Embrace The Suck

Sweetie and I hit the high road to adventure this morning heading for Chesapeake, VA. Unlike the old days when the man who driving refused to stop except for potty breaks, Sweetie made concessions for my bad back. The doctor and therapists didn't object to my traveling. They just wanted me to stop frequently to stretch. Distance + time = muscle ache at the end of the day. Sweetie mapped out our route, determining Florence, SC to be in exact midpoint for both distance and time. I know there is a mathematical word problem in there somewhere, but I don't know how fast the train was going, or in what direction. As  predicted planned to the last detail, we made it to our pre-reserved room in the Econo-Lodge with time to spare. ( Travel question: Why is it when all you do is sit on your patootie all day, you get so tired?) Why Virginia you ask? The short answer is we're going to a very dear friend's graduation. The long answer, is more like a trip down memory lane. A trip ...

I know spellcheck makes a lot of mistakes. Especially the one on my phone. It drives me crazy trying to make words out of my shorthand. Still I don't always proof my writing as well as I should before hitting send/publish. For example, take the title of my last post. "They Shoot Hores Don't They?" I left out one little "s" and it totally changes things, don't you think? My little sister pointed out the mistake. I wonder did anyone else notice? If so, is that what you thought I meant? Then I was corresponding via e-mail with a dear friend. I'm going to be too close to her neck of the woods to let the opportunity to meet her go by. In the subject line I put, "How fare are you?" Fare instead of far. Not really a big deal, except I cringe every time I see the thread. Shhh. Can you hear that? Can you hear my father saying, "if you're going to do something, Mary, do it right" Okay. Okay. I'll start proofing...

I've been having back problems on and off for about a year. It comes on, I suffer through it, go to the doc, get a prescription for prednisone, feel better for awhile. Then the whole process starts over. Last time, I went in saying I didn't want to take any  more prednisone, but after a few minutes of being poked and prodded - does this hurt? yes. this? yes. what about this? yes, yes, yes. - I gladly accepted steroids and would have taken anything handed to me for the pain. Before I go any further, I need to confess that when it comes to pain, I'm a whiner. I try to suffer in silence. But everyone knows "OMG! Crap! or Sweet Jesus!" pack more of a punch when punctuated like a child who drops her ice cream cone after one lick.  Sometimes the pain shimmies down through my leg like an electric poker and my initial response is to shout. My primary care doc reading my X-ray.  "You've got rust, in there." ME: Rust? Doc: Yeh, like an old car. ME: M...

I heard a story the other day that made my heart ache. The 12 year old granddaughter of a friend of a friend swallowed a whole bottle of Tylenol. As we blithely discussed what could be so bad that a child would try to take her own life, the young girl lay in the hospital exhausted and most likely even more unhappy than she was a few hours before. Tests would tell if she did herself any permanent harm. When I hear stories like that I have flashbacks of the days when I felt so much emotional pain, dying seemed to be the only way out. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say even though it is a generalization, people who attempt suicide don't want to die - they just want to end the pain. Their worlds have gone dark. They are lost in the tunnel with no light at the end to guide them home. I've been in that tunnel where the false things I believed about myself trumped reality. I felt worthless, ashamed, lonely, unlovable. It took a trip to the hospital, having my stomach...