Old Friends, New Books and Timeless Music

 I love a good book!  Always have, always will!  To me, the best books are those my friends write!  I love to put on some good music and do my housework, always have, always will.  And I look forward to more new books from people I know.  

It's nearing mid-October as I write this blog.  I admittedly had difficulty getting around to writing.  

It wasn't a lack of material, nor a lack of motivation.  Rather the opposite!  The heat of summer had finally subsided, and the too-brief fall weather had me, for the first time ever, with a seemingly unquenchable case of "fall fever".  Some think it was because of the eclipse tomorrow, or the upcoming winter being predicted to be unusually hard.  

On this Friday the 13th, knowing my beloved OT mentory "Petie" has a birthday this month, I pushed myself to come in from the outside and write this post.  Weeks ago, as summer turning to fall, I was thrilled to see my old friend from seemingly another life, had provided a book through Amazon!  Oh my goodness, to see a face framed in the outdoors jacket on this cover brought it back to me as if I'd just seen her last week instead of the last century! 

Cleverly titling her creation A Frican Odyssey, I'd ask the friends who ordered another friend's book from Amazon for me back in 2020 to order this one.  They ordered it immediately and it arrived very quickly -- and I settled in to read what Julie wrote about the story I knew from the year after it occurred -- her African adventure that brought her into the maylay of mainstream medical care in Colorado. 

The last book a friend published on Amazon my friend brough me after I was over the C-bug, in 2020, and I would sit on the floor and read one story a day to Tres, the new old dog I'd adopted on the day I'd caught the bug, it turns out.  Different client's houses and thankfully nobody caught it from me.  The poor dog watched, clearly concerned about me, as I went through a fraction of what Julie recounts in her book from her African adventure bug.  

Her unfortunate Odyssey lead to a feature in the weekend Rocky Mountain News, as she was getting prepared to return to work as a flight attendant for Delta Airlines.  I had a subscription to that good ol' newspaper.  In those days we had a choice of that tabloid style paper and The Denver Post, which you unfold and it's so large you have a massive paper to figure out how to read. 

When I became an occupational therapist and was getting together with Julie on a regular basis on weekends to get outside and enjoy the day, or go out to eat or get coffee, one of my patients told me they got the bigger paper in order to make themselves have the workout of holding their arms out and unfolding / folding it.  No kidding!  

I'd learn of Julie Emery that winter's day before Christmas in the late 1980s, while merrily drinking my coffee and reading The Rocky Mountain News before tackling the yearly task of Christmas card addressing.  I had a pretty big job for a "girl" with no college degree, with a big researcher and his pretty big deal research program that funneled funds through Colorado State University in Fort Collins. 

  Seize the day .... 

I'd had my health crash after we moved into a new addition, after I'd bought a new car, and after I'd had the stress of my mother, a work associate, and a good friend die unexpectedly within the first two months of 1987.  I'd gotten married that New Year's Eve, and a teenage stepchild was a responsibility I took seriously and helped with.  Or tried. I'd worked hard to regain my well-being to some degree, and was putting off taking classes towards the pre-OT requirements.  Until I read about Julie Emery.  

Since I had cards sitting on the table and was inspired by what I read about her in the paper, I sent her a card through the reporter at the News.  The New reporter was diligent in forwarding it to Julie, and as it turned out, she had just returned from an initial work trip that she refers to in the book and was doubting her ability to resume her previous, beloved vocation. 

But what I'd related in the card about my and my husband's recent seemingly insurmountable health issues gave her hope.  And she wrote me a letter in return --- a task that even today would be difficult.  I was so surprised when, in my mailbox at my little brick house with a white fence and trim, there was mail from this Julie person!  

I'd have the occasion to need to drive to the Colorado Health Department offices in Denver in early 1990 and saw the street sign for the street I recognized as "that Julie Emery person".  I'd see a phone booth and look up her phone number in the book in the booth, and the sweetest person answered -- she was home, making pea soup and would love for me to drop by. 

I was getting my birth certificate -- at almost 30 -- to finally get a passport in order to go out of the United States for my upcoming 30th birthday.  That was the only time it got stamped, and that tells you how different we were in that regard.  Because my odyssey isn't so easily solved by mainstream medicine, and I'd spend my travel money on things insurance didn't pay for.  Doesn't make for such an exciting book.  But if a person wants help navigating how to do as I did, I have that experience to guide them.  

When it came to hiking, mountain biking, snow shoeinng or going out on the town, we were in the same realm in those days.  She had learned to compensate well using her cosmetic dominant arm prosthesis -- I only once saw her using the functional hook prosthesis when at home doing something that required it.  I'd mostly remember the stories of her frustrations when she was adapting to things, some of which are in this book.  She's so funny..... I just love her.  

I'd message Julie to ask if she typed or dictated her book and it turns out her beloved sister had gifted her a subscription to a service that you can dictate your life story it they turn it into a book and give you the PDF so you can use it for other things -- which provided the foundation for the book you can purchase today on Amazon. 

She said she'd consider doing more based on the response she had to this one.   On this Friday the 13th I give a nod to the sisters out there -- good and not so good, and am thankful Julie's got her going on sharing her story.  It's one worth buying and reading, in my opinion. Here's the link: 

  A Frican Odyssey: Travel Stories: Emery, Julie: 9798856418957: Amazon.com: Books

I'm also wanting to acknowledge my mentor in upper extremities -- there were two.  One was Julie's OT turned "second mom", Bonnie Olivette (sp?), who agreed to be my very first internship supervisor in the mid-1990s, thanks to Julie.   This website would not be here being used by you right now reading had it not been for Julie, and Bonnie.   I got to see the ideal created under the old system of payments from insurances. 

The second is our beloved "Petie", who picked up the ball teaching me in bits of time about upper extremity therapy as a coworker in a skilled nursing facility wing near Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado Springs. She also got to see the great times from before!  

We'd crossed paths years before when I was getting my experience in driving rehabilitation and she was bringing her adult son for rehabilitative driving, and became friends.  She's turning another year older this year and didn't even want to talk about it when I called.  Kind of like when Julie was getting back on track of her newfound life after the Frican Odyssey.  Petie's had hers as well.  May she dictate it at least, and hopefully turn it into a book for me to write about here someday. Maybe in her 90s.  Grins