An Exercise in Exercise

I’m so fed up with the constant drone of the message of good health through regular exercise. It’s a theory I remain skeptical about. And with my love of freedom, I have objections to an oppressive exercise regime that forces me to hand over lengthy irretrievable chunks of my lifetime to the most undesirable of activities.

‘Living longer and stronger’ is a questionable theory at best, if one considers the balance of input and output. It seems likely to me that if the accumulated drill time were mathematically tallied and subtracted from a fixed lifetime, the remaining ‘living time’ is more likely to be less than the foreshortened life of a couch-potato.

If quality of life means anything, wouldn’t it be better if more time could be carved out of a yet-undetermined-life-span for more pleasant indulgences? Like a cozy nap, a good book, idle thoughts, twiddling my thumbs, or basking in the sun? Shouldn’t I give preeminence to that, rather than to ripping great raw and ritual chunks of my one and only life-span to the long walk, the long jog, the long drill, and the long grind at the gym with tread-mill and bench-press?

I’ve often contemplated this kind of debate about gain or loss. But now I can finally sit up, clap my hands with glee, and wiggle my toes with delight. My good cheer today is a consequence of a report on Health News that the latest study has proven that compressed exercise can be every bit as beneficial as the extended sessions previously recommended.

So how elated was I to find that this new study suggests that equal benefits can be achieved with only 3 minutes of brisk exercise twice a week? How sweet to know that there is a way to sidestep the time-consuming exercises of the past that gluttonously devoured huge blocks of valuable and irreplaceable present-time existence.

The one drawback is that with the new condensed approach to exercise, there is a warning. The warning is that very few individuals will have sufficient zeal to get blood vessels flowing and heart pumping with the vigor needed to achieve the desired effect.

Still, it’s a warning that doesn’t apply to me. I examined my life style and found I fully meet the strait-laced and unbending requirements of the 3-minute program. I have vigor. I have zeal. In fact my routines go far beyond that requirement.

So now let me tell you how my personal program works.

Starting first thing every day there is the intense frolic of pulling myself out of bed including the repeated rocking to get a leg on the floor and my body off the bed. And then, combined with that, the effort to recover a wayward sock that slithered under the bed. An effort with such extreme stretch and intensity it gridlocks my neck in the search (oh pain!), but eventually the sock is retrieved. But now my bones are locked in a low crawl position and upright stance can only be achieved with as much effort as it would take a walrus to scale a telephone pole.

And so, when I eventually right myself, we move on to calisthenics with even greater intensity. Now, rather than sitting on the bed or bracing myself against wall, bed, or dresser, as I used to do, I dress free-standing in the middle of the room. Obviously dressing from the waist down is most challenging – i.e. underpants, socks, jeans—but I keep my balance, on one leg at a time, with a fast flailing dance imitative in every respect of keeping one’s balance in a slip-dance on keen ice. It can’t get more intense than that.

So you see, I haven’t even had morning coffee yet, but my exercise program is vigorous enough that I can cancel, guilt-free, gym visits or road jogs. The process may have swiped 20 minutes from my free-living time, rather than the optimum 3 minutes, but at the same time, I am well-ahead of the exercise game for this week, this month, this year.

And yes, I am exhausted and as breathless as I should be. All my muscles have been stretched, all blood-paths rushed, heart palpitated, and all cells oxygenated. And now I’m so ready for the couch.

Kill or Cure

First a minor update. The good news is my teeth are fixed and I now have a beautiful smile. Strong, and – ‘secure teeth’ as well, now that I have the talent for keeping them in place. The other good news – I won’t need to see a Dentist again as long as I live.

Now, here we need to digress, cause there is more to this story.
____

I have long been aware that for some puzzling questions, there is no one to ask so you just have to figure it out for yourself. The puzzler for me, is why doctors offer medications for minor conditions that have side-effects that are as lethal as a ‘gas chamber’. Now, I have finally figured it out but must go to a bit of my own history for you to understand how I rationalized my conclusion.

As a child, medical practice in our household stalled at homemade chicken soup, a stay in bed, a warm sponge bath, and a cool cloth on the forehead. And for extreme situations, a goose-grease chest-rub, a drink of honey-lemon tea, or the utility of a warm mustard plaster. Aside from that, no pills, no bottled elixirs, no infusions by needle or any other way.

In the first 16 years of my life, I was in hospital for a few days when I was 4 or 5 years old with double pneumonia. And then when I was 16 I was hospitalized for tonsillitis because it was extreme enough the Doctor expected he might have do a tracheotomy so that I could continue to breath. And yes, for each of these hospital stays I was given antibiotics by pill or injection. But that was the extent of what I was given for medications in my youth.

Since then I have taken no more medications than I can count on two hands, and no more aspirins than I can count on ten digits as well. This is not to tell you that I am in big wondrous rollicking health. It’s just that I prefer to wait stuff out rather than run for immediate medical attention.

Now not all of us aspire to be what our parents were. But many of us do. We have shared DNA, lifestyle, and environment pushing us to follow the same paths – unless the paths of our forebears show evidence of being one big horrendous mistake from start to finish.

So in my analogy here, according to the rules of my birthright, I usually self medicate my maladies with prunes, a salt-water gargle, or chicken broth, rather than pharmaceuticals. And, within the context of that thinking, I assume that many doctors (though I have no way of being certain how many), coming from homes of medical dependency, entirely shun such medieval measures in favor of pills.

I say this because some of them no doubt were raised in a household with a parent, neighbor, or uncle who was a doctor. I know two of my doctors are the offspring of doctors. Most farmers in my area are the offspring of farmers. And many teachers are the offspring of teachers. And so it is no great stretch to assume that many Doctors become Doctors for the same reason. And with that history, I think it is safe to say that in their youth, medications were dispensed more frequently than in other households.

I furthermore expect, that Doctors, like the Pharmacist I once worked for, self-medicate themselves at the first sniffle, cough, sneeze, or stomach cramp. The result of this kind of frequency of medication, according to experts in the study of pharmaceuticals, is that one soon builds an immunity to drugs that calls for an ever increasing strength of medication to arrest infections.

