Neitzche and Beckett

A couple of months ago, AW sent me an email that I meant to respond to.  She basically asked me what was keeping me going:

d)Your grace through this whole thing amazes me, I think I would of just went into a ball and would have completely stopped functioning entirely
e) Someone told me this when I was 19 and the doctors told me I was going to die and for some reason I think of it now a lot when things are tough, even though I’m not religious I find it comforting “God only gives you want you can handle”

I finally finished my response to her:

I guess that there are two things that keep me going: Neitzche and Beckett.  (LOL)

I was probably in 10th or 11th  grade when I first heard a bastardized version of Neitzche’s quote “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”  It is totally fraught, but really something i have lived by.  i have really pushed myself in my life.  really to the edge mentally and physically.

one semester in college i worked so hard (and was so strung out on caffeine) i collapsed and spent a week in the hospital.  fever was 104. but after i got better i think i was stronger for it.  though, i always worried there might have been some brain damage.  i never was able to pull all-nighters again.

In Waiting for Godot Estragon says “I can’t go on like this” and Vladimir says “That’s what you think.”  Sometimes it is translated “That’s what you say.”   But actually the French is “On dit ca”  or “One says that.”  Which I think is a subtle difference.  But really, what else am I going to do?  I’m waiting.  But i’m not just sitting around waiting.  I’m actively waiting.  For what, who knows.  Godot?  The White Light? The Singularity?  The End of Oil?  Whatevs.  I’m just trying to keep myself entertained while I wait.

I did the dishes

I did the dishes this morning.  This is no small thing.  I haven’t really done them for 7 months…  P and S and mom did them.  But S is in San Diego.  And my apartment is quiet and empty.  And the 48 hours of dishes were slowly building up.  And I took 10 minutes before I left today, and did them.

I started a mediatation class this monday.  Its Yogic.  Which is a little weird for me, b/c it involves God talk.  I just think of it all as a metaphor.  But there were some really good things that the really cute young monk talked about.  One of them was the idea that you are always either reinforcing or correcting behavior.  Every decisions reinforces that behaviour.

The monk used the example of cupcakes from Billy’s Bakery.  He obviously loves them.  If you walk by and smell the wonders of the cupcakes, and have one, the next time, you will want one.  You will be habituated to them.  If you go in then, you will almost expect to do this again and again. You get the ball rolling, and it rolls on its own inertia.

Conversely, it is hard to bring yourself to meditate at first.  It seems painful, and hard.  But the second time it is easier.  And the third even easier, and before you know it, it is just part of the routine.  You get the ball rollling and it rolls on its own inertia. Or at least that is the idea.

So washing the dishes is a big first step in getting the ball rolling.  Tomorrow it will be easier to do the dishes, and by next week, it will be no big deal.  Returning to the New Normal is hard.

My brother is on a plane to San Dieigo

And I am now here by myself.

Before I went to sleep, we raised a toast with the leftover champagne from his Sunday party.  I had less than half a glass, but on top of the other drugs I am on, I was nearly immediately woozy.  I slept harder than I have in months.  I woke up in the middle of the night to turn off the fans, and walked into more than one wall or piece of furniture.  Very deep, heavily drugged sleep.

Today is the first transitional day to Fall.  Its not Fall yet, but it isn’t Summer anymore.  Last night I didn’t have to run the AC, and I even turned off the fans in the middle of the night and put on the duvet.

So this morning it is twice as quiet.  No S, no whirring air.

I woke up from a dream in which I was crying.  I was crying in the dream. I don’t think I was crying physically, though I woke up with all the emotions of crying.  The dream was an extended “I forgot to wear my clothes” dream.  As a teacher, these dreams happen to me.  Once I actually forgot my clothes, but that is a whole other story.  Usually I am not worried about being naked — I worry about the other people made uncomfortable by my nakedness. but this time I was worried, even though I did have underwear.

In the dream I got into an argument with my father about underwear — this make no sense, b/c it was a dream, but I think I was borrowing someone’s iPhone to watch a youtube video about underwear, and my father got angry because I he had ironed my underwear, and that was not enough, i had to go look at underwear too!  This, of course, makes no sense because my father doesn’t ever do my laundry, and i have never in my life had ironed underwear.  That might be fun.

Somehow we were all outside, surrounding a school bus.  I was in the bus.  Everyone was outside.  I cursed angrily and threw my housekeys at the front window, which made a small chip or crack in the window, and walked out of the bus.  The outside turned into the tightest bend in the street that I grew up on, and I started walking through tall grass in the direction of my parents house.  Crying.  I was in front, but I could feel the presence of my brother walking with me, to my left and a pace behind me.  Some other people, who might have been friends or might have been relatives broke off from the group and started walking behind me.  I was still crying in the dream.  Then I woke up.

