From my Mom

Mom read the last post and sent this:

just wanted you to know
yeah, I read the blog
and yeah, I’ll always be your mom

you just ran a triatholon
a full one
with no training

you are going to be ok
yes, you need to re adjust your expectations of normal

the new normal, remember

YOU ARE GOING TO BE OK

and yes, you are jet lagged as well
and yes, you are coming off big time drugs

remember  Jr year in college?

I love you
always
mom

Just for background, Junior year in college I was addicted to caffeine and worked myself to exhaustion, and spent a week in the hospital. It was pretty bad. I had to go home for a month to recover after I was let out of the hospital. I couldn’t even fly for a week or so after I got out, I was so wrecked. Anyway… I guess that is perfect segue.

Last night I had a pretty solid freak out about feeling overwhelmed. I was watching Stephen Colber w/ O and I got a jarring phone call about logistics from one of my assistants. The news wasn’t really that bad, it just foregrounded the extent to which I was kind of all over the place.  And then I panicked and really freaked out. I started thinking about all the things I need to do. All the places I’m supposed to be. And like Jennings’ post, I felt like everything was moving past me so fast, and I could not hold on to anything.

O and I talked about it a bit. I explained all the things I was supposed to be doing the next day.  And she told me that I shouldn’t. And I protested. Even though I knew she was right. I just couldn’t see how I could just say no.  Or not do things. In this case, it was a conflict between my weekly pyschologist appointment, and a five hour long meeting at the studio that I found out about two days earlier. I rearranged my whole schedule around it, but then realized I created a conflict w/ my psychologist. I tried to call and cancel yesterday day, but got a busy signal both times. I should have known it was a sign that I shouldn’t cancel…

O wrote an email for me, backing out of the meeting at the studio. It was almost impossible for me to send the email. O had to write and send it. I am so afraid of backing out of responsibilities. No one wrote me back to reprimand me. No one wrote me back at all. Maybe they expressed their anger at me privately. Or maybe they weren’t angry at all. Maybe I am just afraid of their anger… I came for the last hour of the meeting. Everything had gone fine without me. I contributed some in the last hour. My presence was helpful, but not essential. My absence did not derail the whole process. It was kind of amazing to me. And I don’t mean that in some self-centered way. I mean that I just feel so obligated to do what is asked of me, that I find it almost impossible to say no.

So it was a good lesson, I suppose.

I am trying really hard to learn from it.

I have said no twice today. I sent them to other people for help. It was good. And each case, the person wrote me back to say that it had worked out.

I had a major freak out today

I had been building up to this.

i get this sense from people, and its not my paranoia (b/c others have confirmed it) that they think I am healthy, and or I am getting away with something. having my cake and eating it too. being on sick leave, but still being productive.

of course the whole effort to continue working as if i am normal is a classic defense mechanism. “if i can keep working, i will know i am okay.” or “if people keep seeing me release things, i won’t look weak or sick.”

it is so demoralizing to have that backfire so badly, as it seems to be right now. it is awful to have to prove how sick i am to someone. And of course, its impossible. Totally impossible. But there I was, on the phone, trying to explain every facet of how much pain and anxiety and discomfort and nausea I am in. I had to describe my mouth lesions, and the pain of eating. I had to explain that the lesions and joint pain from Reiter’s syndrome is the same pain that full-blown AIDS patients get. I had to rehearse the whole thing on the phone today. I had to prove my pain.

Part of the problem is that I am perceived as being productive, and therefore healthy. But my productivity is completely derived from my crew. All I do is make a few decisions here and there, stumble around scratching my legs, forget to take my drugs, and generally tire myself out and then go home exhausted. Okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but the point is, its not me, its my crew. And *then* the conversation turns into jealousy and/or resentment that I have assistants.

O had a major intervention with me tonight. I had been realizing that I had a problem for a few weeks, but I had no idea what to do about it. I have such a hard time saying no. We worked through a lot of tactics and strategies.

