Life doesn’t always go as planned. And, sometimes, it REALLY doesn’t go as planned and you’re left juggling three emergencies and Huns at the north gate. That happened to me in June 2023. My middle sister had just had a baby, my youngest sister wanted to see the baby and baby’s older cousin who was graduating high school, and my husband’s work schedule included a team building exercise that involved parachutes and long drops.
In the whirlwind of chaos my husband did his high adrenaline fun with his work buddies and landed wrong. He didn’t die. For that I am truly grateful.
He did, however, damage his hip so badly that he couldn’t keep up with any of his regular activities. Things like running, biking, and parasailing were right out. Some days he had trouble standing.
After months of physical therapy it was determined that he needed hip surgery. Cue the call to the insurance.
Our insurance is funky. We’re Americans. We work overseas. But our insurance is covered by a company in the USA and not in Korea where we live. So we needed to find the nearest surgeon who would accept our insurance and who could do the repairs needed.
It turns out that the nearest hospital to Seoul was in Honolulu, Hawaii.
So, here I am, Valentine’s Day of 2024 sitting in a hotel room in Honolulu while my husband fades in and out of consciousness because he had hip surgery on Monday. Saying this wasn’t on my planning board for 2024 is an understatement.
My original plans involved a nice dinner out with said spouse, and working on the final pages of ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS A CRYPTID. Neither of those are happening.
And that’s okay.
Hubby will recover. We’ll do dinner out another night.
Books will get written. The deadline is four months away and I have time.
Today I’m living on Island Time, watching a storm roll in over the mountains and listening to the surf crash while daydreaming about buying a dive camera I’ll use once in a blue moon.
Before surgery hubby and I did go snorkeling. We saw sea turtles, a monk seal, and a leopard shark as well as hundreds of fish (most of which I can name despite not having used my marine bio degree in a professional capacity in over a decade).
If you come this way I highly recommend getting out of Honolulu and hitting the north shore. Wander towards Shark’s Cove (named for the shape, not the inhabitants) and Electric Beach. Bring water shoes and a snorkel, put on your sunscreen, and go have some fun!