So now, to return to my original story. After my teeth were extracted, my mouth became infected. And because of this I was given an antibiotic.

With that antibiotic came that blood-curdling fact sheet that is dispensed with drugs nowadays. Now I’m not certain a mouth infection is life threatening, although I realize it could lead to blood poisoning that is. But still, according to the fact sheet I was given, this medication –

“…should only be used for serious infections because it can cause a severe (rarely fatal)
[thank god, for that while wiping beads of sweat from my brow]
intestinal condition…This condition may occur during treatment or even weeks after treatment has stopped.” [!??]

And furthermore, side effects include
“nausea, vomiting, mild diarrhea, sore/painful throat, joint pain/swelling, yellowing eyes or skin…oral thrush, vaginal yeast…rash, itching, swelling, severe dizziness, trouble breathing.”

Holy shirt! What is going on here? I have no immunity to anything medical. There is no reason to call out the entire brigade. One aspirin for me can easily arrest pain equal to the pain of child-birth. Guaranteed, I don’t need such an extreme antidote. Honest to god, I’m certain this bacteria in my mouth could be arrested with a salt water or lemon juice gargle, or a bit of moldy bread or cheese, perhaps even with nothing more than three sandwiches over three days layered with goose grease and raw garlic.

And so I ponder, “Why have I been slammed into this kind of extreme treatment? Surely there are pharmaceutical drugs that cure bacterial infections without radical desperation that verges on the point of 60% possibility of a kill and 40% possibility of a cure?”

That leads me to the conclusion that Doctors are impacted by two life experiences that I don’t have. One is intense medical study and knowledge. The other is their own immunity to drugs arising from living in a medical climate where drugs are dispensed like candy in order for health problems not to interfere with their education, study, travel, family life, or ultimate medical practice.

So now, as I sit on an examination table and have a small bit of infection examined, the Doctor reacts to my condition as if I came from the same environment that he came from. Seemingly with the assumption that I have swallowed as many medications, as he has, and so nothing will work for me except the most extreme measures. Which isn’t true of course. I know that, but how can he know that?

Sure I could tell him…but will he believe me? When within his own education and life experiences, he is so convinced otherwise?

A Gardening Chronicle

I thought about gardening today and the theory I have heard that the sun, the dirt, and growing things, are supposed to be a healthy non-pharmaceutical alternative for hormone replacement for post-menopausal women. So for those who prefer a natural fix, isn’t that a good conviction to contemplate?

So I go to the garden and contemplate that thought as I crawl about on hands and knees yanking out weeds and putting them in a pail. Doing the healthy thing.

But out here in my garden, my conviction that a magical interchange of feeble weariness vs. youthful estrogen is happening, begins to weaken as the dirt presses into my knees and grinds its way into my shoes and under my fingernails. As flies nip at my neck and the sun beats down on my head. As rivers of toily-sweat drip salt-water into my eyes. And as cramp-spasms form painful knots in my ankles, back, and knees.

Now despite the warnings of possible side-effects, my friend told me she takes estrogen-replacement medication (in pill form) to preserve a quality of life that is very necessary. You know, stuff like energy, ambition, and bones insisting that they have the strength to run, to jump, to dance, and chronically insisting that is what they want and plan to do.

As for me, I hate taking pills. I hate an artificial fix. So I remain in my garden: absorbing hormone-replacement in a natural way.

But eventually I am finished and when I dump my pail of weeds and look up, there is Hub taking his ease in a lawn-chair on the deck.

“What’s with you?” I ask, biting my lip and stifling my annoyance. “Are you unaware how much garden work needs doing?”

“Not at all,” Hub replies. “I told you, when we were planting them, that was too many potatoes. So while you were weeding the rest of the garden, I hoed my two rows, and I am done! YOUR six rows still need hilling.”

Oh, really? Well, I’ll do them alright. How opportune for me to have so many more hours to sap up a grand excess of hormone-replacement. Then we’ll see…

He might be grinning now, but man, is he going to be sorry, when I’m finished – and my excess estrogen-replacement fervor of potency and carnality kicks in.

He’ll be running fast as he can – to the garden – to hill the remaining potatoes.

Blogging Flu Prognosis and Diagnosis

First off, get your facemask on. Just as a simple precaution for yet another contagious disease not so fully understood.

It has been one very long, tough winter. Long enough that I have been almost driven to take some kind of mind-altering drug for the first time in my life to keep my nose and eyeballs above the high waters of depression.

But I’ve somehow struggled through with the bit of rudimentary stupidity and mild-dewed bravery that I was born with. Some say I’m depressed, but what do they know? They’re as apt to make stuff up as I am. And besides, I don’t need a diagnosis; I need a cure.

The winter battle has left me fatigued. And when I sit down to my computer there is the real threat that I might stay so long that my writing becomes too painful to read. So painful that the few readers who hap by will be saying, ‘Why doesn’t that foolish woman stop while she is ahead?’

That may even have happened already. My readers coming to a full stop before I do. That’s what seems to be happening, but so what? I’m a stubborn, opinionated soul who will clutter up any available writing space for the rest of my life just to get those backed up words that ‘anxietize’ my soul, out of my system.

I’m not one of those who loves myself enough to rigidly exercise, monitor my diet, take fitness classes, or rotate clothes at a maddening speed to keep in fashion. So likewise, I am not one to quit when quitting is preferable to me looking good.

That’s not me. No such self-discipline here. So, in accordance with who I am I’m not going to be self-disciplined with my writing either. I should probably stop but I will continue to write no matter how tough the struggle.

But there is one supportive factor that urges me on. That gives support to my situation without that being the intent. There are as many bloggers right now struggling with spring maintenance of their blogs, as there are writing joyful notes of goodwill at Christmas and loving thoughts on Feb 14th. So I think the nasty infectious web-blog flu is making its rounds like any other seasonal virus.

