Home is whenever I'm alone...

My body had wandered off again. It walked out the door without saying where it was going. It roamed aimlessly, my self inside, imprisoned as a silent witness, for hours and hours, for days? weeks? - time is obsolete for the wanderlust. My limbs had wandered off so far and for so long that my silent self had been growing anxious... "How will I get back HOME?"

I walked barefoot across the beach and I stared out across the ocean, and I trailed up the cliff-lined path watching white globes of fuzz from the dandelion blossoms float abound the pebbly way, and then, where my body sat, I saw the glowing salmon-colored bridge pillaring mightily into the clouds while a perfect white sail boat bobbed beneath in it's shadow. The waves, the most beautiful, enforcing yet pliable, majestic waves stretched across the infinite blue and gold plain. My eyes watched them attentively as they slid into the rocky beach like sex in silk sheets then subtly but erratically shifted emotion to crash and drum against the already diluted boulders, making the sky and peace around my body jerk up in fear of danger. On a far off rock in the water there were birds that looked like small people trying to stay dry as they watched the sun fall down and patiently waited for the tide to curl back into itself as the moon filled the sky.

I later found myself sitting on an outside stoop in the dark smoking a 3-year-old Clove cigarette. A black woman who I had never seen before drove into a parking spot, got out, locked the door, and briskly walked past me as she held her breath and started into the building I was sitting in front of. "How are you?" I heard myself ask.

"Good. You?"

"I'm good," and I felt myself give a polite smile.

I was smoking a 3-year-old Clove cigarette, but I am NOT a smoker. How could I be good? Why did I lie to such an innocent stranger? She didn't deserve the lies my mouth automatically spat out. I needed to get back control of this body.

I read some old journal entries to get some perspective. Apparently in the time I was just going along with my body, 5 years and 29 days, I had wandered to the Lands End region of San Francisco on a Sunday in 2008, and several pages and bindings later and exactly 3 years and 17 days later, I had discovered disgust for myself on a Friday. That was 3 days ago. Within my California wandering, pen ink inscribed my movements and behaviors. I had:

• Moved into a new apartment 6 times.
• Started 4 new jobs, the most recent of which I had taken 3 promotions but never saw a cent added to my salary.
• Sued 1 landlord. I threatened another.
• Saved lives with passionate mentorship and suicide prevention, reproductive health, nutrition, and teen dating violence workshops.
• Witnessed death.
• Contracted a life-threatening bacteria and shat intestinal tissue and blood for about a year.
• Dated 20+ guys... 1 who had a self-tattoo of a skull and the letters "L.I.P" which stood for "Living Is Pain." One who was secretly involved with cocaine. I dated a guy for 2 months before we both officially concluded he was gay. I dated a guy for 1 week who weighed about 100 pounds and never slept, ever. Another guy I dated briefly lived above a car stereo shop and was making a documentary about the car made famous by Back To The Future, the Delorean. Most recently I fell in love with and moved in with a married man. Well... separated. Eventually divorced. Whatever. We were together for over a year and half and he was my first adult love. My first adult heart break.

Flash forward to present day confessions: I'm in a studio apartment that costs more than half my monthly income. There's a hornet that's crawled on the windowsill above my bed since the day I moved the bed in. The shower faucet has two settings: frost bite and hell. The bathroom smells like smoke, and that bothers me. Me, the one who smoked a 3 year old Clove. Those things are made with fiberglass! How did I get here?? How will I get back home?

I idealized my "home" to be like the home in Edward Sharp and the Magnetic Zero's "Home," which coincides as my iPhone's ring tone...

Home, let me come home,
Home is wherever I'm with you.
Oh home. Yes I am home.
Home is whenever I'm alone with you.

But now that I'm alone, actually alone, I can see that song is bullshit. God bless it, it is a great song, but it's a song for happy people in happy relationships and big 4 bedroom houses with white picked fences and a 2 car garage with a riding lawn mower and 2 yapping mongrels pissing on everything. It's a song for the illusioned who are also going along with their bodies and buoyantly bobbing through the Bay believing they can BE someone. HA! It's impossible. The home I've propelled my body toward is a manufactured fallacy. Home does not exist... not for the wanderlust... not for the mind-tramp.

