Two Stories

 

I

Tonight I made a beef stew. I poured a bit of oil into a heavy pot and waited for it to get hot. While I waited I put a bit of flour in a large bowl with some salt and pepper and then threw the beef cubes in and tossed them until they were well coated. When the oil was hot, I added the beef in two batches, watching the edges curl and the flour darken and the spatters of oil and fat fly out and land. I turned my back on the beef and chopped an onion into medium dice and then I minced four cloves of garlic. I pulled a tube of tomato paste out of the refrigerator and rolled it up like toothpaste until it squirted out the top. The beef was browned in two batches, removed and sitting on a plate, the oil in the pot the burnt bits of beef then more oil and the onions and the garlic and the tomato paste stirred all together until fragrant. 

Read the rest here.

Apotropaic Devices: I Will LIft Up My Skirt

 

Tonight I watched a recording of a lecture titled "The Vulva's Pilgrimage: Understanding Medieval Genitalia Badges." I bought a ticket to hear this lecture from The London Drawing Group, so in lieu of listening live at some ungodly hour, I received the recorded version and watched it tonight after dinner. The pandemic has made possible a number of things for me, and, no, I'm not going mad. While I've begun a number of crafts and even dabbled in art for the first time in my life, I'm not yet casting vulvas. Yet might be an operative word there. 

Continue reading here.

Happy Two Days After Christmas

 

There's been a lot of sweetness.

And a lot of Dumb and Dumber.

Reader, what's happening?

Dysfunctional Resilience

 Last night I was reading in bed and I heard a crackling sound and then again a rustle and I thought it might be Sophie but I didn't feel like getting out of bed so I kept reading (Homeland Elegies) but that was it, the guilt was creeping in and then I heard coughing a tiny cough a choke, really, so I lay the book down and got out of bed and walked down the hall the short hall and into the darkness of the room where the lady lay the princess lay gurgling. I don't know how to write anymore and remember writing these tales before when I used commas and semi-colons and short muscular verbs. Now it's all run-ons and no punctuation and stream of thought because after nine months of being at home and teaching on Zoom and doing all the usual things with Sophie like marveling at her hair and feeling her grace and changing her diapers and managing her medication and arguing with her insurance company and paying Nice Neurologist to write me scrips and listen to my suggestions for what we should do next, well, there's no other way to get it all down. I flipped on the light and Sophie's lips were dark were they blue? was she breathing? had she had a seizure? where's the pulse-ox? Let's make a long story short (the requisite shall we?). Sophie is ok so no worries all is well thank god (where is god?) and I sat up with her all night, you see, because I knew in that moment that had I not gone into her room at that exact moment she might have died. It feels good to type that out here in the public space that is this old blog for you dear Reader some of you well over a decade. I just knew in my bones that this is how it will happen but that it did not happen not happen last night. I sat up all night and then I fell asleep and woke with a start at ten til nine and Sophie was still sleeping Sleeping Beauty right next to me her lips red red rosed. I had to teach at 9:30 on the Zoom and one of the Marias was coming at 9:00 so I got up from the bower where we lay and made coffee and opened the door to one of the Marias who would be taking over for me. Where was I? My friend Noa from days gone by calls this all of this dysfunctional resilience and I call it a tale, a happily ever after, thickets of thorns and brambles and words and thankfulness to be alive, even now with no punctuation.

What it's like to be afraid

What's it like to face death every night? you ask. What exactly is it like I ask myself. Tonight. Every night, almost. Every time Sophie has a seizure. Every morning when I go to her room that short walk down the hallway to her room. Will she stop breathing in the interval between my comforting my attendance and my stance at the sink rinsing the syringe clear of the syrup (poison) I've shot into her day night day night day night day night day night day night day night day night. Will she have stopped breathing in the night and lie warm or cold in her bed? This is not morbid. I am not a soldier. The things I carry. What's it like to face death every night? you ask. What exactly is it like? I ask myself. I am not a soldier. I carry nothing but a syringe, a couple of pink pills, a white capsule, a cup of juice diluted with water. No arms but my own. I am not a soldier Sophie is not a warrior and this is not a battle. What's it like to face death every night? you ask (you have never asked). It's a song may the long time sun her gray face turned pink shine upon you my finger at her wrist all love her pulse furious surround you my hand at her brow and the pure light it's okay it's okay within you over and over guide your way on. It's the water rushing through the syringe at the sink afterward my head tilted. I am not a soldier Sophie is not a warrior and this is not a battle. I'm thinking not of crosshairs my perspective is the narrow tunnel of the hall the bed at the end and her small form. Focus.

