Ostomy Memories of Missing Body Parts

Missing body parts don’t stop people with pride and grit. Tammy Duckworth lost both her legs piloting a Blackhawk helicopter in Iraq, but went on the become a U. S. Senator and have a child. Johannes Michalski was a double amputee living in southern Utah who became a well-known painter. And of course, Helen Keller led a fuller life than most people, and she lacked both sight and hearing. So who’s to say that a lost large intestine and rectum ought to stop anyone? [I may be gutless but I’m not an asshole.] It would seem, then, that parts previously considered essential were really something you could do without if you set your mind to it. In high school, for instance, my dark curly hair was one of my most attractive features; now I’m bald as a field mushroom, but still have my charms. About eight years ago, I had to have a laparoscopic cholecystectomy to remove my gallbladder. My doctor, a comedian, told me that I wouldn’t miss it. “Without it, you will no longer be the kvetch your wife says you are, since you won’t be so galling.” So, we get by, we make do with what we have, we adapt. We don’t whine; we mellow. We become philosophical. As curmudgeons, we may be churlish, irascible fellows and a trifle cantankerous at times, but we’re just as sensitive and soft-hearted as anyone. Despite what we’ve been through, the pain and the stolen body parts, we don’t hate mankind, just mankind’s excesses.

I agree with so much of your offering, Henry. We humans seem to do so well improvising to satisfy our needs and, often, the needs of others. With prostheses, body mechanics, PT, and a strong will to succeed, we get it done. I think an exception to these accomplishments is when one loses one's mind. The more I watch the boob tube, the more I feel our species is losing its ability to think. Maybe it's just because it's more difficult lately with a pandemic, climate change, the Divided Circus of America, and the rest of the crap. What's most difficult for me to understand is the more one's mind gets lost, the louder their voices become. I don't know how they're connected, but it helps me better understand the cerebral-anal relationship.
I probably have no business thinking this way, so I'm forgiving myself in advance by offering that my mind was totally disconnected from my fingers, so I can't be responsible for whatever they typed.
Approaching total nutsnimania, Mike

You have plenty of right to think this way, and you are right.  The whole country has been dumbed down, critical thought has become rare, and reason cannot be counted on to overcome prejudice, preconceived ideas, and stupidity.  As a species, homo sapiens has not risen as far as it thinks it has above the beasts in the field that, in fact, do not perform near the depredations upon each other as we humans do.

Hang on, fellas......I'm still looking up "irascible." Give me a minute here...........I'll be right back.

;0)

bob