Not Really MIA...

It's been a while...again. Oops.

It's Friday, thank goodness, and I've had the benefit of a very long nap. This past week did a number on my stamina. Long meetings at work, lots of stress, lots of 'must be social' activities that made me alternately happy and tired. I'm a true introvert who gets rapidly drained of energy by being around a lot of people for an extended period of time. I think the nap was my body's way of getting some alone time, not to mention down time. I haven't been sleeping well; see above mention of meetings, work, etc. Oof.

One of the good things about this week's very long meetings was that they gave me time to spend with some wonderful women from my past. Jackie O. and Suzanne came down, and we carved out time to go out to dinner at Circa 81. I loved introducing them to Circa and seeing their reactions to their icy chocolate martinis and shrimp and grits. We laughed a lot, and loudly. Being around Jackie reminded me of our trip to The Library of Congress and our mutual love of books and learning. Suzanne is one of those people whose very presence inspires me to be a better person. She's funny and kind, smart as hell, and I admire her faith because it's uniquely her---honest and heartfelt. I snuck up behind her on the first day of the meetings and surprised her, and the hug she gave me in greeting made me feel like I was the most beloved person ever.

Depression doesn't let me feel that way often, but when I do, it jostles my heart.

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I made the switch from the brand-name antidepressant I've been taking for eight years to the generic. I just couldn't see paying over $200 a month for something I could get for less than $2.00. Yes, you read that right. In some cases, generics are just as good as their pricier brand names. In some cases, they're not, and this, for me, is one of those instances. But it works well enough that I function and feel fine 99.9% of the time. I have noticed that rainy days make me a little sadder, and I'm more easily moved to tears, but I can live with these changes.

It doesn't escape me that I'm fortunate to be able to afford any medication at all. There are far too many people who can't afford what they need to be well. And that's a terrible commentary on the state of this country.

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I have a ton of things I want to do this weekend: knit, crochet, read, paint, draw, clean this house, cook some good food, maybe sit outside while the weather is fine. I think we're going to go see R's side of the family on Sunday to celebrate some more birthdays. That's always a good thing, celebrating.

Again and again, I am reminded how fortunate I am, how many blessings are strewn through my life like roses blooming along a path.

I am blessed. I am blessed.

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The Unexpected

My mother is in the hospital again after suffering what doctors are calling a psychotic break induced by prednisone therapy. She spent the past two weeks or so staying awake for 72 hours at a time. Her blood sugars are out of control from the medication, and when she arrived at the ER Friday afternoon, she was, in highly technical medical terms, absolutely bananas. I'm pretty sure the ER staff is still talking about the tiny-boned lady who screamed terrible things at them before they could sink two shots' worth of sedatives and anti-psychotics into her backside. I went to the hospital to see her today, and the first thing she demanded of me was that I bathe her. The nurse gave me a sympathetic look as she darted out of the room. I'm not freaked out by my mother's nudity or her bodily emissions, but the IV line and cardiac monitor leads made the task harder, not to mention her constant flinching and hissing and corrections to the way I was washing her skin or wringing out the washcloth or, you know, breathing. It's not a secret that my mother and I have had a difficult relationship. There have been times when I wished for a different family, for siblings, for witnesses to some of the things she's said to me, for someone to stick up for me when she'd spin one of her stories with me as the villain and herself as the victim. But today, when I saw the way her bones showed beneath her skin, when I saw her distress as she lost control of her bladder and urine ran down her legs, all of that disappeared, and all I felt was this huge helpless love for this woman. I wanted to take her suffering away but I couldn't. All I could do was wash her and dry her and smooth baby powder on her back and tell her jokes about how I pee on myself because of the stupid diuretic I have to take. I made her laugh and distracted her from the indignities of her failing body, and I kept seeing not the bird-boned tiny wrinkled woman with wild hair but the dark-haired beauty of my childhood who loved to dance to disco and thought Donna Summer was the bee's knees. I've been crying on and off since I left the hospital because it finally hit me, after all of our fights and bitter silences and standoffs and threats that I love her beyond all reason, and when she is gone from this world, I will miss her so badly in a way that defies all measurement. I've wasted so much time. Tell your Mom you love her. Do it now.

Trying Something New

SIL Kat, wicked temptress that she is, sent me a link a while back for an e-course called How to Paint an Owl. She knew I would be helpless to resist! I signed up for the class this week and have been noodling around on the classroom site. I'm so excited!

This is What I Think Of

Today is February 3rd. It is my MomMom's 92nd birthday. I'd give just about anything to talk to her and wish her a happy birthday right now. I want to believe that she's in heaven/paradise/whatever you want to call it, and she's having one heck of a party. I'm talking confetti, chocolate cake, all the books she wants to read, her sisters and brother and husband smiling around her.

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A coworker's wife died after a battle with cancer today. She was 51, two years older than I'll be in a couple of months. I can't imagine what her husband is going through tonight. Grief, certainly, maybe even relief that for her, the long suffering is over. Hearing about her made me think of my cousin Jane, who lost her battle with cancer at about the same age. Jane who had perfect posture and a ready smile and raised therapy dogs. Jane who laughed about her double mastectomy because she could wear tank tops without worrying about flashing anyone. Jane, who fought and fought and finally lay down her weapons.

