Mt. Cook Mt. Cook was definitely one of the more enjoyable and scenic parts of Tisa and I's voyage. To anyone who is not familiar with it, Mt. Cook (or Aoraki in Maori) is the tallest peak in New Zealand with an summit of 3,754 meters or 12,316 feet. The water in the river was frigid and the shaky suspension bridge that towered over it was something out of an Indiana Jones movie. To say the very least, I loved the experience.

My Poor Fragmented Ankle photo 34584 754 0 right Vance Kotrla and me taking a buddy picture just a few weeks before I landed on the ankle This photo would have been in early March 1996 photo Just a few weeks after my 17th birthday I participated in the 1996 Katy ISD Junior Varsity district track meet I was not very fast but that only partially mattered I was a pole vaulter I wasn t a particularly great pole vaulter but as it happens nobody else was either The two leaders in the district were me and a guy named Jim Davidson Incidentally he went on to marry Vance s in the photo high school girlfriend I like to think I was favored to win I always warmed up in my heavy sketcher boots the iconic 90s leather boots with steel in the toes It was certainly unconventional but my logic was that if I could get my feet moving in those the feather weight track shoes with spikes would let me fly It s unclear if that decision affected what happened next but my coach certainly thought so After just as handful of warmups I took to the vaulting runway again My speed was good the pole hit the vault box right on the mark and I launched a good eleven feet into the air It was almost perfect Unfortunately instead of landing on my back I came down straight onto my right ankle The weight of my body from that height essentially bent my ankle 90 degrees inward I laid on the pad screaming in excruciating pain I was eventually carted away to the trainer on the school s golf cart My dad drove me to the hospital shortly thereafter The hospital told us that I had a very bad sprain but no broken bones I wore a soft ankle brace for the next two months Jim Davidson won the meet Fast forward 17 years Apparently after almost two decades of recurring injuries from football soccer tennis baseball and running my ankle said go fuck yourself I literally just stretched my ankle at my desk and it never recovered from that stretch I was immediately in pain I assumed I had just contorted it strangely and it would be fine in the morning Not so much It turns out that there are three bone fragments apparently referred to as loose bodies floating around in my tissue Over the years the ligaments have been pulling away from the ankle bone forcing these loose bodies into uncomfortable positions It s not clear exactly what I did but the end result is that two of my ligaments are torn and at least one of the pieces of bone has turned itself inward causing all of the pain This was confirmed with an ultrasound Adding to my month of international traveling home rebuilding moving and job transitions I will now be doing all of this from a boot and having surgery before long the bone fragments really need to be removed Since I ve apparently been exercising on the ankle of a 65 year old for the past 17 years I m very curious to see what my ankle feels like in a few months Thankfully my sister has graciously agreed to care for me