I have a habit of having the most obvious dreams.  Really unsubtle…

On top of all this, I think I’m getting sick again

The good news is that I have started meditating again.  I’m going to a class w/ O.  Its Yoga, not the kind I did before.  But close enough.

A point of clarification, or becoming the little brother

It has come to my attention that some of my less-than-careful posting about ex gf’s has made me look like a typical dude who can’t take care of his own shit, and needs a woman to take care of him.  It was put to me in more delicate, and less annoyingly heteronormative terms.

The posts in question are here and here.  It would take way too long, so I’m not going to try to defend or explain.  I will say that they are stories completely without a context.  And that in most all relationships I have been in, I am always the caretaker.  I will admit to a mamma’s-boy binge here and there (going back to Portland for the Interferon and being taken care of,) but I am so much more my mother, than a mamma’s boy.  I am a total Jewish Mother, feeding, and caring for, and supporting, and making sure people go to the doctor, and nagging them when they don’t. I specialize in force feedings, nagging and guilt trips.

And by force feedings, I mean the kind where someone is coming off of food poisoning, or a really bad night out, and has not drank water for a while, and has not eaten for even longer.  I am a specialist at coaxing them into drinking some water, then switching to juice, and then to a smoothie, and then to toast, and then my job is done.  Don’t ask why I have such experience at this.  Again, the story would take way to long.  Let’s just say something vague like “past experience” or “history” or “my mother taught me well.”

So one of the most interesting challenges of the last *six months* (!) has been learning how to accept help, and ask for help.

I have always been a Jewish Mother of a big brother.  Well, not always.  For a while we fought terribly – I was an expert in verbal taunting, and I was still bigger and stronger than him.  I am no longer bigger and stronger *and* he practices Taekwondo, though I am probably still a better verbal taunter, though he is a very very close second.  After I left Middle School and grew out of that phase, I have always looked after my brother in one form or another.  For a while it was a burden my parents gave me.  Or rather, they begged me to take on.  Because he pretty much refused to listen to them for a while there.  I resisted for a while, and then it was just the way it was.  We both gave in to our parents’ wills. School help, life help, help dealing with our parents, etc.  I have even (and repeatedly) offered to make an appointment and pay for a proper hair cut; each time he turns me down.

The amazing thing about the last six months is that I have become the little brother.  My brother is taking care of me, taking me to drs appointments, telling me what to do, bossing me around, nagging me about things I need to take care of.  He is the dominant personality in a conversation, or situation more often than he would have been in the past.  And he is doing the grocery shopping.

When we were all home, there were moments when x and KM and LK and P could glimpse moments of my childhood.  In the way my dad showed them around the woodshop in the garage, or the way we would interact around the dinner table, or whatever.  One time S and I and my Dad were debating something; I forget the details, but Stephen was coming out on top and was teasing me about it.  So x called one out, saying “I just caught a vision of your childhood.”  I told her “Yes, but in the version from our childhood, I was S and S was me.”

And now he is leaving.  Leaving for the west coast to start a PhD.  I will miss him.  A lot.

Three pix from Portland

Here are three pix from Portland I forgot to post.

Here is the SASTM tool that my Physical Therapist used to massage my scar.  (No, its not a sex toy…) I asked if I could buy one.  The set of 6 or 8 or so costs over $4000.  Spendy little jobs.  But they work well.

SASTM tool

These are pictures of the Marquam Trail, the trail I walked on every evening in Portland.  This trail runs right behind my parents house.  You can’t really see any other houses from it.  It is protected city land.  By car and/or bicycle this is 5 minutes from downtown Portland (admittedly, it takes much longer to come back up the hill by bicycle.)  Makes me wonder why I don’t live there.

Marquam Trail, Portland OR

Marquam Trail, Portland OR

Immunosupressed = True; Neti Pot = FAIL!

i spent the day up at Columbia.  no fun.  i just heard back from the doctor, and my white blood cell count *was* low.  The cut off is 3.5, and I was 2.8.  I think its called Neutropenia, right?  Or is that just a suppression of one type of white blood cell.  Everything else was fine, chest x-ray was fine.  Anyway, I’m off the IFN for the week.  I go back on Tuesday for bloodwork again.  If I’m back to normal I will restart the IFN at a reduced dose and ramp back up.

This evening, generally feeling much better than the past few days.

As per my naturopath’s instructions, I got a neti pot and tried to use it, but had somewhat of a comical failure.  I followed his instructions, and also watched a demo on youtube, but I couldn’t get it to work right.  It would just stop up in my top nostril and not go out the bottom.  In one attempt it ran out the back of my throat into my mouth, that was the closest I got to any flow.

If you know  how to use one of these things, and know what I am doing wrong, please comment! (LOL)

Along the way, I found a funny one.  Watch all three rounds of irrigation…

P.S. I weighed in at 203.4lbs.