Not that home anyway.

Something in the act and motion of breaking up with my "partner," saying goodbye to his family that had welcomed me in, and saying adeau to the friends he had temporarily shared with me, and moving all my furniture and things we shared out of our tiny abode, and letting go of the dream of building a home and a family with him, something in all that has allowed something else to awaken within me. The plug that connects my mind to my body was reattached.

Reattaching is an interesting process. Watch anyone coming out of a coma and you know what I mean. They open their eyes, that's usually the first step. Then slowly... very slowly they regain conscious function of their digits and voice, they become aware of their senses, and they reclaim their human power with their human spirit.

For me, my reattachment (one could even call it my rebirth) began with opening my eyes, gasping for breath, and crying. I wish there was a stronger word for the type of crying that took over me, as its violent nature was incomparable to the cry of cut skin or broken bones, or to that of the misfortune of being laid off from a job you actually like. I heaved with sadness and sobbed until my stomach ached. Reality was too harsh for my vulnerable new self to accept at first glance - I wanted to go back into the womb of my relationship, where happiness was make believe, but at least it was happiness.

I cried until I fell asleep, and when I woke again it was like only parts of me were turned on. I could use my body when I told it to move, but it felt numb. I could follow through with previously arranged appointments, but even meetings with friends looked hazy and ever dream-like. Waves of tears would crash into me unannounced, taking total siege of my attention, and then slowly drift away. I rode this ebb and flow of dazed emotion for weeks.

Then one day I opened my eyes once more and I saw light. There was light at the end of my tunnel vision where the image of the boy used to be. I don't really know why it suddenly appeared - maybe just a credit to time - but I told my body, "Go towards that!" and my body followed. My mind called it's first shot in years, and my legs and torso and butt did as I commanded, and I trailed toward hope.

Still, I had a lot of relearning to do. Specialized therapists needed to be scheduled to help my mind take full and confident control again. I had to take extra vitamins to help my soul stay fueled through the exhausting process. I had to dig deep into my memories to remember what self-love and compassion and intentional, spiritual living felt like, and I had to trust that those feelings could be rebuilt inside my current, previously mindless, machine.

Reattaching is a process and I assure you, I am not yet fulfillingly self-actualized. It's a path to be on - a journey not a destination. Occasional slips of unconsciousness take hold... hence the 3 year old Clove... but I am making a practice in leading with my mind and my heart, not with my body.

Living this way feels like a throw back to my senior year of college, which was the last time I actually lived alone. It was the best time of my life. My heart was free. I walked through the world with a slight skip in my step and a smirk on my face, and I patiently waited for the "real world" to arrive post academia. That was the year I felt truly, indescribably blessed with life; I had very keen awareness of what was important, and I felt the presence of god daily if not moment by microscopic moment.

The circumstances are right again - I'm single, I'm living alone, and my eyes are wide open for the next big thing. With this re-found worldview, each step I take on this journey is a step in feeling more alive, earthed, and whole. Every place I plant my foot, I feel a little more me, and a little more home.

on being patient

Patience is a virtue. Patience is a form of despair, disguised as virtue. I am full of patience, and fully occupied with being a patient. And broke because of it.

The newest medical update is that I definitely had a UTI last week. My doctor looked at the results and sarcastically asked me if I knew I had one, “and boy do you.” She put me on Nitrofurantroin. But it didn’t work. Half a week later the symptoms came flooding back, straight to every toilet and porter potty I came across as I wearily strolled through The City streets during Fleet Week. What do they call it when you’ve been on antibiotics for five months and can’t drink alcohol or enjoy coffee or eat dairy when everyone around you is having a party and you have to excuse yourself every half an hour to pee blood? Patience.

Sunday, the day of rest, I anxiously called my doctors office three times and left messages articulating my patience for the matter. Then after a several hour exercise in patience, a doctor called her patient back. “Oh did you see me last week?” She said.

“I don’t know…” I’ve been a patient of 12 doctors since May, don’t expect me to remember their names, as I no longer expect them to remember mine or appropriately advocate for the bits and pieces of me that are falling apart.

“I’m the big fat stupid blond lady...?”

“Oh yes. I did see you.”

“Did we get a culture done for you?”