But in reference to that flu, let it be known. I didn’t start it. No one caught if from me even though I am NOT the author of consistently cheerful and uplifting thoughts.

Truth is, I don’t know who started it, but I don’t think I’m the only one that caught it. The painful part of the malady, not being so much what I write, as the disheartened tone with which I write it.

It’s enough to make me think that colds and measles all those other maladies labeled ‘contagious’ are not caused by transfer of micro-beasties but by an unwilling shared state of mind. It may even be possible that blog-flu is linked to the absolute expectation of climate warming. Warming that, though housed within a ruinous context, is still what I have steeled my soul for and I am most prepared for. But how can it happen while winter so arduously still threatens cancellation of the whole evil event?

I only theorize here. The origin is not fully understood. But still this blog-flu will only mend by plunging onward and upward. And as choked as you may be by reading this depressing caricature of how I feel at the moment, don’t run. This flu is dire, but it is not life threatening.

We will recover and when recovery is complete, I want you to dance around the May Day tree with me. We’ll really get into a frenzy of ecstasy, that will transport us back into the rapture of those original vague-in-memory-now, good times.

“See you later, commiserator!”

Good Looking and Funny

With Christmas right around the corner, I want to discuss other ways to pump pleasurable endorphins into one’s brain besides eating turkey and chocolate. And how unfortunate it is that we miss easier ways to find joy in a humdrum day—simply by doing things that are truly stupid and utterly inappropriate.

Now before I continue, let me tell you about my day.

Today Hub and I are making the dreaded trip to town. So Hub showers, shaves, puts on clean clothes, a splash of after-shave, and grooms his hair. Soon after I see him examining his image in the hall mirror. He puffs out his chest, sucks in his stomach, and turns left and right examining his profile, his hair, his physique, his biceps, and sniffs the citrus odor of his aftershave.

“You are such a fortunate woman,” he says to the mirror, though his comments are meant for me. “You have a man who smells good, dresses good, looks good, has a sense of humor, takes good care of you, takes you to town” and here he does a clumsy little jig and says, “and is agile as well!”

I laugh at his silliness, at the bold way that he is breaking all the rules about what is and isn’t appropriate. Being so silly when we are too old to be silly. Immature, some would say. With no serious thought given to appropriate or inappropriate behavior.

So many, having seen this display, would be as one is expected to be – appalled rather than allowing themselves to find humor in it. Isn’t it sad, that in our somber judgment, we have forgotten that silly-laughing is every bit as authentic and therapeutic as jokes that play on a comic clash of intellectual thought.

Knowing that laughter is linked to life and longevity, we still feel it is necessary to sneer with sophisticated rigidity at dumb acts and dumb conversation. We feel socially compelled to make discriminatory judgments minute-by-minute of each day of what is funny and what is ‘not funny’ because it is such nonsense. So there is a bareness of laughter in our lives that causes us concern. Enough concern that some communities form Laughing Clubs. Members get together where in desperation they force laughing sounds in the hope that eventually the culmination of their efforts will create enough of a ripple to spawn heartfelt laughter. But I digress.

And so, returning to our topic, social influence has us believing that with maturity it is imperative we act our age and reject silliness rather than seize it. I don’t know why when silly-happy brings its own sweet level of pleasurable endorphins and gaiety.

It’s easy to keep cynicism at bay through mid-life and latter years if we allow ourselves to be happy even if that happiness is prompted by utter foolishness. The complexity is how to shelf the part of us that wants to reject outright silliness thinking that such rejection enhances our own intellect. It’s really quite sad when we can no longer roll on the floor with laughter and find easy joy through exposure to someone who is happy, even if it is silly-happy, rather than practicing sober immunity.

If I were to sum up what gives life special meaning I would have to say dry humor is good. Intellectual comedy is good. But silly-happy is hilarious. With that kind of joke, we don’t have to worry whether our laughter breaks out in a snort, a cackle, a hiccup, an explosion, or even if we dribble a bit in our underpants, because sophistication, delicacy, and decorum have no part to play in silly-happiness.

And so, as Hub puts the car in drive, he says to me. “By the way tomorrow you will be more fortunate than you are today. Bet you thought it wasn’t possible?”

And so, I have to ask, “What is happening tomorrow?”

Hub grins. “So soon not noticing? So soon forgetting the obvious?" Here he breaks into a happy singing voice...

"To know me is to love me. I get better lookin' each day!”

Dense Mammary Meditations

Only recently scientists have discovered that urban women have denser breasts than rural women and unfortunately this leads to urbanites having a higher risk of breast cancer. But my point in this discussion is not to make light of cancer, or its dire implications, but rather to discuss scientific assessments of the cause of greater breast density. This is the article that leads to today's discussion:

“CITY WOMEN AT GREATER RISK FOR BREAST CANCER
CTV.ca News Staff

Women who live in cities have denser breasts than those who live in suburban and rural areas, making them more likely to develop breast cancer…”

And so, out of this study has come the bigger question puzzling researchers – ‘Why is this so?’

And so, with all that academic pondering, within formula thinking, rather than common reason, they think it might be phenomena tied to higher levels of pollution, population, or greater stress, among a host of other wild guesses. And I’m left to wonder if there is any logical sense to these premises?

Meanwhile, the simple sparsely-educated mind thinks it might have to do with wearing bras. I live in the backwoods and because there are no solicitors knocking at my door, no neighbors chatting over the fence, and no one next to me peeking in my window, and no paper boys or mail man coming to my house, my tits hang loose and my bra is around here somewhere (maybe next to my teeth), but it isn’t around my chest.

And when I look in the mirror it seems to me, that when a 34B, is pointed straight at my knee, it lacks density.

Still I am as ashamed and embarrassed to be caught without my bra as I am to be caught without my teeth in my mouth, so it probably goes without saying, if I lived in the city, I’d probably have a bra on 24-7 and I’d know where my teeth are.

So I have to say, does it take a Scientist to realize that when soft pliable stretchy goods are conscientiously packed and supported, they are likely to be denser than when the same pliable goods are hanging loose, flopping around, without any support?