I am writing to say I am scaling back. Drastically. I only have 12 more weeks. 8 1/2 until I go to portland to finish up the treatment.

I put an autoresponder on my email. If you write me, you will get it.

I am only going in to the studio one day a week, at most.

I am not going to start anything new. Nothing. And I am going to finish things that are more than 75% done.

I am going to stop releasing or publishing anything, as people seem to equate me releasing new work with me being healthy.

I am going to focus my energy on riding my bicycle, reading at the library, and meditating.

***

This is *so* hard to do. Partly write this here so you all understand what I am going through, and also so you know why i may not respond to email, and also to help support me and keep me in check.

A Tarot Reading: “No”

tarot - the ace of no

Addwag writes:

In honor of your last few post I did a tarot reading for you and I thought the card I pulled for you might be helpful for you to see.

I really don’t know what to say to you sometimes, because you are so much like me- I feel like I am giving myself advice which, lets be honest, I never listen to – esp. when it comes from myself.. I am too busy trying not to fall behind whatever self imposed deadlines I made for myself.

hope you’re feeling a bit more rested (but that doesn’t mean you should get out of bed)

mantra: no no no..

xoo
a

A lesson I am trying so hard to learn

Addwag writes via email:

PS i just read your blog-

why in gods name are you emailing me about my stupid questions when you feel terrible? although I appreciate it, please next time, it can wait, I promise..  send me an email that says something like (I will write it so you can just paste the reply in)

“I feel like shit today and I shouldn’t be on my computer so ping me another day when I don’t feel like I am dying of a rare disease you get from monkeys in the congo”

sorry- but us overachievers have got to learn to force ourselves to stop working sometimes.. xoo

if there is anything I can do for 2,000 miles away let me know, promise?

Dermatologist versus Oncologist

My Oncologist freaked out on me when he realized I was using Taclonex, a topical steroid.  I was given it by my dermatologist to treat what I know know was Reiter’s Syndrome.  I didn’t realize any of it was a problem.  My oncologist freaked out so much that I went into a full dysesthesia attack.  Fun.

So I stopped the Taclonex, even though it was working on the Reiter’s Syndrome.

Today, I told my dermatologist this story, and he pooh-pooh’ed the concerns of the oncologist, citing several studies that showed that topical steriods do not make it into the bloodstream.  And at the same time was a touch defensive, trying to reassure me that he would never have give me something if he was not 100% confident it was safe.

So it doesn’t make it through my skin into my bloodstream… but I had *skin cancer*.  Or am I falsely relating the surface with the site of the original cancer.  When the real risk are those rogue cells floating in my bloodstream?

So whose instructions do I follow?  How much pain can I take from my fingers?  How much of the pain is the infections (which I go a prescription for)?  With the infections under control, will I get some of my fine motor skills back? (I’ve been having trouble picking up pills, keys, gummi bears, and other small objects b/c the tips of my fingers are so sore and my finger nails are mostly gone.  Also, opening the magnetic clasp on my computer is a comic affair: I find some spoon, or USB cable, or the corner of my iPod Touch, slip it in, and lift it up two or three inches, and let gravity pull the bottom half away from the top half (it usually lands on the table with a thud)

So whose instructions do I follow?

Things falling apart

Broken iPod Touch

I just broke my iPod, and found out that my mileage accounts have been cleared out on a technicality, all within 60 minutes…

At first the iPod breaking didn’t phase me. Am I that meditative? Am I that drugged up?

It is just an object. There is no data lost. The screen is cracked, but I can still navigate and retrieve what little data is on there.

Then I started to feel bad. Defeated, or something. I sat down to make a plane ticket to Portland for July for my last month of IFN injection. O and I are going to PDX for a better climate for my last month of injections. If all goes well and I don’t have to have any breaks (cross my fingers) I will be done on Thursday July 23rd.