“Well, you said you would, but I didn’t get any results…”

Today I dropped into my doctors office and patiently waited for those results, but when another new doctor made time to speak with me, and after sending her nurses on a wild goose chase to find said results, the conclusion was that no culture test (the protocol test for patients with complicated medical histories that figures out what bacteria is actually the cause of an infection and what the proper treatment would be) was done. 

“Great," I drooled, proving that patients can be sarcastic, too.

The new doctor gave her patient two white pieces of paper with scribbles on them that pharmacists magically recognize as prescriptions. The notes were for - you guessed it - more antibiotics. We are in the 6^th round with Cipro in one corner, and a broken bladder patient in the other. Simultaneously the 7^th round is underway with another left right uppercut combo from Metronidazole that aims to knock the broken privates patient down down down. 

According to the World Wide Web and the warning label on the bottle, Cipro “may cause a severe intestinal condition (Clostridium difficile-associated diarrhea) due to a type of resistant bacteria,” along with yeast infections, thrush, and irreversible tendon damage. Dairy and vitamins/supplements should not be taken as they may bind with the medication and totally screw up its effectiveness. No vitamins or supplements means no probiotics which means I have nothing to shield me from relapsing with C Fucking Diff for a 3^rd time. A 3^rd relapse means it’s time for this patient patient to get her ass back onto the doctor’s table for a transplant. And all THAT means is I am shit full of despair.

See a doctor once for a condition and you can call me a patient. I can tolerate the waiting room, the smaller waiting room after that where I have to sit naked under a paper robe, the $60 copay, the $45 prescription, and the lack of intelligence displayed by the doctor during the guessing game we call medicine. See a doctor 12 times for a condition and the 5 conditions that have spurred off as side effects of not effectively treating the main condition the first time, you may no longer call me a patient. You may call me anything but. First try calling me irritable, depressed, and extremely pissed off; I’ll respond to that.

I’m still waiting, though, for someone to tell me how to cope with this much physical and psychological damage. I’ll be verbosely honest in admitting that I am run down and beat up by the happenings of the last 13 odd weeks. I am not accustomed to being ill for any period of time and was not previously prepared for so much suffering. 

On top of all the side effects and debt from copays and prescriptions, there’s the emotional trench I’ve naturally fallen into. Coupled with a bunch of new beginnings at work, home, and relationships, all I can see of myself is a swollen shadow of who I used to be, a mere fraction of who I want to be. I don’t see how to handle all the new beginnings with the shit-tinted lenses my brain is giving me. If my body is too dependent on antibiotics and too fatigued to operate it’s immune system, how am I supposed to defend my soul? I feel like I’m under the weight of the entire Pacific Ocean to overcome these obstacles and be “happy,” be “successful,” be “good.” And all my doctors keep telling me to be patient with myself, and cross my fingers. Is that the best solution? Is all else lost?

Like a scab that won’t heal, the one thing I know how to do right now is remain open. I am stretching my arms out wide for a virtual hug from the world and a real validation that things are going to be OK. I’m writing, but mostly, I’m listening. I’m pleading with the gods to give me a resolution to this jagged despondency. I can’t stand being [a] patient anymore. I want to be me. I want to open because that’s who I am, because it’s godly, not because I’m desperate to achieve health and sanity. I want my wanderlust mind babbling to be more about how the sunlight reflects on people’s skin and how humans tattoo themselves on the skin of nature without regret, not about diarrhea, side-effects, and self-loathing. But that’s where I am. This is “now.” Now is crappy… now I have to take more antibiotics and keep holding my breath for that infamous moment when all is right with the world, when living life the way it was meant to be lived doesn’t require so much patient patience.

One thing after another

Since my last little novel was posted, it seemed like things were getting better for me. To my optimistic self's surprise, my health remained seated for the roller coaster ride. It's been a bumpy, turmoil-ridden experience to say the very least. But when do I ever say just that?

1. I did get the re-promotion, or un-demotion as it really was. Lots more work, no more pay, but I shouldn't complain... because as our wise old predecessors in their high pitched, nasally, dreadful sounding voices always say, "In this economy, you should be grateful to have ANY job. it's hard to get a job at McDonalds these days!" Meh.

