daily delights - february 18

 

i have to try pretty hard these days to look for the bright spots in all this isolation. i am weary of working from home. i almost want to throw up, thinking of having yet another teams meeting. my back is tired from sitting too much. and while i love my joggers (they're not sweatpants), i want to put on real clothes, do my makeup and fix my hair and i want to leave the house. more than just to pick up packages at the back door of the local shoe store, where they've begun to surreptitiously sell shoes (i can't blame them) as well as dispense packages. i want to stop feeling mildly irritated at those idiotic people who wear that pointless clear chin mask that just sends all their covid droplets up into their own faces before disseminating them to the rest of us in the grocery store. i want to drive to the office, listening to podcasts while i drink my latte from the travel cup i made it in for the drive. i want to see my colleagues and laugh and have casual conversations that don't take place online. all of this sounds like it was pretty hard to find today's delight and it was. but i found it. one fat, creamy ball of burrata, a perfect avocado and a perfectly ripe, sweet papaya, sprinkled with a dash from my last precious container of everything but the bagel - i don't know whether it was a late breakfast or an early lunch (i ate it around 10:30), but i do know that it was delicious, decadent and yes, delightful. it's the little things. sometimes we have to look for them, but they're always there. and this too shall pass. and then i'll likely miss these days of sweatpants and an artfully placed scarf.

swept away by the winds of gorm

there's a storm raging outside. they've named it gorm. anytime there's the slightest chance of drama, they name the storm. and these winds definitely sound like they're hurricane force. i'm trying not to have my inner view seem as stormy, but it's hard. the week brought that nasty email and i'll admit i let it suck a whole lot of my precious energy away. then, on friday, my beloved frieda cat was coughing and so i took her to the vet to see what was wrong. it was much more serious than we thought - she had torn her diaphragm and the rest of her organs were pressing in on her lungs and restricting her breathing. to fix it would have required a complicated surgery where she had to be on a respirator. and it just seemed like too much - a cat on a respirator? and what would her quality of life be? so, with great sorrow, i chose to have her put to sleep. bitter tears were shed. she was a special one - molly's baby and my favorite (despite all of those kittens) - i miss her sorely.

friday morning found me at the back specialist, meeting with the surgeon and the anesthesiologist in preparation for my upcoming back surgery. when i left, i didn't know yet when it would be, but i woke up to a letter on saturday morning with a time next friday. a bright spot in the darkness of losing frieda. this continuing nerve pain has worn me thin and i find it harder to cope. so much energy goes to the pain, it's difficult to have any left for everything else.  and it hasn't helped that i had to stop with the high grade ibuprofen in preparation for the surgery. the oxycodone i was given to replace it makes me feel strange and doesn't take the pain to the same degree. ibuprofen is definitely the best pain reliever for me.

i've been trying to just ignore the pain and go about my life as if i were a normal person - walking around, going to dinner and a movie with my family, but admit it's not really working. we went to see spectre on friday evening and i had to fidget through the whole movie to try to find a comfortable way to sit that gave me relief from the pain. usually, sitting isn't the problem, standing is, especially standing still - as the pain is mostly in my left leg, thanks to the nerves that are affected. but friday evening, probably due to the change in meds, sitting comfortably was a problem. i even wondered if i should have gone to the movies at all. but luckily, no one was sitting beside me (on the one side) or in front of me, so i did get through it in the end. i think husband was a little annoyed by all my fidgeting, but he also knew i couldn't help it.

i will go back to work this week, taking it easy like last week. it was great to be there and i can't wait to be back to normal so that i can be fully present. there are so many fun tasks to do and great people to work with. with the sound of that wind out there, i think i could fly there right now if i put on a billowy coat.

there were other bright spots in the weekend - a beautiful thanksgiving feast prepared for us, here at our house, by good friends, who knew i wasn't up to standing in the kitchen for hours, but that i missed thanksgiving very much. it was beautiful food and great company and a silky pumpkin pie and precisely what i needed. we had originally planned it for actual thanksgiving, but work schedules got in the way (those silly danes have embraced black friday, but alas, not yet thanksgiving) and we had to move it to saturday. that worked out just fine. what's important isn't the day of the week, it's the company and the food and the candles and the wine and the laughter. and those go a long way towards soothing the wounds of the nasty email and the loss of my precious frieda.

