As the Grateful Dead Put It...

...Sometimes the light's all shining on me
Other times I can barely see
Lately it occurs to me
What a long strange trip it's been..."Truckin'" by the Grateful Dead

    For the last two weeks, I've been on deadline, getting Swan and Iris out. When I wasn't crunching that out, oh, holy crap, was I in hell. You know, the slice reserved for other people, that you walk through with them, but doesn't happen to you.
     Orion had a lump beneath his ear. Vet honest: at his age, lymphoma a very real threat. Not a good candidate for chemo between being 13 and having a heart murmur. Through my tears, I sobbed that if it were the worst case scenario, no treatment, keep him comfortable, and reevaluate as needed.
    The biopsy was inconclusive because of the inflammation, but the cells didn't clump together as they do in the presence of dark forces.  His white cells were elevated, but all else seemed fine. He's on a course of antibiotics and some herbs to clean his lymph system out. I chose not to repeat the biopsy at the followup visit--he's been acting fine, eating, dragging me on two 45 minute walks a day. So I told her that I was satisfied that it was an infection, and that we would leave it go at that. There's been no change to the swellings. The herbs will just take time.
     For now, we choose to be in the moment, we choose to be at peace. We choose, too, potato chips. They're not just for breakfast anymore.

Choosing the Higher Path

   Well, as I mentioned in my last post, I'm up on Facebook. So far, as I also mentioned, I finally was able to see what friends from other forums look like (all of you are quite gorgeous) and I was able to get a peek at some of my classmates from high school.
    One's thick blond hair had vacated the premises. It makes his eyes look bigger, and adds to his distinguished look. Another woman, who'd been kind and gentle and with a voice to make angels dance looked fabulous. Other had been beaten up by time, or their attempts to beat back time blew back on them. The meat jerky look brought on by over tanning is just not very attractive, is it?
       But there was one photo that caught my eye. I don't know what happened in the thirty plus years since she transferred to another school due to a prolonged strike senior year. I don't know if it was because she had been camping when the picture was taken, but the picture brought a vengeful smile to my lips. She had not been very nice to me, and she had been the leader of the popular girls cliqued since days at their elementary school in the part of town populated by executives from manufacturing plants.
     For about thirty seconds, I thought about sending something to the effect that she always had looked like five miles of bad road and now she looked as if she'd been dragged down it face first. The thought of the b-word crossed my mind.
     And then I thought again. She was, and will always be, less than worth it.
     I allowed myself an extra hair fluff and snarky grin the next time I went past a mirror.

Ok, I Surrender

I'm up on FaceBook. Oh, I dragged my feet, oh I resisted. But it was futile.
And Godde help me, I'm having so much fun. I know what the charming people I chat with in forums look like. I've made some business connections. And just chatted with a friend in Arizona.
Maybe this technology thing isn't so bad after all.

Why Do People Give These Yahoos Money?

     Oh, my, Godde. How...when...why? Another 200 survivors of abuse at the hands of Roman Catholic clergy have come to light, this time a group of boys who attended a residential school for the deaf.
      Why didn't the "good" (said snarkily) people at the Vatican do anything about it? There was an office set up to handle these matters, wasn't there? And Pope Benedict, wasn't he part of it?
      Yes, and it's looking more and more as if he used his post to cover allegations up as quickly and quietly as possible. Both when he was a cardinal and now as pope.
       Yes, this is the church that ran ads to coax the strayed back into the fold. This is the religion that enslaves women with the threat of hell for standing up for their reproductive rights; the one that pays lip service to the sanctity and dignity of human life.
      Right. Oh, did I mention that they blocked scientific progress by putting Galileo on trial and burning the astronomer who figured out that the earth rotates around the sun?
       But all that aside, they're crying persecution. Victims have filed civil suits, unable to get the justice deserved in criminal courts. After all, it was just a sin. Just because it caused long standing damage to the victims' souls doesn't mean it was anything otherwise.

    

Random Equinox Thoughts

     Listening to WNIJ for the Saturday Blues as I write. 

     Worked on the outline for my e-mag, Swan and Iris.