2. Took a week off from the work for a road trip up north. I wish "up north" had the same meaning as it did in Michigan, where a few hours up I-75 meant Pine-lined lakes, hammocks, rednecks peacefully shining their shotguns on their stoops, and ultimate bliss. This time, however, up north was by way of Bend and Portland, OR and Seattle, WA. The facebook pictures are nice, I'm sure you agree.

3. Retested for C. Diff, and it was positive. ("So I've got that going for me.") Started on Vancomycin and the 4 more weeks of antibiotics plan.

And with #3, today's story begins:

When my doctors say positive, what they really mean is esteem-destroyingly negative. After 16+ weeks, I still had the toxic bacteria eating me up from the inside out. So I wasn't going to hesitate any further to do whatever it took to be rid of it. The 4 week plan was this: 4 pills a day for week 1, 2 pills a day for week 2, 1 pill a day for week 3, and 3 pills a week for week 4. Sounds like a cake walk, right?

But after week 1, I was still experiencing the runs in a fashion un-writable. Imagine saw-dust.... ewwwww, now you got the picture. So I called up my specialist and he exasperatedly told me either I don't know what I'm talking about and going crazy (in so few words), or that the "Vanco" (abbreviations make people sound smarter/cooler, I suppo.) was not working for me, which would make me the first person in history to not be positively (or negatively?) effected by the drug, or that I have some other problem on top of having C. Diff - like Crohns Disease or another nasty colitis. He told me to come in for an urgent colonoscopy. Too bad for him I was going on my vacation in two days, so he wouldn't be able to stick his probes in my no-mans-land. But it was too bad for me, as well, as I stuck to my 2 pills a day stage of the plan for an extra week and sucked up my discomfort throughout my holiday, and hoped that I get more constipated than anything else in order to veer away from the subsequent plan: a fecal transplant. On a side note, it was alarming how many of my friends and family stepped up to donate their fecal matter for the potential operation. Seriously alarming.

Back in the Bay Area again, I went in to see Mr Specialist. 60 bones for the copay - 5 minute consultation. "You look fine!" my doctor exclaimed. Apparently the modern medicine is based on outward appearances and who can afford to actually get such stellar advice. "Go to church, say your prayers, be nice to strangers, and hopefully you won't have to see me again. But if you relapse again, you know how to find me." If only I was a church going nice person who knew strangers!

With no surprise left in me, I have had a repeat of the runs since the breakthrough medical opinion was shared that September afternoon. But I also have had a lot of time this summer to examine the different types of runs one emits, and I know that these runs are different runs than C. Diff runs. Now the cause of my perpetual discomfort is a diet issue. Lactose Intolerance is the culprit. It's a crying shame for this milk loving cheese eater. Pizza, quesadillas, cheese-burgers, milk shakes, ice cream, and morning cereal are all serious no-nos now, among alcohol, coffee, and most regrettably, popcorn. Even if I do get better next month or some day and time over the rainbow, I know my life is less full because of the May through October (or beyond) in 2010 without such edible essentials. It's like taking away worms from a bird or Steve Irwin from the crocodile that ate him. How will I possibly get along?

With rice, rice cakes, bananas, and most recently added to the list, cranberry juice. Sounds like a diet for an old person who wears depends , unquestionably. But that old person is me, trapped in a 26 year old, Hottie McHotterson's body.

So what does cranberry juice do for a dame with intestinal problems? It helps her urinary track infection! I woke up yesterday morning at 5 am (aka way too early) from a bad dream that involved finding the ladies bathroom to discover the urgency of finding my reality bathroom asap. When I found it, I also found the classic symptoms described on wikipedia of a bladder infection, which I'll highlight for anyone who has also never had such problems: urgency without much product, cloudy smelly urine, severe pain, and a desire to cut out your insides. I couldn't get back to sleep because any way I laid I felt pressure on my bladder and I felt like getting to the toilet again.

It was a memorable scene, me sitting there slouched over my lap wishing I could stand up or lay down for more than 5 minutes without rushing back to the porcelain bowl. It was a scene I've played out a hundred times in 4 months. The only luxury was that this time I was focused on a different hole, and nothing was coming out.

I cautiously went about my day with a third eye on my bladder, but except for some upset stomach and general ickiness, which I've grown accustom to, I ignored the early morning signs of danger as a fluke to having bad dreams.

