPT lacks feelings—at least I think it does—because otherwise it might be thoroughly annoyed with me by now. I push it hard, change direction, notice one more detail, and then ask it to take another run at the whole thing.
But it hasn’t walked out on me yet.
In fact, we are working together remarkably well.
Shelby has handled my new phone, and it should arrive here any day. We’re putting it on her plan, which should finally bring that ridiculous phone adventure—old addresses, failed deliveries, and all—to an end.
My roommate Charlie came into my room this morning pushing my wheeled walker. For a moment, I thought he was another Pillars patient who had wandered into the wrong room.
Then I realized it was Charlie bringing back my little walker.
It felt surprisingly good to see both of them.
Then came the bigger news.
My next ankle surgery is scheduled for Wednesday morning, July 22—the day before I turn eighty.
God, life is strange.
I could spend a lot of time thinking about how much more enjoyable parts of my life might have been if things had gone differently.
I recently allowed myself to care deeply for a woman who did not feel the same way. That hurts. But honesty is not a mistake, even when it does not bring the answer you hoped for.
You can offer another person the truth of what you feel.
You cannot decide what they feel in return.
So now I am trying to face what is directly in front of me.
First, surgery.
Then, healing.
Then, home.
I am more than ready to escape the institutional rhythm of bells, meal trays, bandages, schedules, and waiting for someone else to decide when the next part of my day begins.
And when I am strong enough, I am going to try for the beach again.
The beach was in sight when I went down on the Fourth of July.
I didn’t make it that day.
But I am not finished trying.
Maybe that is what turning eighty means for me: not pretending the road has been easy, not denying what has been lost, and still looking toward the next thing worth building.
Even from this bed, I am working.
Pillars is becoming a real home within BluSup—a place that recognizes the people, care, history, and recovery happening around me.
BluPilot is growing from an idea born out of injury into a serious mobility project that could someday help people move more safely and independently.
The MB Journal continues telling the story as it happens.
And BluSup.com keeps becoming the larger world that holds all of it together.
I will have surgery the day before I turn eighty.
I intend to arrive at eighty still hopeful, still creating, and still planning another trip to the beach.
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