it was good to pause and be thankful for the time i did have with frieda and being happy that i told her every single day that i loved her. good to be consciously grateful for how understanding my new job is about my back problem - they even put a couch in our nearest meeting room so that i could lie down when i need to and have ordered me a special office chair that's good for my back. good to take a moment to be grateful for husband and the days he's taken off to drive me to the doctor and for all of the cups of tea he's brought to me when i've been miserable and in pain and no fun to be around. and thankful for what a cool young woman sabin is turning into. and thankful for friends willing to prepare my favorite feast. in that light, that nasty email seems unimportant and just gets swept away by the winds of the storm named gorm.

melting away

we had our first snow sunday morning. our part of the country didn't get that much, but it came down quite heavily for an hour or so on sunday morning. in other parts of the country (e.g. copenhagen), there was much more! so much that trains were delayed by hours and the police advised no travel. my car, parked over there at a friend's place, had 40cm of snow on it and the branches of the trees above were completely bowing down over it, heavy with snow.

we're going over there this afternoon. husband will have to shovel it out for me so i can go to work tomorrow. because i'm actually going to go back to work! my back isn't better, but it's better enough (or my meds are good enough), that i can go in for a few hours a day. and as long as i take the elevator instead of the stairs and don't stand too much, it should be ok.  some part of me just wants to ignore the pain and act like it's not there and just get on with my life. i'm going to try to indulge that part over the next few days.

friday, i'll meet with the surgeon and learn more about the surgery that it looks like is on the horizon. i hope it's on the immediate horizon, as i really want this over with, but we have the appointment first and then it's scheduled. i wouldn't wish back pain like this on my worst enemy (actually, maybe i would, when i think about it). it just never ends. i had a few moments of feeling normal in recent days - i went to a café with a friend on friday and to an evening gathering with friends on saturday (luckily, there was an easy chair i could sit in for most of the evening). yesterday, i mostly laid in bed and read to gather strength.

i'll admit to moments of despair, where i have feared that this pain will never go away. and some part of me still feels that way. i can't stand or walk for too long before the pain becomes too much in my left leg. thanks to the nerves that are affected, the pain isn't actually in my back, it's mostly in my left thigh and knee. if i stand still for too long, it feels like someone has lit a sparkler inside my left knee. it goes away nearly immediately if i sit down or lie down. the surgery will take away the prolapse that's touching that nerve and it's my fervent hope that after that, the pain will just melt away. sort of like how the sun comes out and melts the snow.

fog rolls in

i have the weirdest sense that i do not know how i feel. after two and a half weeks of acute nerve pain, is it getting better? somehow, this morning, i just don't know. it's like i lost my ability to sense myself. it still hurts in my leg, but is it hurting less? can i walk around for a little longer? stand for a little longer in the shower? maybe, but i'm not sure. am i just used to the pain? are my meds helping? do i feel like myself? what does myself feel like? i don't know if it's a medicine-induced fog or if i've simply lost any ability i had to be in touch with myself and my own body. i feel apart. like i'm looking at myself from a distance and i'm not wearing my glasses...

waiting (and pain) win

this is my view, these long, painful days, spent mostly in bed. i feel like i'm once again being taught a lesson in patience. back pain takes the time it takes to heal, there's no hurrying it along and there's no escape from it. and there's no denying it and just pretending it's not there. it wins, every time. i've spent so much time waiting over the past year and all of it has been agony in some sense. maybe i'm supposed to be learning a lesson here...about patience and taking things one step at a time. but i remain resistant and defiant to that lesson. i want my back to be better now, so i can go back to work at my wonderful new job. i want to be without the intense pain of the past two weeks. yes, i've been in steady pain for two whole weeks. what is it i'm supposed to learn from that? to get in better shape? to take better care of my body? probably, but the doctor also says it wasn't necessarily something i did, it could just be bad luck. but as i lie here, grateful for the company of cats, i do ponder yoga and meditation and maybe even taking up running. i'm ready for the pain to pass. it feels like i've waited long enough. but i suppose it will take the time it takes. and there's no getting around that. i do wish someone would clean the muddy pawprints off that window tho'...

