You walk like a drunk sailor now.
Each shoe is less comfortable, less reliable, as your feet become planks.
Your blood vessels are in dry dock and your nerves die of drought. It’s been 42 years since daily jabs became your mantra. But they’re harpoons against Moby Dick.
Worse, it’s systemwide. When your pancreas mutinies, everything’s afflicted: Balance and vision, resistance and thought, mood and intimacy.
Keelhauling goes back to the 18th century Dutch navy. It was meted out for severe shipboard offenses. You’re tossed off one side of the ship and then hauled by blocks and pulleys across the ship’s keel to the other side and up. Barnacles abrade and the keel concusses. Water fills your lungs in gusty gulps. For most, it’s a death sentence.
Yet there’s always the glimmering hope you’ll survive.
CNN reports a medical breakthrough – someone recovered from your disease through the infusion of insulin-producing cells. They estimate just a decade before it’s perfected.
Another decade means a full half-century of riding the keel. It happened to be me. But it could have been you.
