Riley Poor’s Recovery Blog

I want to start by thanking everyone for their outpouring of support. Katrina has been my everything through this–without her I would probably not be here to write this. I want to thank the Albany medical staff–I will have you in my thoughts every day. I want to thank my parents for their everlasting love and my brother for taking an adventure. It just wouldn’t be right to not have one of us on an adventure–I dreamt about the day you teach me how to surf. I want to thank the Starr brothers for their continued support, Brendan thank you for being there for Katrina. Jamie you’re the man thank you.  I also want to thank Justine & Steele, I feel your love everyday. Luke your prayer I remember well and it will be protecting me everyday. Jake and Simon I miss you guys everyday and Jake thanks for picking up my slack–you’re going to make a great camera guy. I want to thank everyone at Powder – I will never forget that night of the awards; and Freeskier, for always supporting everything I do. The ski community is like a family to me and I will be there for any one of you in the future. I want to send my congratulations to everyone at Poor Boyz – we had a goal and we accomplished it. Cody thank you for putting me up this summer, I can’t wait to work closely with you for the rest of our careers. TJ, Rory, Sarah, JT, Tom D., Curtis, Dave, Johnny,Tyler, Micheal, Simon, and Luke thank you for your visit it was so good to see all of you.

Moving forward, my biggest concern is getting my body back on a good schedule so I apologize if you’ve come to visit and not been able to see me. It looks like with my intensive rehab schedule that weekends will be the best time for visitors, and it sounds like I will be able to talk again next week. So it will be allot easier to see all of you. There are a million more people that I wanted to thank but I need to take it easy on my lip reader!  I want to sign off letting you all know that I am going to make it through this a stronger man. I found out today that an old friend who has been there since the begining of my career was here at the hospital and they have a nicest edit suite that I have ever seen so I will be ready to work soon.

love Riley & Tinka

(translated by Katrina - not an english major (lip reader))

P.S. if you would like to visit Riley please email Katrina at bobknits@gmail.com first in order to confirm it will not interfere with physical therapy.   Visitors will be allowed only on weekends. Thank you all for your understanding.

Today was Riley’s golden birthday and his present he shared with all of us was a trip to Denver and ultimately Craig Hospital 15 days after his injury. Maria called a bit ago sounding exhausted and said that all went well , also that he has had a steady stream of visitors at his side today which was better than cake.

The facility at Craig sounds fantastic from the brief description Maria gave me. Riley is tired and still needs rest but this trip today was the moment we have been waiting for and the next step on his road to recovery. Happy birthday buddy.

Ri, Tinka and Maria should all be in the air and headed to D as I type this @ 5 a.m. Pac time. They will get to the hospital sometime this afternoon.

It has gotten to the point now where Ri and Tinka and perhaps Maria will be taking over the updates because they are in much closer proximity to it? It has been great therapy for me to write my thoughts down here but they are mine and this is about Ri and his recovery. At some point when I get the time I may start a blog to chronicle my recovery from all this. Maybe call it Jasper and Me?

So keep the flow of positive energy up friends and family. There are way too many people to single out for thanks and too long of a list to type out here. You all know who you are hopefully. If not, then feel free to contact me for assurance.

Maria called me right after the stewardess said we could use our cell phones last night arriving at Sea-Tac to tell me that they had just finished watching Simon win the big air at X. The fact that he and the others are carrying on and doing what they love means so much to all of us because that energy has a healing power of it’s own and not just for Riley either if you know what I mean. I haven’t seen the footage yet but I am sure it was huge, I heard it was a double, and that the crowd went wild for it. Congrats Simon as Luke would say, “No, you are the man”

There are very few of us here reading this that will ever experience what these athletes do when they are going that fast, that far off the ground, in frigid temps, with a rock hard landing awaiting and for me I am happy just watching the film. Still more X to go today with the Men’s Slopestyle tonight and I am going to have to find a tv to watch it on I guess, at least it is at a decent hour here on the West Coast. I am looking for my boy Sammy C to throw down large there btw. The staying up until midnight and beyond thing was ok but hopefully we will all be able to drift back in to our regular sleep schedules here one by one over time?

