Week Seven of the Terminal Knee Watch. I can walk as fast or as long as I want. I can swim. I can play golf. I can climb up and down a stepladder. I can squat. I can kneel. I can rise from a sitting position on the floor. I can once again handle my dog on a leash. I can go yonder (only my Steeples understand that one). In addition to Child’s Pose and I can also practice:

These three poses are improvements over previous weeks. (Photos gleaned with respect from Yoga.com) Seven weeks later and improvement is still taking place; this knee simply will not stop, people.

I can sit cross-legged. Whereupon I can be enchanted by YogiCat’s commandeering of my meditation space. She’s watching the fairy lights twinkle. After this she would curl up to take a nap right there in the basket, so I didn’t have the heart to ring the bowl.

I can hike up to the neighborhood food truck for afternoon coffee.

I know what you must be thinking. Is there anything I cannot do? I still cannot run. I cannot hop down from any height to land on my left leg. I cannot apply force to a shovel with my left foot. The knee will still not tolerate any impact greater than walking or descending stairs. But this is not a post about what I can’t do; it’s a post about what I can do.

I can cook. I can do home improvement projects. I can work in the garden/yard. I can attend community events. I can drive. I can work my day job. I can shop. I can perform a wide range of household tasks. I can bend to reach books at the library. I can pivot and panic to hustle away from a spider floating down from the ceiling in the file room (which obviously means I can never go into that room again). I can climb into and out of the bath unassisted. I can hunker down during a tornado warning. I can spin around in a circle in any given space trying to remember why I walked into that space (why did I come in here?).

I can go for a walk at the lake, the same lake at which I have run many miles over the past ten years, and finally appreciate that it is more lovely than I ever noticed.

I can pick up trash which has washed up on the shore. I can stop to coo at baby ducks. I can move way in earnest from mama ducks. And because I’m walking, not running, I can go in the middle of the day without a life-or-death battle in the heat. We’re already reaching the 80s here in Mercyburg. By this time next month it will be 90s and you know what happens after that.

Look at all the things I can do with my knee. My sublime, glorious, resplendent knee. How lucky am I to have this knee? Who could ask for a better life with a knee such as this one? I am favored, blessed, and splendidly advantaged to have this knee. Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, this knee walks me into mine. I could not be more in love with this resilient, supple, life-affirming hinge. Whatever this knee needs, she shall have, even if she needs me not to run. It’s an easy trade when you consider all the knee does for me. I can do this for her.

— Mercy