In two weeks, I will have four months before I go to Portland. Somehow going to Portland feels okay to substitute for ‘being finished’ even though there will be another three or four weeks of injection there.

I figured that I was flexible with dates, and I had a bunch of mileage to use, so I fumbled my way through the password retrieval process, only to find out that I had *no* miles. None. All cleared out. All 104,000 miles cleared out. On a technicality of a expiration policy that i was never told about. I did the same on my United mileage account, and same story, though no love lost there, as every flight I have taken with them has been miserable, and I don’t even know if I had enough for a full ticket (with the free ticket inflation these days.)

Expired Miles

Expired Miles

It all sucked really badly. I felt really defeated. And overwhelmed in the face of bureaucratic logistics… is it worth all the headache of calling customer service, trying to get through to a human, and then the physical and emotional trauma of having to play the cancer card. To tell them that I have not been able to fly, so my miles were zeroed out for inactivity, and now i need my miles to finish my drug treatment. I’m getting dysesthesia in my hands as I type this, just thinking about it.

The thing is what I am really afraid of is that something might happen like this on a bigger scale. What if the dollar were to tumble so drastically, my bank account might as well be filled with Rubles? What if the City of New York is so hard pressed in debt that they drop all untenured faculty. I’ve been seeing some of this happening: My 401K from school (which I look at once a year tops) has half as much in it as when I last looked. O just got a pseudo-rejection letter from an academic job search, saying that despite a full slate of excellent candidates, they have decided to terminate their search without hire — They don’t have any money. Job searches are being canceled halfway through. I am trying to get my work into a gallery right at the worst possible time in nearly two decades. And I might be buying an apartment in my building at a moment when buyers and sellers are at a standoff over prices, with buyers refusing to pay current prices, and sellers refusing to admit that their apartments are worth 20 percent less than they were last last year. Admittedly, if I do buy the apartment, it will be at a significant ‘insider’ discount as per the byzantine NYC condo conversion guidelines.

first they take the miles and make them disappear. then they take the dollars and turn them into rubles, and back again. I should rereread Master and the Marguerita soon

Bad Cold, Infection or Immuno-Supressed?

My cold in the mountains just kept getting worse.  I was burning through kleenex and cough drops, and had lost my voice completely.  I injected my IFN, and in a panicked moment after a sleepless night of chills and with an excruciatingly painful sore throat I decided to fly home a day early.  I made some frantic phone calls to the front desk, the airport shuttle and and the airline.  I made the decision yesterday at 6am, and was on the shuttle to the airport at 730.

By the time I got home it was even worse.  My Dad called and insisted I call my primary care physician and get some antibiotics.  The Dr. on call (it was 9pm on Friday) at first was hesitant to proscribe anything, because he was concerned that I might be immuno-surpressed from the IFN.  I haven’t had any bloodwork in over a month, so I couldn’t tell him for sure.  In the end he wrote for antibiotics and some codeine cough syrup.

The codeine helped immediately, and it seems like the antibiotics are helping today.  I’m feeling better.  Still up and down.  Throat still super painful swallowing.  Yesterday I felt so bad that anything feels better.

I definitely need to go see the dr next week.

Day 16 with the Oracle of Not Doing

Infusion was uneventful. Passed my blood test.  Got the drugs.  No major side effects.

I was pretty stressed yesterday and this morning.  I got really anxious before Monday treatments because the side effects start again IF my liver function is within a normal range.  I was really nervous my liver would be working too hard and I would not be given the drugs — I have a plane ticket out of here on Saturday morning, and now I know that I am going to be on that plane.  Nice.

Today I spent the morning with LK.  She has been here since Thursday, and took part in the EPIC pizza party and hike.  Today was a little bit of solo time with her.  I met her cousin, and she told me stories about her family.

Early on in my diagnosis I spoke to LK on the phone for a long time.  She kept saying “so M, you realize you are really going to have to change how much you can do, and you are going to have to say no, and not do things.”  And I said something like “yes, yes, just after I finish this next project” or something like that.  And she repeated herself a little more insistently.  And then she offered to say no for me.