     Been snowing and raining by turns, driven by a steady northwest wind. It's melting, but it's not how most people would choose to usher in spring. I really wanted to at least get the cold weather crops in, the spinach and the chard and the radishes. But it's ok.  I have a chicken in the crock-pot with leeks, carrots, and celery. Will be ready about 6 or so. Yum. 

      Will likely get some seeds going in the nifty little peat pots, anyway.

      It's called growth. 

  

 

The Colonoscopy Broadcasting System

    "We wanted to show viewers that a colonoscopy wasn't that bad," said one of the people at CBS News. "The Early Show" host Harry Smith volunteered to go live with his yesterday. Just what people want to see first thing in the morning: the insides of a large intestine.
     Let me see if I have this straight. You have to fast for the better part of a day, drink a gallon of a high-powered laxative, deal with its consequences, undergo general anesthesia, have a fiber optic camera stuck up an unspeakable place, and the general public is supposed to believe that it's "not that bad?" 
    This is not something you do because you're 50.
    This is not something you do because a public figure has taken it up as a personal crusade due to experience. Ms. Couric, I tip my hat to you, and send belated condolences in reference to your late husband. But due to the invasive nature of the procedure, both physically and insurance-wise, it had best be considered carefully.
     The inconvenience, discomfort, tagging by insurance companies, and risks would be acceptable if someone had started showing disquieting symptoms (bleeding, constipation or diarrhea problems) or had a strong family history of colorectal cancer. It might be warranted under those circumstances.
    One friend of mine became severely dehydrated. An acquaintance who had end-stage pancreatic cancer was in the hospital. They insisted that she needed a colonoscopy, even though nothing could be done if beyond pallative measures had it spread there. It reeked of insurance money.
    Despite the serious consequences, the procedure has been the basis of plot lines on "Two and a Half Men," a show I tolerate for The Spouse's sake. I give the writers credit for making it funny.
    One also has to give credit to whoever thought up the Colonoscopy Sweepstakes, where CBS picked up the tab for one and for your stay at a swanky hotel in Manhattan. Being confined to a bathroom is just how I'd want to spend my time in one of the world's great cities.
    Paging Dr. Freud.

Ask Not For Whom the Guitar Swings; It Swings For Thee

    Oh, I wish that I could be a grownup about this. But I can't. So I won't.
    This morning, I listened to Stephanie Miller (http://stephaniemiller.com ) on the way to walk Orion at the park. She reported on the latest political scandal involving an uber-Republican Congressional rep from California. After doing everything in his power to block passage of anything remotely in favor of equal rights for LGBTs, the rep in question was involuntarily outed. Seems that there was this little matter of a DUI as he was leaving the district's premier gay bar with a new (cough) friend.
    The choice to reveal one's orientation is highly personal and emotional. In a perfect world, there would be cake and champagne to validate and celebrate. I feel some compassion that the foot of fate booted him from the confines of the closet. However, it's tempered by his anti-gay anti-equality voting record. Some might say it's God's judgement. Other might say it's a slice of karmic pie for kowtowing to the party fringe. Freud called it a "reaction formation," where one has some component of themselves that they find so appalling that they go into total denial about having it, but see it everywhere in everyone else and make it a focal point for their self-hatred.
    I just hope he can learn to accept himself as he is. Had he the grace and courage to do that, he would have spared himself a lot of embarrassment and untold others a lot of pain.
    This may have been the first noteworthy scandal of the year, but I'll bet not the last.  Last summer, we had Gov. Mark Sanford (R-one of the Carolinas and one of the Right Wing's darlings) who'd invented the cover story of hiking in the wilderness while actually leaving the country to visit his mistress in Argentina. Thoroughly ticked, his staff pretty much threw him to the press lions in the hall outside his office as tourists looked on so he could explain himself to the world. Jenny, his wife, skipped the festivities and moved out shortly afterwards.
    Will we have anything to top the resignation of an alderman in one of the O'Hare suburbs?  Seems that there was this day when he invited two (cough) personal recreation consultants (cough) over to his house. While he (cough) received services from the consultants in the kids' playroom, his wife walked in on them. At a loss for words, Mrs. Alderman cold cocked him with a Hanna Montana toy guitar.
      I wait to see how that will be topped.