Don't forget I'm moving to Substack.

Cannabis is Medicine

 

Don't forget to migrate over to Substack to see my new post!

Here's the link!

"You are not behaving like a decent person, and I do not respect you."

You are not behaving like a decent person. 

I do not respect you.

Gabrielle Blair, The Consequences of Your Actions


I hope you'll read the above link, because in this post Gabrielle, otherwise known as Design Mom, writes literally everything that I think, on a nearly daily basis, as I struggle to maintain relationships even in my own family. It's incredibly exhausting and debilitating to all involved, I'm sure, even as I acknowledge how it pales in comparison to my fellow human beings who are fighting for their lives.

A lot has happened in the last week or so since I've been here on the old blog. I tested negative for Covid, thank goodness, and I'm sorry I didn't let you know earlier. I took Sophie to the beach for the first time in years -- down to the water -- in her new beach wheelchair that my parents bought for her. I think I'll leave you with these glorious pictures. Having access to the beach again is transformative and brings me to my knees in gratitude. Sophie was so happy.

Pandemic Darts

Reader, Sophie is full of grace. She's a little lady. She loves to be outside. Really, that's all she wants to do -- to be outside. She loves the trees blowing in the sky. She can't walk as well anymore, but she enjoys sitting on the ground. Her eyes light up when she's outside. There's a lesson there, I know.





I had a conversation with Nice Neurologist the other day about Sophie's resistant seizures. We never really talk about anything else. Sophie's seizure control is okay -- but it really is all relevant. What she endures and what we think is a good day or week or month is a nightmare for others. A friend recently called me for support as she'd found her four year old son under the water, seizing. He'd been taking a bath with his older brother. She called me from the hospital. Her son was okay, but she wasn't. The boy hadn't had a seizure in four years, and she was wrecked. She should be wrecked. There are few things worse in seizure world than the bathtub seizure. Nakedness and thrashing and the water a killer. Yet, he hadn't had a seizure in nearly four years. How have I watched my daughter seize nearly every day (we have had brief periods of total seizure freedom) for twenty five years? More importantly, how has Sophie seized so many times yet loves and lives to be outdoors? While I listened to the panic and horror in my friend's voice, I couldn't help but think no wonder I'm dissociating half the time while Sophie is seizing. I don't really know how I do it. How I've done it. This shit is hard. I was struck by how I know this, yet I still don't entirely rest in it. I still feel agitated or guilty that I'm not doing enough, researching enough, trying to figure it all out. Figure it all out. So, back to the conversation I had with Nice Neurologist the other day. We were in a bar playing darts. He said, What about giving her a pulse of Ativan in anticipation of her bad days? and threw his dart. My turn. I don't understand why that would help? Do other people do that? I threw mine. Well, let me think about it. I'll look into the research, see whether it's been done. He threw another dart. Our darts were all over the bar at this point, a Dilantin hanging off of the seat of a chair, an old-school Diamox wedged into the front of the bar, Ativan dangling from the back of a stool. A guy walked by pulling one out of his neck. Nice Neurologist aims but generally misses. I throw wildly most of the time, but when I really concentrate and listen to what I know, I hit the target. Or maybe it's the opposite. It's only when I throw wildly that I hit the bullseye. No amount of concentration or attachment or expectation improves my aim. There's a lesson there, I know, and it's how I do it.

I don't know why I'm telling you this now. During a pandemic when the whole country is going mad. I guess I'm encouraging you to hang in there. The whole "we can do hard things" mantra. I don't know why, but we can. Lots of people do hard things, literally all the time, for years and years and years. Something is changing, and we have no idea what's happening. I think we need to think wildly and let go of our concentration, our attachments and our expectations. I think we'll aim true that way.