The deal was I would either email her to ask if I could do something, and she would tell me “No.”  Or I would simply know that she would say no, and say no myself and then tell her.  So here is our email exchange.  She became The Oracle, and I became the Supplicant.  NOTE: This was all written before the positive result from the lymph node surgery and the second major surgery.

Dear supplicant,

The Oracle accepts your energetic shifts regarding your grant, your now-ex, and your mother, but she wonders about your priorities, given your decisions about how to compose this e-mail. The Oracle would appreciate less self-reflexivity in your tone, because really, she already knows.

When it comes to mothers, there are no mistakes.

Perhaps your mother would like to sew you something to protect your calf from new york city, brooklyn, car insurance, and other contributing factors. It could also have reflective tape, and maybe a family photo tucked inside. The Oracle senses that your mother might not be sure how the pinstripe suit will help you with your skin cancer. Is the fabric supposed to shield you from the sun while you are riding your bicycle? Are you going to grow your sideburns long and buy a big black hat?

The Oracle is considering visiting Portland at Christmas. Would the supplicant join her on this path? The Oracle likes your parents, and is nearly envious of their ability to engage intellectually with a variety of topics.  Oracles cannot, of course, be envious, but if they could be, she would be. The Oracle is also curious about their house and how the kitchen looks now. Although I sense its quiet, pulsing perfection, the tactile reality of opening the fridge would give the Oracle great pleasure.

The Oracle doesn’t really care if you apply for that grant, because many of her fellow priestesses are approaching 50 years old and have applied for that grant for the first time. The Oracle considers SL to be very Wise in his proclamation that there will be time for things like this later. The Oracle will make psychic contact with SL and invite him to join the circle of healing currently in place, held together by an infinite number of people and animals, most of whom you do not know, all of whom wish only for wholeness, smooth scars, and neat incisions.

The Oracle loves you. Take five deep breaths, shut your eyes, and imagine your parents’ refrigerator. Then imagine opening the fridge and being one with its bright, shiny light, sinking into its sterile, nurturing shelves and merging with the salad greens until you feel washed, spun, crisp, and good enough for your mom to present in her favorite bowl.

yours in bliss

LK

On Mar 8, 2008, at 8:09 PM, m wrote:

