The Boot

I haven’t posted for a few weeks. This summer I was a wreck. No, really. After a fist-full of accident-free decades, I was involved in a car crash. Two, actually, within a month and a half of each other, but who’s counting?

Enter the boot.

But not quite yet.

Cue the first accident. I was visiting a friend who lives in the country. I will spare you the details, but a dark, curvy unfamiliar road and a black bovine or two were a part of the scene. I will steer clear of the details. 😉

After a few weeks of physical therapy I was released. Good as new, or as new as a person my age can be.

On the first day of September I had a collision with another vehicle. I wasn’t injured too badly, way less than my car. It was totaled.

I, on the other hand, was recovering nicely, except for my foot. Three weeks after the accident had occurred, I returned to the doctor who determined I had a stress fracture. And that’s when the boot came into play.

I was instructed to wear a non-flexible boot on my right foot for six weeks. Which I am doing! One week and a half weeks left, but who’s counting? It has gone relatively smoothly after I adapted to the driving thing. What I didn’t expect was the conversation-starter my boot has become.

So many people ask me about the boot I am wearing. Strangers in stores, waitresses; people at church and work all want to know what happened to my foot. So I tell them I was in a car accident which left me with a fractured foot. And then THEY  tell me the story of when they had to wear a boot.

Which is probably why they ask about mine in the first place. And that’s okay.

Our life is our story. We all have stories that we want to tell. We want to connect with others who know where we’ve been, or who have been where we are.

It’s the way we were created.

People have a need to be heard. They want to be acknowledged and recognized, even if it’s by a total stranger. And usually connection happens because of a commonality. A boot perhaps?

I don’t have any astounding stories of how a life was changed because a conversation happened due to the boot I am wearing, but this experience has opened my eyes to how God can use us and our stories to touch the lives of people if we are open.

God can even use a boot to create connection.