Dad needs to be careful

Dad is Mom's caretaker through her cancer treatment and, well, life in general.  Today he was trimming the scrub oak trees along our back fence so the sun gets to the bamboo screen and the garden better.  He set up a 25' ladder into one of the trees to trim some branches away.  We live on a hillside and the back of the lot has a really steep slope especially right at the fence.  Dad was up with the lopper (thank God not the chain saw) when the ladder slipped downslope and he was launched into mid-air.  He should be more like a cat and land on his feet instead of on his back with a thud.  The collision with the ground and the small of his back knocked the wind out of him making him crawl around on the ground on all fours like a dog gasping for air.  I felt sorry for him that he was in so much pain.  He's lucky he isn't either in the hospital with a broken back, hip or paraplegic as a result of that fall.  Dad is a Physics genius, so he thinks, so he calculated his speed on impact.  He estimates the collision at about 15 miles per hour when he landed.  He should be more like a cat and land on his feet!  He needs to keep himself healthy to take care of Mom while she fights the cancer.  Not splaying  on hard-pack and gasping for air for five minutes like today. He took some Alleve to ease the swelling.  His left elbow is all kinds of black and blue.  He did tough it out for the rest of the day to finish so the yard would look good when Mom came home.  Get it together dude!

Mom came home and felt sorry for him and scolded him too.  She pointed out the she may outlive him because he has so  many accidents that cause bodily harm to the old duffer.  Dad cooked her hamburger sliders with grilled zucchini from our garden.  They laughed and hugged and generally enjoyed the evening.  The old duffer recovered well!