A shout out to the cohabitants of people with broken legs.

Undoubtedly the folks with the broken legs have it worst.  They have pain and reduced mobility and the mushy fall leaves are slippery under their crutches.

But their housemates . . . they take out the trash and recycling, vacuum, clean the toilets, fetch the laundry from the basement, bring in the groceries and put them away and walk the dog! For many months.

Walking back from school  with BF, he was a celebrity with the "Oh I broke my [leg, heel, toe] once too!" crowd.  (One of that crowd is himself actually a radio celebrity; he shared his story of taking off his cast/boot too early and, as a result, having what now looks like, in his words,  a misshapen "old man foot."  Some have a face for radio; I guess he has a foot for it).  Several people wanted to share their accident stories, the duration of their cast-wearing,  their surgical scars, and the appearance of their wounded limbs. 

Peripheral to the sharing and camaraderie, I suddenly, urgently, felt a desire to find the spouse of every one of that crowd and say:

 "Mon semblable, mon frere/soeur:
we who take out the garbage, vacuum, do the laundry, clean toilets, bring in the groceries and walk the dog
are the the invisible crutches behind the crutches! 
Let us celebrate that our working limbs let us heft and carry! 
Let us spend an evening together writing rude words on the crutches of our injured loved ones! 
Let us reorganize our kitchens to suit just ourselves!
Let us wash the clothes on cold instead of warm, if we so choose!
Let us missort the socks!
Let us buy the bread we like better, because if we are  buying it and putting it away, why should we not?
Let us, in short, indulge in small acts of selfish mischief because we are the invisible crutches
and  while the extra chores make us a bit shorter on time, we have the power.
Courage!  Mes amies!