Now I can do things like this...

If, You

When the doctor tells you that you might not be able to walk in a year, that you might lose speech ability within two years, that in six months you might not be able to use your hands, you will say, "No." You may scream it. You may say it as a side effect of confusion. You may be determined to survive It. But that's not denial. You say "no" because you have a passion to live, or at least a passion to not die. Not yet. And you can't run down that list of things you want to do before you die. There's no list. You want to keep enjoying what you do. And if there were some vague list, you don't want to rush through everything on it. Nothing comes after that. And what point is there in rushing through life simply because you know you're going to die? And when you get to that list, anyway, and try to figure out what to do first, you only have enough energy to prioritize things according to how you would do them that day. And then you sleep. And you live through your dreams, because thankfully you were smart enough to not have kids whom you'd force to live out your own dreams. And when you wake up, some of your priorities have changed. Some new ideas will be added, too. So every day, you could re-sort this list. Prioritize for each day. And maybe that will be enough, but I doubt it. Making the list is administrative work. It provides the framework, but maybe "resting in an expensive hammock in the fall while reading Edward Abbey" isn't on your list, and that's all you want to do today. Screw the list, then. If you have the energy to read, go for it. If you want to sleep, why not? Sleeping is a glorious part of life. Eventually you'll look at the day's list and think to yourself, "What really seriously truly needs to get done today?" Usually the answer is nothing. Or what needed to get done was exactly what got done. You had a good nap. You did a little reading, and it was good, but you don't need to reflect and analyze it. Enjoy it and explore it, or enjoy it and let it go.

When a doctor tells you that you are going to lose all mobility and muscle control, perhaps due to issues with the myelin of your neurons or perhaps due to strange antibodies that attack any bit of health in any system of your body, when that doctor says you might die from It or Its symptoms, you can say, "No, actually, I don't feel like having that. I don't want it." Say it and let yourself mourn that way. You are mourning comfort. You will have to find a new comfort, and that comfort may be mistaken as denial at first. But you must mourn and process information. And then, then you must plan a timeline. However, this is more like a Choose Your Own Adventure book than a timeline. Or, you could make it a flow chart. "If I lose my sight, hearing, ability to sing and ability to play guitar, give my instruments to J. If I only lose my sight, hearing, and ability to sing, let me keep my guitar so I can learn how to play anew." There's an old ad campaign with posters of smiling people. And all these people have depression. The point is, you can't see it from the outside. Somehow, this idea was seen as a breakthrough. What is the face of emotional abuse? What is the face of an unseen physical disability? What are the legs of a lazy person, and how are they different from the legs that are too old to move? Or the legs that no longer receive clear messages from the brain?

You are invisible, except for your limp.

Frantic Immediate Emergency Situation

I seem to have run out of Post-It notes, and I don't know what to do! It is two in the morning, and Staples is closed. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to survive. I don't know what to do. Why is there no 24-hour emergency Post-It delivery service? I don't know what to do.

Where's my froggie?

Awesome.

Birthing Day Spam

The best subject line for email I got on my birthday was "anti growing old supplement". That was pretty awesome. Even better than the asthma attacks I've been getting.

I found out this week that my 10-year high school reunion is being planned. I'm amused and disgusted. It's an opportunity to get together with a bunch of people I never liked to watch them drink and dance. Knowing me, I'd sneak off to some quiet corner with a book. Yes, even now. And if a few folks joined me, that would be okay. You can join me. Just don't be drunk. We're not in high school anymore. In other words, I'm not going to pretend that you can live your own life and I'm cool with that. Because I'm not cool with that. I'm going to judge. Yes, I'm going to judge. In high school you might have been able to get away with being stupid, but I'm not going to deal with it now. Therefore, I will not pay $30 (or more) to have a meaningless encounter with mostly non-friends in a drinking and dancing capacity. Did I go to school dances back then? Absolutely not. And some things don't change. It just sounds painful and pretentious and boring and shallow.

I would be slightly amused, however, to go to my high school reunion carrying an inhaler and sporting braces, two things that were not part of my high school career but are so [stereo]typical of adolescence that I have to giggle.

For my birthday, I got a new inhaler. I haven't taken it out of the box yet. I hope it matches my red inhaler and my blue inhaler.

Ear-lye in the morrrnins

When you type "think night" instead of "good night" in an IM, you need sleep. When you try to say "Izzy whiskers" and say "isky whizzers" despite repeated efforts to correct yourself, you need sleep.

"Will our children know a world with tigers?" - I hope not, because that means I'd have to have kids.

The highlight of this past little while has not been learning that my gums are messed up due to no fault of my own, that I get to have braces again, that I get to have surgery to remove bone from my hip and then surgery to implant it in my gum. Oh, and the wisdom teeth get to come out, but that's not a major major surprise. No, the highlight came a few days ago when I heard that Canada is implementing a "Do Not Call" list. Many of you may think this is not big news. And many of you live in the U.S., where such a list exists already, whether you know it or not. Don't get me wrong here: This is not the "woe is me; someone called during dinnertime" reaction. This is bigger.

For the past several months, I've been getting four or five calls PER DAY from two phone numbers. (Thank you, free caller I.D.) No messages get left on my machine. Why? Some of those calls are robots/computers trying to find out when I'm home so that they know the best time to call me. There isn't necessarily anyone on the other end. Now, I've done a little research. One of these numbers is a call centre in Ontario. The call centre appears to do contract work for anyone who will hire them. Which is everyone. For example: When Columbia House wants to contact you to urge you to re-join their club, when you have credit card debt, when you have unpaid traffic tickets, whatever—this call centre will contact you on behalf of anyone and apparently harass you, if you happen to pick up and there's actually a person on the end of the line. The best part is that they call people who haven't been in a Columbia House club, people who haven't got credit card debt, and people who don't have unpaid traffic tickets. And they will never leave a message, so I figure things can't be that important. But why call so many times per day? What could be so important but not be important at all? The problem with having this number blocked, however, is that so many different groups call out from the call centre that you never know if it's something of relevance/interest or not. Grrrr.