The Story of a Broken Ankle and some Bronica 110mm Macro Shots.

So the old year ended with the thud of Gillian falling on the stairs as she missed a step while we were moving a mattress at near midnight. The wine we had drunk early that evening, I’m sure, played no part in this incident and thankfully no blame has been attached to me as the man pulling at the other end.

Apart from the look of shock on her face, she appeared to be in no pain, so I suggested nothing could have been broken. The fact she was now unable to walk rather put the kibosh on this snap diagnosis and the horror of a late night trip to casualty seemed the only option.

We arrived at Casualty after midnight and, avoiding the closing time rush, moved through the system at what seemed a reasonable pace to find this was a very badly broken ankle inducing much shaking of heads and sucking of teeth amongst the professionals. I saw no evidence of huge emotional  storms sweeping the staff or any life changing acts of redemption amongst the patients – so not like the TV series at all.

The ankle, broken in three places was too swollen to operate so we were sent home for two weeks before the surgeons could do their work. Stairs suddenly became a huge obstacle and, even after surgery, Gillian remained upstairs apart from periodic nightmare trips to the well named Trauma Clinic for the best part of two months. My sympathy for patients and their carers the world over increased immeasurably during this phase. Up and down those bloomin’ stairs I went, raising my fitness levels to heights only a 2012 aspirant could rival. The patient, a perpetual motion machine at the best of times, could only look on and admire (I think that’s the right word)  as I valiantly kept the domestic ship on course through the early months of 2011.  It was nothing, pretty much what I do the rest of the year and that Peace Lily dying could have happened to anyone.

Life went on in this happy  fashion with the bungalows seeming ever more attractive on ‘Homes Under the Hammer‘ and Gillian agog at my skill at ironing. It was  the removal of the cast to replaced by an ‘air’ boot  that proved the great leap forward, well more of a hobble.  For the first time in 2011, Gillian went upstairs upright and combined this with another first of the year …. a bath.  Now she could move it was rather disconcerting to find her not in the same spot I had left her. James used to do the same thing to me when he discovered his mobility.

This week the boot comes off and proper physio begins to get her walking without a limp. She is of course part cyborg due to the metal in her ankle and will be alarming airport security for the rest of her life. Normality is still some way off but Gillian had her first glass of wine this year last night so things must be on the up.  I’m still sent hither and thither round the house in a development I fear that will become permanent, but at least now a little time is opening up for my creative pursuits.  I hear a nation breathing a sigh of relief while, oddly, I have been removed from ironing duties.

I celebrated with two sessions in the garden with my Bronica SQA and Bronica 110mm Macro f4 lens fitted with a S18 extension. This is the older and cheaper of the 110mm macros for the SQA but still takes fine images. The S18 lets me get a bit closer to the subject because for a macro lens the Bronica 110mm f4 likes to keep you at a distance. I added a stop of light for the extension and, once I’d made an intial reading, just wandered round the old garden landscape in search of vistas new.  An afternoon in sunlight and a morning in shade did the trick though I had to contend with the curse of the wind for which I should invest in a windbreak.  I shot 2 rolls of Ilford Delta 100,  souped them in Rodinal 1-50 for 12 minutes and scanned with the Epson V700.

Here is my selection from the two rolls and I  found  a preset in Lightroom called Yesteryear which as I was contemplating some toning seemed appropriate.

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