This Is A True Story

A very long time ago I held the baby in my arms in a brown and cream-checked easy chair, rocking back and forth while she screamed. Breathing in I calm myself, breathing out I smile, I said in my mind over and over back and forth. I got in a black car with a driver who took me to a nursing home in the Bronx where an Orthodox Jewish rabbi a supposed holy man recovered from a stroke. I walked down a hallway with the baby in my arms behind a small group of men in beards in black they turned left into a room there were no other women. The rabbi sat in a wheelchair his head on his shoulder his eyes looking straight at me and the baby and his eyes were clear and I had to look away look down not to escape but to absorb I guess (it's been 25 years). He said some things some things I won't repeat here although I've said these things before some things about eyes and evil eyes the whole time he spoke his head lay on his shoulder (the stroke) his beard lay on his chest he stroked the baby's head and said she'll be okay. He gave me a small medal with a sign on it that I pinned on the inside of her clothes for months, maybe years, taking it off each small shirt, dress, onesie, for months until it turned black it was cheap and magical. Years go by went by are going and as she seized seizes I say you're okay, it's okay, it's okay, it's okay and for a while I thought it would be okay and then I thought (with rue) when? and then with dark humor I forgot to ask when? and now it's all okay, it's really okay. 



May we be well, happy and peaceful.
May no harm come to us.
May no difficulties come to us
May no burdens weigh us down
May we always meet with success.
May we have strength, resilience and courage to meet the inevitable failures and disappointments in life.
May we be held.
May we be transformed.

Conversations in Quarantine

I can't do it anymore.
What's happening?
I can't do it anymore.
Where are you?
I'm driving.
Where?
I don't know. Anywhere.
You should pull over.
I can't do it anymore.
It's too much.
Yeah.
It's too much for all of us.
Yeah, it's always been too much.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The yeah yeah yeahs.





How's Sophie, he texts.
Fine
Then,
nothing.





A nasty toxic red tide we see during the day on the beach in southern California turns into a glowing blue -- what? Phosphorescence. Some people call it magical. I'm transfixed less by the blue emanating from dolphins and water in moonlight than the transformation itself. The smell of decay masked by light. It doesn't seem possible so I guess, magic.






How's Sophie, he texts.
She's running a fever. No other symptoms. I will talk to the doctor tomorrow.
Then,
nothing.






People on cell phones bore me. The people I can't see and the people I can see. The head low like a horse without the velvet nose. I'd like to see some teeth, the huge yellow ones biting an apple.




Anger.




Red tide. Decay. Stink.

Phosphorescence is light emitted after exposure to radiation.
It's produced by something that doesn't flame or heat.

(BTW, Sophie had a fever last week for three days with no other symptoms. She also stopped having seizures which is always the case for her. I wondered if she had The Virus. I wondered whether she'd die, but I wonder (this) (whether she'll die) every single day. The parenthetical. My powers of dissociation are strong. I had my first tele-health meeting with The New Physician. She took up 1/2 of the rectangle that is my phone screen. She wore a white lab coat and stood in front of an examining table with a blood pressure machine on the wall behind her. I wondered if it were a backdrop, one of those screens you can put up behind you while you Zoom. My students do that. One of them has the Tiger King guy behind him, the stripes playing light across his face. Wavy. We're reading The Crucible. The student can't believe I refuse to watch Tiger King. Why not? he asks.  Why? I say. What's a crucible? he asks. A container that holds high temperatures, metals melting. The doctor says, I wouldn't test her because it's so uncomfortable. I imagine driving in a line of cars into Dodger Stadium with Sophie in the back of the car in her wheelchair. Would someone open the door and have to swab her? I read somewhere the nasal swab felt like it touched my brain. 
)




How's Sophie, he texts.
Fine.                                                                  (I am, too.)
Then,
nothing.



I'm outside today picking mint from the garden. I rip it up take a huge bunch inside and wash it in the sink. The apple tree has blossoms and every succulent has a bloom. The sky is blue and a velvet hummingbird sideswipes my nose, I hear it coming. Hear it here.

Bodhisattva

I'm all over the place. Perhaps. (condition) Filled with vitriol and judgement and sadness masked by bitter humor. I know this in parts (not part). It must be irritating to listen to someone compare a disabled person and her caregiver to a pandemic's dictates. To constantly draw parallels. Parallels. One line tilts at some point must tilt at some point in this madness we call living. Sophie knows everything about isolation and confinement. Her journey is not mine nor are there parallels. But tilt. Because she is my heart I can understand how deep. Fathoms. Unfathomable. Unfathom is not a word, but I am learning unlearning to do it because of her. When she was a baby and screamed for hours I rocked her in a brown and cream-checked chair from the life before her, chanting Breathing in I calm myself, breathing out I smile.  Tonglen. Breathe in all the world's pain and suffering and breathe out good. When I forget -- tilt and the unfathomable depth of her eyes.