> Dear Oracle,
>
> I have forgotten many of the things i have not done.
>
> You could say this was a good thing: to forget the things which you decline.  Mostly it was because I am strongly remembering three things I decided not to do, two of which were hard but good to do, and struck hard at my spirit, and the last of which was something I should not have said no to.
>
> I did not apply for a big grant.
>
> This made me feel like my illness and my resolutions surrounding it were finally, actually impacting on my so-called life.  The fact of the matter is that my CV is not my life.  I know, oh Oracle, that I must repeat this many times.  Also, another fact of the matter is those things are such crapshoots, though I do feel like I had a better shot than in previous years, and supposedly getting into final rounds is good just by itself and often leads to other invitations.  Yet another fact of the matter was that I didn’t really have a project that would work for them anyway.  SL reminded me that we aim for long so-called careers, and will be around and alive for the next round in three years.
>
> I did not succumb to the relationship-games started by the woman I was dating
>
> Which is to say: we broke up. She started a fight over my defining boundaries.   I insisted that my boundaries were important.  She said that it was not okay with her the way I was “distanced.” I think she was bluffing, and wanted me to give in to her and come running back.   She thought that I was going to say ‘all right, for you, just this once’ or something.  But i did not.  This caused her to cry and cry.  This was exhausting.
>
> This is overly simplified, as the Oracle does not need the details, but rather the universal truths.  The only detail the Oracle might need to know was that the fight she started was over whether I should sort through her automobile registration and insurance papers to make sure they were in order.  She made it sound like she had spent most of her time ruminating over this seemingly insignificant detail since it had happened five days earlier.  Needless to say, it was an inappropriate request to make of someone you have been dating for a couple of months on weekends.  And so I said no.  And then when she started relationship-games, I also said no.
>
> I also said no to my my mothers repeated requests to help-me-out-in-my-time-of-need.  This was a mistake.
>
> I repeatedly explained to her that there was nothing she could do.  She could not fly here and come take care of me; it would just be more difficult for me, as I would feel compelled to take care of her and she would get in the way of my daily life, which has to continue in some form or another.  I turned down her request to send me money to pay for… take out food… cab rides… etc.  I told her I would take more cabs, and that I could pay for it.  I told her that take out makes me feel like shit.  This is true.  She just got more anxious.  So today I told my mother she could help in whatever way she wanted.
>
> But Oracle, I arrived at an even better way for my mother to feel like she is involved with me and helping-me-out-in-my-time-of-need.  I invited her to make a project with me.  I want to make a pinstripe suit with reflective stripes.  She sews. She is going to do some looking and talking to people. I made a wiki page for the project, made her an account, and invited her to post her research the wiki.  Nevermind that in a spurt of research after I got off the phone, I found someone in the UK who has done it, and patented his process. It is the process of sharing with her that matters, right?
>
> your supplicant
>
> m
>
>
>
> On Mar 6, 2008, at 2:28 PM, LK wrote:
>
>> hon, the oracle has been so slack. I’m sorry. look for her feedback soon!
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mar 1, 2008 at 1:02 PM, m wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> Dear Oracle,
>>>
>>> This week i had to do things I had previously said yes to, and could not say no to.
>>>
>>> The planets were already spinning.
>>>
>>> When my wounds heal, I will pretend to join a gym so I can use their sauna.
>>>
>>> I will perform the breathing exercise as soon as my cleaning lady leaves.
>>>
>>> This week I asked for help.
>>>
>>> I asked someone to come clean my apartment (and paid them).
>>>
>>> I asked someone to rub my back (and paid them).
>>>
>>> I asked someone to rub my body and touch me gently (I did not pay them, they are my regular intimate)
>>>
>>> I asked several people to spend time with me, for lunch, for dinner, just to be in the same space
>>>
>>> I asked several people to accompany me to my doctor’s appointments, and wait for me until they were over.
>>>
>>> I asked my friends to send me funny things from the Internet because laughing makes me feel good.
>>>
>>> I did say no
>>>
>>> I said no to someone else’s intern who wanted me to hold their hand through a software installation
>>>
>>> I said no to three people who wanted help building websites
>>>
>>> I said no to a meeting I did not have to be at
>>>
>>> your learning supplicant,
>>>
>>> m
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mar 1, 2008, at 2:12 AM, LK wrote:
>>>
>>>> Dear Supplicant,
>>>>
>>>> The oracle requests that you perform two exercises. One involves breathing through your nose one nostril at a time. Hold the other one shut. breathe in, change nostrils, then breath out and in again. Change.
>>>>
>>>> The other involves locating a sauna in your neighborhood and sitting in it. You might have to pretend to join a gym. It’s probably better if you wait for your leg wound to heal somewhat first. The oracle has heard good things about this place, which while not quite in your neighborhood, feels like a resonant harmony with your current state: http://www.russianturkishbaths.com/enter.html
>>>>
>>>> “being early” is an intense space to occupy. Be very careful. Be sure to look at a wide variety of colors, especially blues and purples, whenever you’re early.
>>>>
>>>> yours in bliss,
>>>>
>>>> LK
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Feb 25, 2008, at 7:47 PM, m wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Dear Oracle,
>>>>>
>>>>> I pull at my spinning planets to slow them down:
>>>>>
>>>>> Today I informed a colleague that I would not be able to be a guest lecturer in her class, as previously arranged.
>>>>>
>>>>> Today I told a client I had a health issue and would not be able to deal with their website issues at my usual speed.  (And then delegated it to my assistant.)
>>>>>
>>>>> Today I am going to be early.
>>>>>
>>>>> in supplication and heavy-yoga-breathing
>>>>>
>>>>> m
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Feb 25, 2008, at 10:41 PM, LK wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Dear Supplicant,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> The oracle requests that you send data re future activities so that she might better channel your unresolved energies.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Presenting successful resolutions to the oracle only effects currently spinning planets at their current spin rate.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Continue with the prostrations, as directed.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Yours in bliss,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> LK
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Feb 24, 2008, at 4:53 PM, m wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Oh Guru of Calm,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Oh High Priestess of Doing-Nothing-Ness
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I report these things which I am not doing:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I did not go to the big event at the studio on Saturday, even though everyone else was there.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I am not doing the alumni interview.  I contacted the Alumni chair, and told him i had an emergency and could not do it.  His problem now.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I am not going in to school for the applicants job talk on tuesday.  Emailed in, and told them I had a medical procedure on monday.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I am not going in to the studio on Tuesday, even though I dont have to go in to school.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I turned down an interview for a exhibition catalogue. They can reprint something i already did. Or not. That is enough.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Your supplicant initiate
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> m
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>