Just a thought…

"Affluenza" - Medical Notes

Have you heard all the hype about the latest disease so rampant in our nation? So aptly named ‘affluenza’? This is a disease that attacks individuals that believe that more money equals greater happiness.

To explain further, when the goal in life becomes a focused and fanatical effort to make more money, move to a bigger house, drive a newer car, get more stuff, that is an affluenza infection. And the ongoing symptoms are people work more hours, spend less time with families, and wake up each morning more disenchanted than the day before. And yes, the malady is aptly named and the symptoms easily understood. The outcome is dire. If left untreated, it results in failed relationships and a barren and meaningless existence without the comfort of awe and appreciation for nature and the beauty of living.

And so books are poring out of bookstores like porridge out of a magic pot to stem the tide of the disease. There are tapes, and books, and television shows, and ads for all the equipment needed to cure this newly defined ailment.

The cures come in the form of hints and helps for scaling back. Moving to a smaller house, riding a bike, cooking from scratch, and living with less. And I had to think, “this is good. It goes hand in hand with environmental protection efforts.” But at the same time, I’m having a bit of a problem with the disease experts and their lists of cures.

The infection comes with a misunderstanding that money brings happiness. But when the bottom line after all the scaling back is the remark that Hub and I heard after watching a show on Affluenza on television the other night, something is very wrong with the overall picture.

An individual, who had changed to the simple life by moving to a smaller place, and reducing his income, and finding recreational enjoyment in wandering marshes, rather than paying to see a movie or dinner out, concluded with a comment that erased all that he was trying to do.

You see the disease starts with a misappropriated understanding about wealth and happiness. And the cure is to simplify life and find a new understanding of happiness unrelated to wealth. So, in summing up his new lifestyle, I expected his reflections to be about a newly discovered delight in the beauty of flora and fauna in the marsh or the birds floating overhead. But, no. He said the grandest thing about the lifestyle changes he had made is that when he readies himself for bed and removes his wallet from his trousers, that the amount of money he had there when he woke up, remains the same.

This is where Hub and I looked at each other and said, “I think this guy missed the whole point.” The one about reverting to a non-monitory focus. The one about awe and enjoyment derived from a simple life.

And so now, I feel a misappropriated understanding of the disease continues with the concept, not so judiciously hidden, that in living miserly one can find such happiness in daily and miserly tabulation of how little money is spent and how much money is saved. That’s when I concluded that in the mix of it all there are many false prophets exploiting false cures.

It seems to me that the poor lost starved souls desperately seeking help are going to have a hard time evading the charlatans. Money is at the root of the disease so when tabulation of money is part of the cure, that cure is a nothing more than an ineffective placebo of no intrinsic remedial value. This is not a disease where immunity can be found through inoculation of the patient with the offending money-think microbes.

What has to be re-cultivated is awe and fervor in the beautiful simplicity of dew sparkling on a rose, a moss-covered rock, a forest blanket of leaves and ongoing reflection and appreciation. The cure is complete when the recovering patient finds all meaning and joy in the affection of friends and family and a spectacular sunset, rather then readying himself for bed by checking the stability of the contents of his wallet.

More About Invalid Care

And so, after the last two posts, about me ailing and about Hub’s less than adequate care for an invalid, I have two options.

1) I can either give my list from the previous post to the lady living here who instructs First Aid and other Certification classes, (though that isn’t too promising – with the itinerary being rigidly fixed by some overseer), OR…

2) When Hub gets a minor flu, I will provide him proven elixirs of relief by preparing him “Sick Room Cookery” from my trusty cook book published in 1899…

Let’s see. It might be well for him to have “Chicken Milk”, “Eel Broth”, “Calve’s Feet Broth”, “Vinegar Whey”, or “Meat Juice”.

The “Meat Juice” sounds perfect. The recipe includes this little commentary:

“Its appearance is against it… Children generally take it without difficulty; but adults, unless they are too weak to have an opinion…, have often an insurmountable objection to it. Nothing can then be done but to hide it in a colored or covered cup, or add a little Liebig’s Extract to conceal the color.”

Of course, I shouldn’t discard the “Oatmeal Drink (Recipe by the late Dr. Parkes).”

Not only does the title for this recipe refer to the “late Dr. Parkes”, the recipe sounds like a potion that hovers somewhere between kill, or cure.

Here again, the recipe includes an interesting commentary:

“If you cannot boil it you can take a little oatmeal mixed with cold water and sugar, but this is not so good; always boil it if you can….
Those who tried this recipe last year, found that they could get through more work than when using beer, and were stronger and healthier at the end of the harvest.”

[Source: “The Dominion Cook Book containing valuable recipes in all the departments including SICKROOM COOKERY” by Anne Clarke].

And here’s where my imagination kicks in. Can’t you just see pub-goers who buy into a healthier lifestyle sitting at a table watching a hockey game on the big screen and yelling for another draught of oatmeal?

Yeh. I think I’ll keep my cookbook at the ready, but I won’t seek revenge. I’ll just seek to improve Hub’s health, strength, and work motivation at the end of the harvest.

Duped and Distressed

I told Hub the other day when we were invited to a social gathering, it was not a good idea. When you tend to be as reclusive as we are, (and hate the dreaded trip to town as much as we do), we have little, if any, immunity. And so, I was right. Sure enough I picked up a bug.

But so what? I was in expert hands with Hub with his whack of certificates that make him an expert in First-Aid, Resuscitation, Tourniquets, Heimlich maneuvers, shock recognition and prompt medical treatment.

Now I, on the other hand, have never been to any of these classes. So I don’t know what is involved. But I do know what isn’t involved. And the gaps have certainly swayed my confidence in the value of certified caregivers.

These are the things Hub does not know and how could this happen with him going to another intensive 3-day seminar every time I turn around?