Dispatch from the Left Coast

Do you know the art of erasure? I don't mean the art of disappearing or being invisible or making something or someone invisible, although that'd be awesome. I'm talking about taking a piece of writing -- a newspaper, the back of a cereal box, a page in a magazine, an advertisement -- and whiting out random words to create a poem. You should try it, especially if you're tired of or hate doing jigsaw puzzles. I hate doing jigsaw puzzles, and I'm busy enough teaching and taking care of my family, but I do love the art of erasure. Let's all do it and report back tomorrow with your creations.

I told Mary Moon that I feel anger and depression in equal measure but what rules me is dissociation and its close cousin, anesthetized cheerfulness, because what better coping mechanism do we have than the ability to let go and smile? I've perfected the art of dissociation after watching tens of thousands of grand mal seizures over the last quarter of a century. I'm not talking mindfulness here, although it has a place right alongside the dissociation. I believe both are distant cousins of the stick your fingers in your ears and hum method. Now that I'm thinking about it, though, I'm never cheerful. Optimistic, yes, but I can't stand cheerfulness. I really can't stand a Pollyanna. I prefer the darkly humorous and bitter people of the world who still manage to be incredibly kind. For instance, I'd rather be dying alongside someone who is sweet with a gallows sense of humor and dark view of mankind than someone who is sweet but claims to be a Pollyanna.

Who the hell is Pollyanna? I really, really, really can't stand the Pollyannas of the Pandemic. So much better to say, What the fuck? at the absurdity of waiting in line at the Costco for your giant jars of mayo than I actually LOVE the solitude and am enjoying making elaborate food for myself and then watching a corny chick flick! The queen of WTFs is my friend Sandra who has been posting her WTF lists on her Facebook page, recounting life in the Pandemic with a severely disabled kid. The thing is after the hilarity and dark humor of that, she tells us something for which she feels gratitude, and that gratitude is all the more beautiful for its WTF frame. She wrote come amazing commentary today about what it's like caring for a child with complex medical needs during the Pandemic. Turns out it's not that different than caring for him during typical times, something that we've been sort of Cassandraing about for decades. Read it here.


I don't know what I'm talking about anymore. I thought I might have caught the Covid on Sunday. I just felt OFF. Evidently, I don't have it, though, at least not yet, because I felt better on Monday and Tuesday after dosing myself up with elderberry syrup, Yin Chao and prayer. Just kidding on the prayer. I lay in bed for hours in the darkest hours before dawn making elaborate plans for when I got sick. I won't regale you with these as it'd be about as interesting as me recounting a dream. I did a lot of mindful panicking in my tiny little mother mind™ before I conceded to the powers of the earlier-mentioned dissociation and concluded the whole session with a dark nod toward imminent death and the cessation of present troubles. Last night I woke in the middle of the night with the most intense headache I think I've ever had. I stumbled to the bathroom and shook out two Advil (even though my mind balked because I've heard that Tylenol is better than Advil for the Covid) in the dark and then stumbled back to my bed where I lay for hours, wondering whether this was a precursor to Covid or a stroke, but I eventually fell asleep and woke embarrassed in the light at my earlier histrionics.

Reader, what's up with you? If you're wondering, that photo is Oliver multi-tasking. He went to CVS to get Sophie's medications while attending "class."

We Can Do Hard Things, Monday 3/30/20

to Chris Rice

Some of you have asked -- my boy Henry is up in Washington. He lives off campus with a few friends and is doing "school" virtually. I understand from both boys that school is really just "school," that they don't feel they're actually learning and that it's all bullshit and boring. I hear the word boring a lot, and to tell you the truth, I feel grateful that they're bored. At least for now, because who knows what sort of long-term effects this strange, strange time will have on them, our youth, our hope, our future?

I miss Henry.

Sophie just had a huge seizure that rattled me. I'm still capable of being rattled despite being tens of thousands of seizures in. Epilepsy really sucks. When will this be over? Never.

I read an article by Aisha S. Ahmad titled "Why You Should Ignore All That Coronavirus Productivity" that was published in the Chronicle of Higher Education. The writer says:

Yet as someone who has experience with crises around the world, what I see behind this scramble for productivity is a perilous assumption. The answer to the question everyone is asking — "When will this be over?" — is simple and obvious, yet terribly hard to accept. The answer is never.