day 12, a meditation question

The drugs were fine today.  I mean, I felt like shit, but it was okay.  I am not going to let it keep me down.  I had headache and chills and fever when I got home.  Not as much of a spike as the first day restarting, but I felt worse longer.

Last night I had a meditation conundrum.  I realized I might be doing it wrong.  I was using music to block out the sound.

so I asked three meditation-minded friends a question:

can you listen to music?  what do you do when your environment is really loud?

i know you are supposed to do it silently.  and i had just listened to one guided meditation by gil fronsdal where he says explicitly that it is not allowed, and that it is a crutch.  his reasons make sense.  but he lives somewhere in marin county.  you could hear cars driving by every three or four minutes, but that was the only sound.  plus he’s an expert, and i’m a beginner, and I need this for my health.  it may be a crutch, but people with broken legs use a crutch until their leg is strong enough, no?

when I do it at the infusion center at the hospital i use early ambient brian eno to block out the noise.  which is about as close as you can come to listening to white noise.  the center is loud, with phones ringing and machines beeping, and all kinds of old folks gabbing away and trading war stories about their chemo?

or also thinking about when i go back to nyc, and the apartment is so loud.  just the apartment.  people upstairs, people in hallway, friggin loud refridgerator.  i dont expect that will be anywhere near as bad as the hospital, and yet being able to do it at the hospital is crucial for my calm.

I asked three people.  My massage/healer/counselor person, HT who is a verifiable Tibettan Buddist (proving her street cred by flying across the country to hear one of the holy men speak), and SL who whispered something about learning to meditate across the studio table very early after my diagnosis (with his trademark crafty one-sided raised eyebrow.)

My massage person said that yes, it was a crutch, but because I was not using the music for entertainment, but for more of a white noise effect, it was okay for now.  The most important thing was that I was getting what I needed from the meditation.  That the music is familiar to me, and therefore comforting; part of the problem with the the infusion center is that it is scary, so the comforting effect may help me be more mindful.  (we spent more time talking today, than we did massaging.  that is def what i needed today.)

SL is hardcore (as usual), while acknoweldging that rules are always meant to be broken (also as usual).  He wrote:

I use earplugs sometimes.  There’s also something called sound meditation where you try to hear every sound but not focus on any of them.  Or something like that.  I have only *heard* about it. har har.

This might be helpful?  I haven’t heard it myself…

http://www.buddhanet.net/audio-meditation.htm

Mindfulness of sound and thought, firstly instructs on how to use sound as an object of meditation then asks the listener to shift attention to thoughts. The second part of this track is more instruction on how to manage difficult thoughts when they arise rather than a guided meditation.