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can't afford to live in london? try copenhagen.

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what if hipsters need help too?
you may think i'm posting this facetiously, but it's definitely a good read.

i need to be where facebook is not

being in severe pain changes you. it makes you feel outside of yourself, not normal, crabby. it feels like you'll never be yourself again and through the fog of the pain, you can only dimly remember the outline of that self anyway. it makes you hard to be around, petulant, demanding and even more impatient than usual. in short, you are a bear cat. and you can hardly even stand yourself. i suspect it's even worse when it's nerve pain, as it's relentless and unforgiving and just. doesn't. let. up.

it makes me even more disgusted by the endless array of crap on facebook than i usually am...

~ um, i think that art does not mean what you think it means.

~ yes, we get it, you're not getting any. maybe you shouldn't have left your husband?

~ trouble in paradise? that's the fourth or fifth male chauvinistic anti-woman joke you've posted in the past week or so. are you also not getting any?

~ enough with the humble bragging...you are just. so. #blessed.

~ i seriously doubt that you will ever win that "dream" holiday to malaga, but share away for the tenth time.

~ and i hope, for your sake, that you also don't win the rabbit fur trimmed boots with matching studded skinny jeans that that clothing store is giving away.

~ this year's simplified red starbucks cups represent a design trend towards minimalism, not the work of the devil.

~ are you a little obsessed with cats or what? (see, i even annoy myself.)

~ shouldn't you have had to actually ATTEND that university to get that excited about their football team?

~ that ben carson guy is batshit crazy with his pyramids as giant grain elevators theory (among others...)

~ aphorisms rule the day, there are no deep thoughts.

~ all of those local "news" items are marketing for local businesses - don't pretend to be journalists when you're marketeers.

~ i don't know what's worse? poodles or labradoodles? ugh.

it's clear to me that i need to be where facebook is not until this pain subsides...

seriously?

melting down

disclaimer: i have a knot in my back that just won't quit (i think it's from hunching over the sewing machine for a week) and it's making me generally out of sorts. especially as i'm a little alarmed at how much ibuprofen i've taken for it for the past few days and i'm trying not to take any today.  the items in this post may reflect this rather crabby out-of-sortsness. you have been warned.

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i may have to do some unfriending on facebook. not because i can't take dissent (one might even say i thrive on it), but when the dissent is so ridiculously thick as to suggest that the new york times is a purveyor of "hate rheteric (sic)" simply because the person in question disagrees with their political leaning,  and apparently reason and intellect, that's a bit much for me. but mostly i might have to unfriend because i believe someone who is a teacher should be able to spell rhetoric.

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and while we're on the subject of free speech(!), i can recommend this very well written blog post. and stay to check out betsy's blog - there's good stuff there about changing perspective.

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thank you to lynne for her continued posting of the journey sea shepherd is making, protecting whales from japanese "research" (aka murderous whaling) vessels in the southern ocean. i'm riveted by these stories. lynne's son is onboard one of the vessels, but thanks to her links, i think i'm nearly as engaged in sea shepherd's crusade as she is.

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[this whole section should be read with your teeth clenched.] i wonder if anyone in this house will ever put back the scissors in the kitchen drawer where they belong when they're finished using them in some far corner of the house. i tell you, if one day, i am at last driven over the edge, it will be because i can't find the friggin' scissors when i need them.

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on another less ranty note, if you, like me, love japanese pattern books, here's some great advice on working with them if you, like me, don't know japanese.

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these loose engrams are making me smile. in that knowing, wise way. but don't expect to be able to comment, you'll just have to nod to yourself.  and enjoy.

i am thinking about maps and topographies.

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i'm doing a new 365 project and you can find it here on my new tumblr:
365 moments of perfect clarity

updated: apparently the blog hop thing below (which i've never tried before, nor even seen), is from a post a couple of weeks ago (started by jillsy, #1 on it - and should have been about balance). i saw it on lynne's blog and only read her post and the second to last person on the list before her, and balance had already dropped off (or else i simply didn't get it).  i think it's pretty funny, actually, because it's kinda like those games you played as a child, where you whisper something to your neighbor and send it around the circle and by the time it gets back to you, it's nothing like what you said. i think i rather like that about the blogosphere.