It's not depressing, though. It's very wise, and what it did for me was to affirm what I already know, have already experienced yet willfully forget or bury or don't have the time to remember. What I already know is that I can do hard things. I know this hard thing is like no other hard thing in its scale, so I won't use the word but. It's not about me. What I can offer, though, is my tiny little mother mind™ -- remember that? I do. It's the part of me that was left after Sophie was diagnosed on June 14th, 1995. The rest of me came before that. People are used to things being recoverable, and we live in a culture -- whether religious or not -- that makes faith and hope virtues in what to me is a weird way. Some things are just not recoverable. They are irrevocable. I drove to Ralph's grocery store yesterday, wearing a mask and gloves. I have tried to limit myself from any of the shopping, but I really needed to see what was there because I'm the one planning and making the meals. I parked my car and stood in a long line that snaked behind the building, each person standing six feet from the next. We were let in one at a time, in small groups, and we shopped that way, too. Everyone is shopping that way. My eyes filled up with tears and my mask and warm breath made them fog up so I couldn't see. A long time ago, I was driving my three young children around the shitty from one of Sophie's various therapies or something. I'd gone through the drive-through of In N Out to get some french fries for them. Oliver was an infant, facing backwards, but Henry was three years old and sat in a car seat next to Sophie who was also in a car seat. Henry fed Sophie french fries, one at a time, cheerfully. Cheerfully. Or matter of factly. Matter of factly. I glanced up in the rearview mirror and teared up. The words It will never be normal for them rose up in a snaky cartoon-like bubble, filling the entire back seat. Irrevocable. I think that's why we cry. We are sad for things irrevocable.


I was talking about this with my friend Chris, who is no stranger to things irrevocable, to apocalyptic experiences, who is wise and like a big sister to me. We also know that we can feel joy anyway, live anyway, I said. She agreed. And that my friend is the ultimate example of holding two seemingly disparate ideas in one's mind at the same time and still being able to function. 

I can do hard things. You can do hard things. We can do hard things.

...be slow. Let this distract you. Let it change how you thinnk and how you see the world. Because the world is our work. And so, may this tragedy tear down all our faulty assumptions and give us the courage of bold new ideas. 
Aisha Ahmad

We Can Do Hard Things, Tuesday 3/24/20

I've fallen into a sort of daze the last day or so, my body and mind fluid, amorphous. Taking care of Sophie has never been so easy. I feel nothing but tenderness toward her and none of the crackling anxiety and irritation at my role my plight my duties my responsibilities my aloneness. We.



This morning I woke up terrified but coffee the padding around the house my students the clicking of laptop keys a pan of brown butter cornbread the birds outside the dining room window the musty flowers on the table the piles of books a pink quartz a shell its sound in my ear dispelled the fear.




Reader, did you watch Dear Leader lie today? His white ringed eyes.




Carl told me that the Powers That Be in Washington have determined that a person with cognitive disabilities will not get a respirator should he or she or they need one. I said, We know that already. We is us. We know about the rationing of care.




Someone on Facebook commented that she hopes this actually will change everything. Why do I not believe it will change anything? 

We Can Do Hard Things, Monday 3/23/20

Fantastic Depiction of the Solar System, 19th century

I'm trying to remember what I wanted to write about today, but I just can't right now. I spent hours today doing virtual teaching, and I am beyond grateful for the precious children I teach and the wonderful folks who run the school and gave me this job. I took a walk through a largely deserted Los Angeles. Every person I passed gave me a wide berth. I love this city.

The POSPOTUS is going to gamble lives for the economy. "The cure is worse than the disease," he says. Meaning money lost is worse than suffering and death.










Everything, I know, is transactional in this culture.





My daughter's life is worth less than yours in the grand scheme of things. If she should get sick and need ventilation, she will be turned away if your "normal" child gets sick and needs ventilation. You know that, don't you? These are transactions that we must accustom ourselves to,



because






please, fill in the rest of that sentence. After the because.









A child injured or killed by a vaccine injury is a necessary sacrifice for the greater good. Children with disabilities shouldn't get funding for education because it takes away from those who are "normal." My taxes shouldn't go to a lazy ass person using food stamps to get by. If a person can't make it on minimum wage, he should get another job or another or another.










WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF, the Master of Ceremonies said in the dumbed-down string of letters we call language now,













On another note, my ex and his lawyer continue to hound me. Now they want me to go through a job evaluation -- something that will assess my earning capacity and what the hell I've been doing with my time for the last five years. I'd cry but why bother? We're in a pandemic, and life as we've known it goes on. For some.



Being quarantined is a bit like hospital time. It's not really time but time passes. Those of you who've spent lots of time in hospitals might understand this weak attempt to describe it.



On my walk I thought about God and god and religion and those who have faith in plans and order. I thought about absurdity and randomness, about houses made of cards, about human fragility and frailty, about beauty and hope and pure, dumb luck.

I choose to be dogged with not so much hope or faith but a belief in things as they are in the moment and the experience that what comes next is utterly and completely unknown.

We Can Do Hard Things, Wednesday 3/18/20

Hey, Readers. How's it going? Are you keeping it sexy out there, social distancing?

Speaking of sexy, I read an article about a nun who's basically been social distancing for 29 years in a convent. She had three pieces of advice:

1. Establish structure.
2. Be intentional and love others.
3. Use the time for self-reflection and relaxation.

(I've formally renounced Catholicism in my very own creation: The Eighth Sacrament or Renunciation of the Catholic Church, but I've had a life-long love of nuns -- the good ones -- so I'm trying to take her advice).

In the morning when I open my eyes, I try not to think about what I've thought about for the last three-plus years (I'll leave it to your own imagination but it has something to do with November 9, 2016), and instead I put my hand over my heart and say metta for all of us:

May we be happy, healthy and peaceful.

May no harm come to us.

May no difficulties come to us.

May no problems come to us.

May we always meet with success.

May we also have patience, courage and understanding to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems and failures in life.

Structure:

I get up and make my bed.

I take care of Sophie.

I begin my job teaching middle school and high school kids English literature and language arts.

I take care of Sophie.

I make breakfast and lunch and eat them. I feed Sophie.

I let Oliver take Sophie out for a walk.

I go out for a walk.

I take care of Sophie.

I take care of Sophie.

I catch up with all of you.

I make dinner.

I eat dinner and feed Sophie.

I prepare my lessons for tomorrow.

I sit with Carl and watch something on the teevee or just talk.

I take care of Sophie.

I go to bed and rest.

Being Intentional and Loving Others:

I check in with a lot of people every single day via text, phone and email. How lucky we are to have technology, right?

I tell Oliver and Carl how grateful I am that they are helping me and how much I love them for being who they are and being here with me and with Sophie.

I tell Sophie how much I love her and how difficult all of this is for everyone. Taking care of Sophie (see above) is a form of meditation. Honestly. It is.

I have cut out complaining as much as I can -- an intention most difficult for this old, crabby, sharp-tongued human

I bake bread and cookies and lovingly make food that is nourishing and looks good. Today I pulled something out of the freezer that looked like soup, but I believe it was gravy? Good thing I didn't feed it to Sophie? I am intentional in maintaining a sense of humor. I remember how goddamn fortunate we are to have purchased enough food to carry us through the next couple of weeks.

I paid my saintly childcare worker ahead of time and told her to stay home with her own family. I was able to do this because of the help I receive from my parents and from the glorious state of California.

I talked to my sisters, one of whom was feeling particularly agitated this morning. I reminded her that we should always acknowledge our fears, that bad things are happening and might happen to us. These are facts. I humbly say that it's been my experience that acknowledging things as they are or could be is very helpful in distilling fear and instilling acceptance and calm.

Use the time for self-reflection and relaxation:

See above for self-reflection. I have done hard things. We can do hard things.

I'm working on the relaxation but have been, so far, unsuccessful.

We Can Do Hard Things, Tuesday 3/17/20

Good morning from locked-down Los Angeles.

Roses

Everyone now and again wonders about
those questions that have no ready
answers: first cause, God's existence,
what happens when the curtain goes
down and nothing stops it, not kissing,
not going to the mall, not the Super
Bowl.

"Wild roses," I said to them one morning.
"Do you have the answers? And if you do,
would you tell me?"

The roses laughed softly. "Forgive us,"
they said. "But as you can see, we are
just now entirely busy being roses."