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I spent too much of this week angry about stupid things I can't change. Angry at the men in my office who get away with doing little to no work because their boss turns a blind eye and enables their fraud and waste. Angry at the spineless boss who won't do anything to fix the problem of deadwood draining our limited resources. What I really did was waste my energy on something that doesn't matter. Life is so short, and I spend too much time fighting against the crap I can't fix.

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I watched my husband fall asleep a few minutes ago, and the love I feel for him actually hurts. How did I get so lucky? What did I do to deserve him?


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This is what I think of, and the sky turns dark blue and the world keeps on turning and turning.

Another Month

Wow, February 1st. Good-bye, January. Glad you weren't as sucktastic as last January. (Too much cold weather + truly shitty job = hellllllll, y'all.)

So the twin asshats of insomnia and anxiety have been having their not-so-fun way with me. I've had that squeezy-chest-I-can't-swallow feeling too many times to count lately, and after sitting down and thinking about what's what, it hit me that I have one of those difficult anniversaries coming up, if you'll excuse the psychobabble. February 3rd is my MomMom's birthday. She would have been 92. While the simple fact of a calendar day had escaped me, I guess my psyche was keeping tabs and sending up a flare: Pay attention, you. I sat down with the leather-bound book I've been keeping since she passed on and wrote about her for the first time in over a year. I wrote about the passage of days, the way life goes on, the way my life has changed in ways big and little. I wrote about what my wise friend Pam called the process of rebuilding my life and myself around the empty space left by her absence. I wrote about the fact that in a deep-down way I can barely explained, I'm a different person now. Grief: it's not for sissies. And it can't be ignored, or it will sneak up on you and give you a psychic wedgie.

I'd like to say that the squeezy/no-swallowing sensations magically went away once I faced up to what's going on inside my head, but that's not the case. Maybe I'll see a change once her birthday comes and goes, quietly, unmarked by all except those of us who still grieve for her lost smile, her silenced laughter.

Death, you can just suck it, and suck it hard, you bastard.

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One of the benefits of insomnia (find that silver lining, damn you!) is the chance to experience what you might normally miss. While sitting up this morning at 1:30, I heard two owls hooting softly to each other outside in the front yard. I think one was on our roof, the other in our neighbor's tree or porch roof too. They hooted at each other for a good 20 minutes, maybe discussing the upcoming presidential election and the fact that it's almost time for The Walking Dead to return to AMC. Their mellow altos made me sleepy, and I slept for a few more hours and woke up smiling.

Work killed all my happy owl feelings.

Day job, you can just suck it, and suck it hard, you bastard.

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I haven't been happy with my weight and my lack of exercising for a long time. I suck at dieting. I hate keeping up with points and grams and calories. So in lieu of something formal and program-like, I'm just trying to make better choices. Since I'm not going to become a vegetarian marathon runner (as a sarcastic endocrinologist once suggested I become, or consider gastric bypass), I'm trying to coax my cranky self into exercising a little each day. I already take the stairs at work, park far away from stores to walk, all that happy horse-pucky. Tonight, I did something called crunchless abs, which made my hibernating stomach muscles yelp in shock. Then I got on the floor and worked those outside stomach muscles (more shocked yelping; I distinctly heard my obliques shout, "THE HELL IS THIS?"). I finished off with downward dog and mountain pose and some bellydance snake arms.

It pisses me off that from a physical standpoint, I feel so much better after a mere 10 minutes of really mild exercise.

*grumble grumble* Now I have to keep this crap up. Because it works, damn it. Crap.

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Knitting class started up Monday, and there was much yarn fondling and chatter. Our instructor brought a skein of yarn made from New Zealand possum fur. The Kiwi possums are domesticated and spoiled rotten, much like our cat. I'm sure they have staff on hand to peel their persimmons and wave palm frond fans over their fuzzy little heads. A classmate brought in a skein of roving in the most enchanting shade of seafoam blue-green. She was working a thick cable down the enter of the scarf she's making from this fiber. She had to keep slapping my hand away from her work because I couldn't stop touching the roving. It was so soft and lovely. I started on my first pair of socks, intended for my sweetie. I'm using double needles, and I managed to get the stitches cast on, divided, and joined without any bloodshed or weeping. I sort of overlooked the line that said to work in 2x2 ribbing, so the cuff is short a ribbed row. Oops. Things were going swimmingly until I pulled the work out of my bag to get in a little knitting yesterday and saw that several stitches had dropped off a needle. Grrr. I tried to get everything back in place, but I really think I need to FROGGIT and just start over. 's okay.

Peace out, cub scouts. oxxoxoxoxo

Back to Earth

Woke up this morning to a chirping cat whose chirping took on a slightly more sinister note when I saw her...how can I describe this...scooting on her bottom along my bathroom floor.

Yeah.

My suspicions were confirmed a few minutes later when I turned on the lights. Sight was joined by smell. I would have been horrified had I not been worried about her well being. After a few minutes of discomfort, she obviously dislodged whatever was...stuck...and is now grooming in one of her favorite chairs.

I hope this isn't indicative of how the rest of my Monday will unfold. When you start out cleaning up smeared cat poo, surely your day can only improve.

Right? o.O

Victory, Sweet Victory

I did it. I finally figured out how to work those blasted DPNs.
Photo evidence below. All I can say is BOOYAH!