One day Joe broke his arm. Joe was a traceur.* He loved the exhilaration he got from looking at the world as one big obstacle course--climbing and falling, escaping, and reaching. Joe pushed himself on his runs, sometimes over cars or walls, sometimes across rooftops. Sometimes too far. Destiny watched him from afar, eyeing his toothpick arm and waiting for her chance.
*A traceur is a participant of parkour, a physical discipline--also considered an art form--that focuses on uninterrupted, efficient, forward motion over, under, around, and through man-made and natural obstacles in one's environment. Such movement may come in the form of running, jumping, climbing, and other more complex techniques. The goal of practicing parkour is to be able to adapt one's movement to any given scenario so that any obstacle can be overcome with the human body's abilities. (Wikipedia contributors, "Parkour," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkour [accessed August 1, 2006])
On the morning that he broke his arm, Joe had gone with a couple of friends on a practice run for a home video they were making. A few warm-up moves gave Destiny her chance.
Joe ran up a small wall, perched on the top for an instant, then leaped out into space. His fingers closed around a horizontal metal bar in front of him, a bar that was supposed to stop his fall, a bar supported by rotting wood. The wood gave way, and Joe fell backwards.
The loose, dusty ground broke more than his fall. Joe scrambled to his feet, clutching his left arm. His wrist was bent down and then up in a sharp "Z." Someone called the paramedics while Joe tried to smile, tried to be brave--tried not to look at it.
The paramedics arrived and gave their diagnosis: two fractures in the radius and a dislocated wrist.
Joe woke up in the hospital, eyelids still heavy from the sedatives they'd given him and a white plaster cast from his wrist to his elbow.
For four weeks Joe struggled with his disability. He learned to type with one hand, to live without daily showers, to let other people button his shirts and tie his shoes and wash his dishes and take out the trash.
After a month, the cast came off. Finally Joe was free. He spent ten minutes scratching and an hour and a half in the bathtub.
But all was not back to normal. Over a month of disuse, the muscles in his left arm had shrunk and atrophied. His left arm was now half its original thickness, and the skin hung like plastic wrap over his mended bone. The slightest attempt to turn or straighten the arm sent shock waves of pain through his body.
Heat therapy helped to loosen the shriveled muscles, and he was able to pivot the wrist a little more each day. Finally he could scratch the back of his head. Finally he could type. Finally he could lift his arms and praise the Lord. Finally Jesus told Joe it was time to start strength therapy.
After a month of stockpiling cobwebs in the darkness under Joe's bed, his old 35-pound dumbbell again found itself in the center of the room, squinting at the light. Joe said a prayer for safety, leaned over, grabbed the handle with his left hand, and tried to lift. Nothing. He strained. He sweated. He gritted his teeth and chewed into his tongue. He flared his nostrils and breathed threats at the stubborn iron mass. The weight just sat there grinning. Tactics would have to change.
Joe borrowed a small expandable dumbbell from his sister (for a paperweight, he told her). It was tiny and covered in green plastic. Joe made sure no one saw him as he snuck it into his room.
As Joe struggled with his little green "paperweight," he could picture his friends grunting under the weight of giant barbells, heaving and thrusting as they exerted themselves silly. If Joe was strong, he would be there with them. But he wasn't. In fact, he was shamefully weak.
It was hard work at first--even with such a ridiculously small plaything--and every lift pained him. But as the days went by and he ignored the ache in his wrist, it began to go away. Soon Joe had mastered the little green toy.
What pride he felt when he added two more little green disks. His friends, who had discovered his secret, applauded. He wasn't strong, he kept reminding himself, but he was getting strong. It was obvious where he needed more work, but the solution wasn't to crush himself with unrealistic expectations. It was to start small and work up.
Joe kept at it over the weeks that followed until he had added all of his sister's little green disks to the dumbbell and was flinging it around like an expert. By now he could see the progress he was making. At last he was ready. To his surprise, the iron dumbbell under the bed surrendered easily, subjugated by determination and those little green steps of progress.
Joe still has a ways to go before his arm is completely back to normal, but he knows it won't help to write tearful ballads about things he could once do. Instead, he keeps a determined ear to the Lord's lips, with a determined heart to take each step of progress Jesus suggests--never mind how foolish or how "green" it seems. Instead, he keeps his eyes pasted to the Lord and His strength, which he knows he'll need to lift even just one extra pound. He looks back at how far he's come, and ahead to complete recovery one day.
And when that day comes, well, I might just go out for another run.
Joe Johnston is a member of the Family International in Mexico.