After a month of my limping around, Jess finally shamed me into visiting an orthopedist, who confirmed that, much as I’d suspected (given my wincing at self-conducted McMurray tests), I’d torn the lateral meniscus in my right knee.

As usual, the cause of the injury is a bit short of spectacular: near as I can tell, I did it by planting my foot weirdly while carrying a box of bottled water. Though, this time, I was at least carrying that water to refill the refrigerator at CrossFit NYC, so I can say I injured myself in the gym. [That’s a fair step up from my prior left-ankle disaster, which owed simply to stepping off the curb. While sober.]

At this point, there’s a reasonable chance that I can resolve the tear by rehab rather than surgery. And, if nothing else, it’s a relief to know that – unlike, say, with a partially torn LCL – any pain simply means that my knee hurts, rather than that I’m further damaging it, en route to total immobility.

It also reinforces something I’ve long considered: that a bunch of movement dysfunctions – like, in my case, walking duck-footed – aren’t simple human variations, but symptoms of muscular imbalances that predispose people to experiencing a predictable group of related injuries, again and again and again.

I’m still trying to figure this last point out, reading dorky kinesiology texts and articles on muscle fascia. But I’m convinced it’s time well spent. Otherwise, by the the upward progression, I think the next joint to go would be my hip, and from the eighty year-olds I’ve spoken with, I hear that one’s a bitch.