Mary Oliver

We Can Do Hard Things Monday, 3/16/20

Greetings from Los Angeles. May you all be well.

Stockpiling Medications

Planet Romanesco

Whew. It's been one crazy day, hasn't it? One thing I know for sure and that is that I feel as connected as I've ever felt to every single other human on this planet. My friend Kari wrote today that "our strength is in our compassion, not our fear," and that's where I'm cashing my chips, banking my bucks, paying the piper -- do you know how many idioms there are related to money? I feel as anxious as I've ever felt and much of it has to do with Sophie and her increased seizures and the same old feeling of no one knowing anything and so much fiddling with medication and cannabis and wondering if it's the moon or the weather or the virus or the general level of anxiety that is floating through the air picked up by those invisible antennae that shoot out from Sophie's addled and exquisitely sensitive brain. The Powers That Be recommend "stockpiling of medications" and this statement has made me fantasize about running into a CVS with a machete to grab all the bottles of Onfi and Depakote off the shelves, because for the life of me I do not know what it means to stockpile medications. Perhaps on the planet Romanesco?

Just yesterday I did a little dancing with The CVS Pharmacist and her Sanguine Pharmacist Technician. I'd gone to pick up Sophie's prescription for Onfi, the benzo that she has been on for much of her life but which does little to control her seizures yet to which she is irrevocably enslaved given its addictive properties, and the Sanguine Pharmacist Technician gave me only one bottle and then told me to speak to the pharmacist when I insisted that there should be two. The Pharmacist was extremely harried and quickly realized her mistake but told me that she only had one bottle, that she would have to order the other bottle and that it would come in on Friday, but because it had already gone through ("gone through" is one of those terms that professionals use because, after all, healthcare is a BUSINESS), and I'd paid $75 for that one bottle, I'd have to pay another $75 for the other bottle, the rest of the prescription. All because it had gone through.

Reader, are you with me?

As an aside, the retail "value" of one bottle of Onfi is $1,287 for a 23-day supply.

I promptly told her how absurd that was, that I shouldn't have to pay the penalty for a CVS Mistake and that I wanted the rest of my prescription as written. The Pharmacist looked at me, and then she looked at the line behind me of people stockpiling their medications and said, "You are right. I will write a fake prescription and your other bottle will be here tomorrow." My mind pondered the whole idea of a fake prescription but honestly, the tiny little mother mind™ was stretched to capacity, so I took her word and left the CVS with the one bottle of Onfi that had gone through and as I type this, a day has gone by so that I am happy to inform you that I did indeed pick up the other, the fake prescription and now have two lovely bottles of Onfi on my counter, worth approximately $2,574 and good to go for 23 days.

Bless all the people working in healthcare.

Our strength is in our compassion, not our fears.

May we all be well, happy and peaceful.
May no harm come to us.
May no difficulties come to us.
May no problems come to us.
May we always meet with success.

25 Years and a Surprise

Sophie turned 25 years old yesterday. I'm sorry I didn't post about it sooner, but I just couldn't figure out the words. I was going to say what I've said before: time hasn't flown at all, and I've felt every single one of those years.

That picture above is testament to my working philosophy: never set goals and never answer questions like where do you see yourself in 25 years?

Yes, I did make that cake, but I will take no credit for the beautiful young woman that has graced my life and shaped who I am in ways that I have only begun to articulate.

She's never been much of a smiler, but when I sang happy birthday to her in bed yesterday morning, she actually did smile. A slow gentle with a touch of smirk smile. This girl knows absolutely everything, and I am overwhelmed by her strength and beauty.

Guess what else?

Henry is home for spring break! Oliver went to Mexico on his spring break, and I've tried not to imagine what was going on. This morning The Bird Photographer woke up at the crack of dawn to go do his thing and then head to his home behind the Orange Curtain. I was feeling the post-25 years blues, so I asked him in the darkness to tell me something good. He said that he was sure it was going to be a very happy day. I went to work. I taught my magical students and had a lovely lunch with Henry.

He dropped me back off at work, and I continued to teach my magical students and then walked home. Then this happened:

If you can't see old schoolmarm acting dumbfounded, go to my Instagram account and check it out.

Reader, Oliver never went to Cabo! He surprised me and came home! I'm such a dope that I had absolutely no idea even though everyone else apparently did. I feel like the luckiest woman in the world to have her two beautiful sons at home for a week.