1. He doesn’t know how comforting it is to have one’s pillows fluffed and flipped.

2. He doesn’t know that sick people need to be provided with food and encouraged to eat something—anything. Small, bland, yet attractive meals. At the least, tea and soda crackers, or maybe delicately cut bites of soft toast with a bit of broth.

3. He doesn’t know that sick people should have a bedside jug of ice water replaced at least twice a day.

4. He doesn’t know how comforting it is to the patient to have a warm sponge bath – arms and face if nothing else. Or a bit of hair brushing.

5. He doesn’t know how healing a lavender-scented back-rub can be.

6. He doesn’t know how the sick one will hide under a blanket and grin with sheer delight when the caregiver shows dedication by turning off the Lone Star Channel and checking the condition of the patient frequently (clumsily, on tip toe) to see if anything more can be done.

7. Or even how reparative it is to the patient to hear Hub telling the puppies they must be quiet cause Mom isn’t feeling well.

8. He doesn’t know that it wouldn’t hurt to feel my forehead, even if his callused hands aren’t sensitive enough to pick up a fever.

9. He doesn’t know how important it is to query if the patient wants more blankets or less blankets. Or how glorious it is to have one’s toes tucked in.

He doesn’t know how all these things guarantee a speedy recovery. On second thought, maybe not. Maybe if he knew all these things I’d still be sick – very sick!

But the big question in my mind is how can anyone attend so many seminars given by professionals with such intensity and earnestness and write all those exams and still miss so much of the really important stuff?

Lessons in Review

I’ve learned a few things in the past few weeks that are quite astounding that have actually stuck in my forgetful mind.

I learned from another blogger’s summary of her life-mediator’s advice that one can improve their self-esteem by crossing their “T’s higher. And that journals, in order to effect positive change, should only contain positive thoughts. So much for my “Rage” journal – the one I keep to serve as a therapeutic outlet for the impetuous thoughts that I dare not speak (or post)...

I learned from the Dalai Lama that society needs to shed the conflict created by an enduring ‘them’ and ‘us’ attitude and realize that with today’s technology we are all linked and become only ‘we’. And in realizing that we will readily understand that any act of aggression against other nations is an act that equally cuts into our own flesh.

I learned that garden dirt has something in it called ‘a happy bug’. Something that releases pleasurable endorphins that insulate our bodies from various ailments. We used to get an adequate amount from garden veggies but that is no longer so. The happy bugs are all being washed and rinsed away. Scientists say this happy bug is/was a source of immunity for children against allergies, bronchial problems, even asthma.

I’m inclined to think that such wee critters do exist. There has to be some plausible explanation for why Hub and the grandchildren become so giggly, garrulous, and gay after devouring garden carrots pulled from the soil and rubbed haphazardly on their jeans.

And then, from a science show on Intelligent Television, I learned the most surprising thing of all. That there is a relationship between the sex of the brain and the length of one’s fingers. With men, particularly, the gap between a longer ring finger and a shorter index finger, translates into the amount of male hormones present in the womb during the pre-birth of that individual.

The greater the gap the more competitive (risk takers) men are likely to be. The greater the gap, the more adept they are at science, math, and spatial-visual assessments, but at the same time they are likely to be deplete in empathy and emotional telepathy with others.

It was found that even as infants, male babies are more interested in looking at devices, while infant girls seek to look at faces.

I examined Hub’s hands and can readily see why he drives like a maniac and is so nonchalant about my emotional ups and downs. From this, I finally understand why when I cut or color my hair, Hub never notices. I now understand why I am invisible and why when my face plainly shows that my world is crumbling, Hub continues to dismantle electronic devices without distraction.

Male participants in the study admitted they have little intuition and if women expect to be understood, they need to explain in minute detail how and why they are feeling upset.

So, that’s it for this week’s lessons. These are my new convictions. I’ll cling to them for a while until they are debunked by something totally contrary which shouldn’t take long.

And so, in the meantime, if you want to see the crossbar on the “t” in “Roberta”, look up, way up – aloft, skyward.

Living Longer and Stronger

More than once I’ve come across articles that suggest that people with spiritual convictions live longer than those that don’t, but I never gave it much thought. After all it is a hard thing to prove and not all theories, though intensively researched and polled and counted hold water for long. Biases of the researchers sneak in. Politics lends a hand. And of course society can adopt crazy notions when ‘flock mentality’ rather than ‘independent thinking’ kicks in.

But as to the longevity theory that connects to spiritual beliefs, it seems to make sense. Obviously when people are of a positive mind, that is good.

Now the reason I mention this is because yesterday I wrote a blog. The subject was so difficult. So layered. So hard to bring to surface.

I spent hours manipulating phrases and words to find easily understood clarity. But what kept happening, in my frustration, was notions stealthily coupled on paper when my intent was for them to resist, and showed opposition when I wanted them to fuse. Hours later, exhausted from my attempts to deal with words that were acting like a throng of misbehaving kids, I felt I was finally making headway.

And then, without warning, my screen froze up. But this old lap top is usually pretty dependable though it has its quirks. I pushed ‘ctrl’ and ‘delete’ and shut down my computer. I again started it up and it did what it always does, with such prompt surety. When I went back to my text program, the words I had written came up on the screen as if nothing had happened.

A quick review of what I had written and immediately I was again so embroiled in the subject matter that it never occurred to me to hit ‘Save’. So more work, more struggle. Now the thing is really taking shape. But then, it happened once again. The screen froze up. So nothing for it but to again repeat the routine of shutting down the computer and restarting it.

But “whoa”, what in bloody ---- goes on here? Nothing came up. And no where could be found those weird files in my documents with a foreign name that oftentimes turn up to be the lost document. Nothing. Zilch.

I was horrified. I wanted to cry. I wanted to throw things and smash my laptop. I wanted to talk to someone who lost everything in a house fire so they would have some kind of real and sincere empathy for how I was feeling.

I wanted to go to the bridge and jump off. I wanted to rip out my hair and slash my wrists. I wanted to take words, adjectives, phrases, even thin helpless little pronouns to the garage and smash them on Hub’s anvil with his sledge hammer. I wanted to burn dictionaries.