Another Aspen highlight from this week was the Powder Awards that I mentioned previously. While many of Riley’s buddies got accolades for all the different segments of their sport the biggest prize of all and the last to be handed out was for ski film of the year. Watching it online and listening to the names and titles of the nominated movies I got a thrill when Reasons, the Poorboyz film that Riley helped to film and edit, was mentioned as a contender. But imagine all of our Joy when it came away on top! I have seen the movie personally many times and I do have to admit that it is the best yet in my book too. But I was just thinking that it was a parental view because I always kept it on for the credits to see our boys name on the screen. The fact that it got that type of recognition on the heels of the core film award recently bestowed upon it at another recent film festival I guess means that I have good taste and a better son who has even better yet friends to hang out with and make film’s like this happen. And not to mention the sponsors, which at some point we will get to here.

So hats off to Johnny and the crew at Poorboyz Productions. You are the best and this helps to support that fact. Keep up the good work and Riley loves the whole lot of you like brothers so that makes you family to us also.

I am awaiting word from D326 about how the boy is doing and when I get any further word it will get posted here as it develops.

Peace Out as they say?

I have a flight booked out of here this a.m. to Seattle. Off to Bellingham to gather up the dog and stuff for the next phase in Denver. I will be driving there with Jasper the first of the week to meet back up with Ri, Katinka and Maria at Craig Hospital and hope to see a few of you on the way?

Way too many people to mention here and thank with all my heart for their help getting our lives back on track. Will be in touch with you over the next few days as time allows. This event in our lives has been stressful to the max but in the end I think that the old standard “Everything happens for a reason” will apply in spades.

Best to you all and I will continue to update here as often as I can. This blog has been a great venue for me to get things off my chest and I would like to thank Freeskier for setting it up, I can’t find the actual person right now in my mail, but thanks buddy. We owe you one.

On the Ri front he was up until 2:30 a.m. and still not fully getting the rest he needs. It will come though in good time? His spirits are so high that it is keeping his mind way more active than it need be but when he gets the world the way he wants it he will sleep I’m sure. The plan is still to get him out of here ASAP and we don’t have a set date/time yet, but the exodus has begun.

Love to you all. Bob

Tonight we had a dual screen party in D326 with Nurse Carolyn attending. The tube had X games on it and the laptop was playing the live stream video of the Powder Awards live from Aspen which is still going on as I write this. All of Riley’s buddies had much to say about him and he was moved to send a text via lip reading to Katinka that Luke read at the podium which was pretty cool. We truly live in the age of information. My new favorite quote applies here: “The future is already here, it is just not evenly distributed.” Go here for the action at the Powder Awards: http://www.powdermag.com/events/powder-poll-2009/video-2008.htm (caution as there is some strong language in there in spots) Thanks to all from all of us for the love and support. Special props to Jaspers cousin Shawn and Kye and you to Bushy!  Simon, Seth, Tanner, Luke etc. you are the best friends our boy could have and you always have a home with us whereever it may be.

Ri’s condition is improving at such a fast rate now it is amazing to see. He still isn’t getting enough sleep and although tonight his eyes were drooping several times he wasn’t going to miss anything on either screen, including his buddy Levi’s double back flip on his snowmobile at the competition going on outside. When I left he told me that he feels better and that is huge to me and all of us.

Riley finally had 2 coherent days he finally got a chance to read all your praise tonight. He’s exhausted and I have to read his lips since he can’t speak yet due to the trach. He wants to thank all of you for your out pour of support and he promises he will get back to everyone once he has use of his hands.He also wants to say he misses more than anything his crew and he was able to watch x games. All he can say is I love you Simon and Tanner you guys continue to amaze him and he can’t wait to be back out there with you again soon.Riley wants everyone to know that he can feel the love and energy and it tingles his body every day. Riley is confident he will make a full recovery with all of your love.

thank you,

Riley & Tinka