But the thing to remember is that the noise out there is just like the noise of your thoughts. They’re just gonna be there. Always. And what you’re learning is how to get past the noise (noisy thoughts or audio noise) and let it go. A busy room is tricky, but it’s a great place to practice!

Also, do what you gotta do.  The rules aren’t rules.

HT is a softy, though wise. She wrote:

of course.

and no, you are not supposed to do it silently. at least, it’s not the only way. that’s only a part of it. and there are totally all kinds of different ways to meditate.

yes, the music is a crutch, but i think it is important to identify what it is aiding. it’s aiding you to stay calm, which at this time i imagine is very important in getting through your treatments.

in the future, when you have a little bit more ‘space’ (the japanese word is ‘yoyuu’…can’t quite describe it but maybe S would have a better word), when you’re back in nyc etc. i imagine that would be a situation in which you could develop your ‘meditation’ further- which from what i have learned so far is about trying to be in the present, looking at oneself, and it is a way in which we can develop our mind as a muscle- our mind to stay calm amidst all the chatter of thoughts, desires, insecurities, the sound of cars, apartments etc.

So I went halfway.  I listened to the guided meditation tape, but I turned up the volume so that the hiss of the recording noise and the MP3 compression noise was loud enough to just dull the sounds around me.  I could hear talking, but I couldn’t understand the words.  That was enough.  I just need to get through these next two weeks.

I did get a chance this evening to meditate “in silence.”  Right before dark I walked up the Marquam trail to Fairmount, a steep uphill 15 minute hike.  When I got to the top I sat on a rock and waited for my dad to come pick me up and take me back down.

It was dark by then, and not many cars were driving by.  It is true, what SL said.  Its all noise.  Even the swishing of the branches of the trees, the rustling of the leaves, and the scurring of the squirrels are noise that you have to block out to concentrate.  I could see the lights of each car through my eyelds, and I spent most of my time resisting the urge to look and see if the car that was approaching was going to stop for me.  As it turns out I was distracted by most of the cars that passed, but not my father’s car when he arrived.  Maybe he turned out his lights?  Maybe he was just going slow enough that the engine was mostly silent.  His arrival and my opening my eyes was very peaceful.

Then I got rather feverish on the ride back down(!)

UPDATE: SL points out that I got my facts wrong, and that it is easy to be a hater:

Also, Gil Fronsdal is in Redwood City – which is why you hear the cars going by in his talks.  Kornfield is in this totally remote part of Marin County or Fairfax or something.  Where it is almost totally silent except for the trees and everything else.

What’s funny is when I’ve been to Spirit Rock (the remote location) people will come in late and they make noise and you just *hate* them.  Even though you’re not supposed to.  “what the fuck just sit down already”  Then you gotta work with the noise AND the fact that you’ve turned this person you’ve never even seen into the worst person in the world.

I’ve heard about long retreats where people fall asleep and start snoring.  Or my friend Annie was on a silent retreat (no speaking for days) where someone’s watch alarm went off every hour or something and they never thought to turn it off.  When you’re not speaking to anyone it’s really easy to turn that person into the worst person in the world in your mind.

Liver Function Too High

over here, i had a small setback.  my liver function test was too high. Last week it was 160, this week it was 317, “normal” is 10-40, but on Interferon it is kosher to go up to 200.  so they gave me the IV for the fluid, but are holding me for a week for the Interferon.  i have to wait a week then if my liver function is back in the acceptable range i will continue.  i have been told this is is quite common.  so i’m not worried.  i was hoping that i would be done sooner than later, but that is hopefully all this means.

stopping in the middle or modifying in some way is more normal than not.  my understanding is that it does not compromise effectiveness.  and when i made my ticket, they made me budget in an extra week “in case.”

So now the weird thing is that I am maybe going to feel okay this week.  I say maybe, b/c who knows, as my weekends were worse than my weeks.  That said, I do feel better this evening than I have for a while.

Sadly, it will probably make going back next Monday even harder.