I wanted to escape to a primitive world, to a time where we only communicated with grunts and yips. That kind of simplicity might offer me a hope of remembering what I had written. But what I had written had too much complexity and recalling it, with my current weakened state of recall, was quite out of the question. But amidst all this irrational thinking and heartbreaking frustration, peace and calm quickly descended.

Thankfully, I have this spiritual element. And so, with that, I was immediately convinced that there was a reason that this happened. That the God of my belief decided that it was not time for me to reveal what I so ardently wished to reveal. That the God of my belief had a problem with the articulation of what I had written. So I accepted that was how it was to be.

So yes, I think those with God beliefs live longer. I am one and I have far less stress with my spiritual crutch that prevents me from being, or doing desperate things that are completely rash and irrational.

So even the simplest of pronouns get to live another day -- "I", "she", "me"...

New-Age Child-Rearing

When child-rearing is managed by the book, parenting is ultra-intensive. A hard labor every minute of every day. And so I have often thought. “Why is parenting becoming such a heavy burden, such a fearful task, such an overwhelming job?”

The answer is quite simple, now that I’ve thought about it. We choose to make parenting more intensive. So intensive that I am appalled at the many young mothers I know that are NOT having a good time. Instead they are so stressed and overwhelmed with parenting, they are in a frightful state. And so I think, “Why are we doing this, and when are we going to stop?”

I remember when I was a young mom. I raised my kids without help with housework. I was solely responsible for cooking, cleaning, shopping, laundry, and 90% of the time – parenting. With strict gender divisions of men and women’s work, and with few labor-saving appliances, pretty much anything to do with home-comfort fell into my lap. So yes, occasionally I was overwhelmed.

I used to think, “If I only had a little more help,” but now I observe young mothers and this is what I see. Homes where child care and household duties are split right down the middle, and still mothers are even more overwhelmed. Far more than I ever was. How can one find a sensible explanation for that?

But back then, parenting was simple. Babies were to be kept warm, burped, fed, bathed, cuddled, and with clean dry bottoms. And for toddlers and youngsters there were no compulsory obligations outside of making sure they felt loved and safe, content and happy. And always, through all those childhood years, I assured them even when they had not the vocabulary to understand, that I would keep them safe and protect them.

Still, that part of it came naturally. Reading came naturally to settle them down for a nap but what did not come naturally was any obligation to seek expert opinions on every facet of their lives, or to entertain them with the sophisticated stimulation of flash-cards, or the obligation to run constant intercession in everything they did.

But now, heaven preserve us, one has to research the care and control of children daily. To be a good mom, that is. One must discover how to care for children by taking time to read stuff that is too scary to ignore. Starting with the introduction of solid foods, what to feed, how much to feed, when to feed, how to feed.

Mother intuition, that strong elixir of self-confidence, that initializes in a mom’s soul and psyche an accurate impersonation of how their child is feeling is being sadly weakened by expert interference. That innate intuition that made moms so sensitive that they could feel the heat of a fever or coolness through touch, that told them when children were simply out-of-sorts or racked with the pain of a tummy-ache. The thing that made them dare to recklessly give a little porridge to a crying babe to see if they would readily accept it. Can’t be doing that when instructions from the experts forbid such nonsense for another six months.

And now, with shared night feedings, even the super sensitivity is lost that made moms stir from a sound sleep at the slightest rustle in the crib adjacent to their bed. Of course, there is another reason moms don’t always hear baby’s cries. The other reason they don’t hear them is because the crib is no longer adjacent to the bed as if it had no proper place to dwell. The crib is now down the hall where it looks best in a brightly, tastefully, decorated nursery.

And oh yeh, the experts say its now okay for babes to cry. That is the latest word from the communication experts, that want us bending to every word they say, every phrase they coin, but, on the other hand, encouraging us to ignore a baby communicating a request for an unfulfilled need.

And so parenting that once was simple has become so complex that one must engage in lengthy, time-consuming journeys through manuals and source documents. Everything must be carefully adjudicated. Food must be adjudicated for every ingredient – vitamins, sugars, fats, and the like. And that leads to a further compulsory adjudication of source, storage, and preparation.

Children, in order to be all that they can be, must be emotionally and physically stimulated in pre-determined ways. With numbers, letters, music, shapes, textures, pictures, etc. Mothers are responsible to ensure their wee daughters have father relationships that will not impact in a negative way on their future choice of husbands. Mothers must ensure they every interaction will fulfill a purpose of good, positive, influence. To guarantee that, they must run intervention in every aspect, and waking moment, of their children’s lives. They must ensure their surroundings are put through a fine filter that gives consideration to every germ, bacteria, sound, fume, fat, scratch, and indoctrination. Time must be set aside for formal obligatory story time. Time must be set aside to translate into toddler dialect appropriate behavior rather than children learning through socializing with their own little friends what is acceptable and non-acceptable.

Rewards and punishment have become an endless turmoil of conflicting philosophies about consistency. A consistency that is not necessarily fair, demanding an all-encompassing reinforcement of the value of each and every child despite the reality that the behavior of one is pleasurable and the other totally frustrating. Punishment has become a complex 12-step program that includes an immediate review, briefing, time-out, de-briefing, and summation. Positive reinforcement is almost as time-consuming. It is a 6-step program that must trap every good thing and make it into a grand event.

And then, there must be time for moms to schedule other obligatory things necessary for proper child raising. Time committed to loving themselves. That too, is necessary for a child to be raised properly. Sure there is that primeval instinct whispering in our ear that motherhood is a time of devotion and dare I say it – self-sacrifice? But how can one hold true to such Neolithic thinking in today’s sophisticated world? So certainly, parenting must include set-aside time for hair, nails, and body massages. This is a part of parenting that is not obligatory. It is compulsory.

Now you may well wonder why I am not discussing fathers here, but that would double the length of this rant into a grand epistle. Their duties within the modern task of parenting are just as long, just as self-propagating as the roll of mothers. Fathers must deal with another subset of complexities and filtering. They have specialized rolls to play in nurturing, physical development, and emotional sensitivity. The latest flowcharts of childhood development have expectations for both parents beyond comprehension. Every new day, child experts, doctors, or dietitians, add yet another burden to the heap of fears, warnings, and protocol to be ciphered, learned, understood, and translated into the parenting process.

And so, should I be surprised when I see today’s moms, even with dads that vacuum and do laundry and prepare dinner, more overwhelmed that I ever was when I was putting cloth diapers through a wringer and hanging them on a line? What is so odd about all of this is we seem, as a cluster, to think of vacuuming and laundry as ‘work’ while ignoring the hard work, time, and intensity we are building into sound parenting. Not a moment’s thought is given to how mentally-demanding the once simple task of parenting has become. Demanding enough that manual labor pales in comparison.

So I wonder if this constant tampering with the job description of parenting isn’t having a ‘watershed effect’. The ‘watershed effect’ is a ridge of highland that causes rivers to part and flow in different directions. Is this what is happening with parenting? Are we creating a high ground that is splitting what is beneficial into two streams – one beneficial, the other more damaging than helpful? Could it be that the damaging stream is carrying along confused parents so overwhelmed with fear and stress that they are more and more abandoning children, resenting them, even abusing them in ways that make us truly sick at heart?

How are you doing? All you people that were just fed, clothed, loved, and kept from harm? You must all be total dismal failures with every kind of emotional and social problem that ever touched the life of humankind. Sucks to be you, doesn’t it?

Booked for Cosmetic Surgery

I worry a lot about aging but more so about the damage it is doing to my inner being than the crow’s feet and wrinkles on the surface.

This worry, I think, stems from reading a book that suggested that as we age we sit like fruit in a bowl gradually rotting from the inside out. What a depressing thought. If that is true, I must take action.

After much contemplation, I eventually became convinced that if we can prolong surface beauty through cosmetics and surgery, there must be something we can do about the inner rot. Surely if we are so adept at making the ‘look of forty’ stand still until we are well into old age, we can do something about keeping the imagination and optimism of youth stabilized within. And obviously, having given it some thought, there can be no debate over which is more critical.

Granted, although surface beauty is initially compelling it is not what attracts us to others who are sincere, considerate, respectful, and fun to be with. Beauty of face does not validate the things we most long for. It is not what draws us to others and others to us. It is not what provides the sweet, comforting relationships that make us grateful every day for those special people that are part of our lives.

So as I sit in this fruit bowl, aging, ‘rotting from the inside out’, what I want is a cosmetic routine and re-constructive surgery that hits the problem area. What I want is a salon well equipped with antidotes for the withering at the core of my being.

Maybe we can start with anointing my optimism and shaving away those errant growths of cynicism. And after that I want a profusion of emollients and balms that will keep my emotions moisturized, my feelings silken, my dreams lustrous, my hope ruddy and glowing, my appreciation of life, massaged, and I know, I know…my imagination trimmed down to a reasonable size. And after that, I’ll move to the O.R. for nipping and tucking of those ragged edges of disappointment and fear. I’ll need vacuuming of that puffy flesh of self-ego, and bypass surgery of my opinionated gut. And just below my withered breasts, an implant of tolerance and a size 42D implant of faith.

Now, bring me the mirror. How do I look?

The Surgery

We sat lined up in little chairs in the waiting room. We chatted with dim, inattentive eyes, about things beyond our control. About weather, temperatures, roads, and travel time. I didn’t want to talk but I wanted to eavesdrop. I wanted to find something in one of those conversations to lower my alarm about the here and now but there was nothing. Discussions about eye surgery – right off the agenda. It was as if we were all pretending we were waiting for a call to dinner rather than a call to surgery.

Then one by one we pealed off those chairs and moved into another room. The nurse looked at my name and looked at me and said, “Roberta?”.

“Yes, I said. We spoke on the phone.” And no, we didn’t embrace and mingle tears (see previous bog), but she gave me a wry little smile and flourished one hand under each eye than shook it out over the floor. I grinned and mimed the same.

So now here we sat in groups of five while another nurse dropped drops in our eyes. A stinging drop followed by a soothing drop. Over and over again. Now you know how reluctant even a dim sighted eye is to having anything dumped in it. And the eye is even more reluctant when the thing is expected. So with a running commentary that this ‘may sting abit’ and ‘this will feel okay’ she re-cycled drops into the corners of our eyes. We, with our dim little pigeon eyes, that can’t even read the first ‘E’ on an eye chart, saw them coming, and of course we blinked. And when she tried again we blinked. With tissues, we mopped up hoards of solution spilling down our cheeks, as we consistently blinked in smooth synchronization with each drop that hit.

And when she said with impatience, “you must hold your eye open”, of course we agreed. But the mechanism of unconsciously controlled body movements disagreed so always18 trilla-seconds after her demanding we keep our eye open, without willing it, we breathed and blinked which of course was just as the emulsion dropped. None were talking, we were all too busy willing ourselves not to blink, and wondering if we had any of the critical solution in the eye. I only knew for a certainty I had some of the stinging variety.

With our upper bodies dressed in hospital nightgowns, tied but still gaping at the back, we were each given a sheet to wear as a granny shawl to keep our teeth from chattering. And eventually each of us were transferred from our chairs with our sheet shawls to wheel chairs and transferred to the operating room. An intravenous was set up in my right hand by another individual after three painful failed attempts in my left by the first individual. And then I was left on a stretcher in a hallway. My God, what I wouldn’t have given for a warm quilt? I keep asking for one, they said they’d get me one, but no one ever did.

Discomfort in such circumstances is the not knowing what is going to happen and how it is going to happen. But when it came to parking the guerney I was on in the hallway, that was familiar within the context of my mind. Gurneys are somewhat like taxis on a slow day, are they not? Only taxis wait and wait at a sidewalk entry, and gurneys wait and wait anywhere in a hospital where there is room - hallways, alcoves, etc. So when placed on a gurney and parked in a hallway, I felt the comfort of familiarity with that event.

Across the hallway, but not directly in line with me, was a body under a shawl-sheet identical to mine, with navy dress socks sticking out from under the sheet. I recognized the socks and realized it was the patient that had gone into surgery two patients ahead of me. His feet were parallel with my waist, he was parked a little farther down the hallway, so I had to raise my shoulders and tip my head backward to see the rest of him. But the sheet was bunched around his head making that part of him invisible. So I was left to examine his feet and lower torso.

The feet were positioned like those of the pope when he was packed around during his funeral procession. The body was very still, the face hidden from me, but I watched the feet and lower body very carefully. No twitch, no movement, nothing. I wondered if he had an adverse reaction to something. A sedative or freezing stuff. Maybe he wasn’t moving for a very good reason. If that was the case, maybe I could borrow his sheet. I was becoming so rapidly convinced that he was dead. After all, doesn’t it make sense that with our present health care situation that takes a critical patient 17 hours to get through the convolutions of the administrative process in Emergency, it might take as long, or even longer, to get a dead body transferred from a hallway to a morgue. Less the hurry really. Less the emergency at that point. No one to call up their Member of Parliament to complain or lobby for change. The deceased are the silent minority – and when they succumb on gurneys in hallways they are statistics of a kind that in their dumb silence are, it seems to me, not even counted. We’ve all seen the stat counts – numbers of deaths from homicides, vehicular accidents, drownings, heart disease, cancer, but I’ve still yet to see on the list – death from “unattended gurney in the hallway”. There must be enough to warrant adding these to the list.

Now moving on to another thought, I know that it is true that if you are driving on a slippery road, and you go into a skid, you need to look where you want to go rather than where you are going. Because if you look at the ditch, you will go in the ditch. So I realized if I seriously didn’t want to swipe his blanket, I had to ditch such thinking by turning my head. It was the only way to avoid scuttling across the way to snatch his blanket. Taking it would be so unkind, regardless of what his situation might be. So I turned my head away, and wrapped my sheet tighter around me. I sniffed the air but I could not smell death.

Just then my gurney was wheeled into surgery and my head put into a snug cradle. Something was hooked up to the intravenous and away we go. Finally warm. Finally, oh so comfortable. Not one negative or anxious thought. Loving myself, the world, even the incompetent that couldn’t plant an intravenous in my arm. Still able to hear conversation and able to respond. Thinking what a lovely place to be. Doom and gloom eradicated. Thinking positive thoughts about the Iraq war, politicians, even global warming and the president of the U.S. Loving what I love, and loving what I hate. Wanting desperately to write blogs from that wondrous place. Thinking about them, coining them. Knowing that readers of those blogs would weep tears of boundless delight.

I had no idea what was being rotated through my veins. Whether it was morphine, Novocain, Valium, banana peel with nutmeg, or poppy seed elixir. How would I know? I’ve never tried a street drug, not even marijuana. Or does an occasional poppy-seed bun count? And I’ve never taken pharmaceutical drugs beyond an extra-strength aspirin. But I certainly know now how people get hooked on drugs. If this is what drugs do, life just doesn’t get any better.

So in summary these are the events of today that impacted most on me.
1. Them asking me, of all people…”What eye are we doing?”
Response: It’s my right from behind the eye where I am positioned. It’s the left from where you are standing but if you turn your back to me it will be on the right. (pointing to eye). It’s this one….I think… (all the while thinking ‘why are they, the experts in this business, asking me? No one gave me a print-out of what they found in the assessment of my vision. Even verbal discussion was as limited as a dot-dash telegraph transmission.’
2. Most painful part of the day – all those intravenous attempts with that gigantic needle.
3. Most dubious part of my day – time spent in the hallway on a gurney gazing at a pair of navy blue socks.
4. Most orgasmic part of my day – the feeling that came over me when I entered that drowsy, comfy, positive-minded, cocoon of time and space just before surgery.

So now, it’s healing time and I’ll just have to wait and see how that goes.

As a final thought, I must tell you that only a couple weeks before surgery I happened to notice in a magazine a method for putting drops in one’s eyes. You pinch the bottom eye pouch between a thumb and first finger and pull it out into a pocket. Then drop the eye drops in that pocket. Couldn’t be happier I discovered that little trick. Although I couldn’t put drops in my eyes for an entire lifetime, now I can do it slick as you please. Which is good cause I have to put drops in my eye every time I turn around. I should have told that frustrated nurse, but experts seldom want advice and oft times don’t take kindly to it. So I guess today she’s probably back flooding faces with eye drops while patients wonder if they have sufficient of the stuff in their eyes to safely prepare them for eye surgery.

Check-Ups or Check-Ins

This week I phoned my family doctor for a Physical before my scheduled eye surgery. Before surgery I needed a physical examination by my local family doctor, who then would sign forms that the Eye Specialist required. So I asked the receptionist in my doctor's office if she could make an appointment for me so I could get the forms signed that I needed.

The receptionist replied, “We can’t do that, Roberta. Dr. East cannot fill out the forms. They need to be filled out by your regular doctor”.

”Dr. East is my regular doctor.”

Silence as if waiting for an explanation and perhaps I owe her that much. She probably can't remember ever seeing me in the doctor's office before. So I continued.

"I haven't been there for a long time. I just happen to be healthy. I only go to the Doctor when I am sick and I have not been sick for five or six years.”

Silence for a long moment on the other end. “Oh, hmm. Well…Okay. I’ll put you down for 9:00 a.m. on Monday.

I sighed with relief. Guess it’s true. What you don’t use, you lose. So are people like me a liability rather than an asset to his practice? I thought it was good to be healthy. Approved of by government, medical providers, and society in general.

Well I may be a liability to my doctor but I’m certainly not a liability to private Health Insurance with gratuities of more than $1500 per year. So if I am to fix this, what can I use a Doctor for besides medical attention? Should I pop into his office occasionally for a coffee and a casual visit?