Today I woke up at the still ripe hour of 6 am and history repeated itself. I gotta pee, but I don't pee. I gotta pee, I can't freakin pee!

So I called the doctor - she must think I'm a hypochondriac - and made an appointment with her for tomorrow. About 10 minutes after that, my bladder announced it had to be relieved again, so even though I knew too well what would result, I plopped down on the porcelain again. Trickle trickle pause trickle stop. Wipe. Blood?

I moved my doctors appointment up for two and a half hours from now. Blood in urine, I'm pretty sure, is frowned upon. After all this, I may very well become a church going nice person who stops every stranger on the street for a hug. I need a freakin miracle. I know, and am scared to death that I'll be prescribed more antibiotics for this UTI, antibiotics that will rip through the walls of my stomach and intestines and persuade C. Diff to return with unstoppable vengeance.

Why me? What did I do in this life time or the last one to deserve this? Why am I not getting better?

Before all this, I was a healthy, vivacious young woman who had her own share of ups and downs but over all had a good thing going. And now... what am I but a cesspool, an ill-shaped patient in a dozen doctors offices across the Bay Area without a glimmer of hope or end to the internal wreckage?

It's just one thing after another. If you can stomach it, start praying.

The painful skinny

The blog is back! Several months have withered away, void of the tick-tick finger dance that I once so enjoyed, and behind the monitor a significant number of changes have taken hold of my reality. I make no attempt with this re-found ability to type to make this posting fluid with wise nectar... yup, no interest in that. This is all about facts for friends, in no particular order.

1. "promoted" to Regional Program Manager at work. no upgrade in the salary, just a phat-er title that can easily be mocked with quotes from the Office.

2. DEMOTED... same title, less salary. It's called poverty, bitches.

3. Met the very best man in the whole wide world for me.

4. Moved in with the very best man. No, I am not engaged or pregnant, and do not plan to be for a very very long time.

5. Moved in with the very best man because of item #2, and that my crack-head "psychiatrist" landlord kicked me out of my SF apartment. oh, well, because we're in love, too. I'm now a resident of the hood.

6. Got into a car accident and was dubbed a racist because some guy hit me.

7. I was possibly re-promoted (?) details on getting my hours and salary are still pending.

8. And then I lost 20 pounds by sitting on my ass! the doctor's notes on that are a joy to share...

It started at one of two or maybe both times and places. I got the dreaded SWINE FLU (I wish blogger came with sound effects because I can think of a good one to put here) back in December 09. The rumors about it are true, by they way, it is a terrible terrible flu that forced me to curl up in the fetal position on my futon for a week, watching - but mostly falling sleep to - old Seinfeld episodes on DVD. I felt weak for a month and never even got in to a doctor's office because it was just too much of an epidemic in SF. (A month into feeling better, I was 'diagnosed' with H1N1 during a routine physical. how's that for top-notch, speedy Western Medical Care?) Sob sob sob, that was just a warm up.

February through April I had my odds and ends of colds, flues, peculiar viruses and throat infections that gave my doctors a scratch on their heads, but the illnesses weren't tooooooo outrageous to be believed for the Average Joe. For me, at the time, I was growing wearisome since my typical pattern is: get a mild cold flu in December, get over it 4 days later, get healthy, run amok for 11.5 months. Then again, I was suddenly sharing a world of germs with my studly boyfriend, so I suppose it was all expected.

May 16 (happy wedding day, Allison!) kicked off the worst series of negative health events I have ever faced, and probably, hopefully, ever will face. My throat was sore in the slightest of slight ways before I went to bed the day before, and I wondered about it the way you wonder what is in a jewelery box you get from your Great Aunt Martha on Christmas. Tacky fake gold is the best you can hope for then, and I was crossing my fingers and swallowing my pounding instinct that it was just a flair of jet-lag. Alas, I woke on the morning of May 16 with swollen glands, oozing white patches on my tonsils, a neck ache, a fever, and a head-ache for the memory books. Swallowing my instinct had a gnarly side effect! But it didn't stop me from putting my high heals on and giving my boyfriend his debut at Allison and Patrick's wedding.

Post the ceremony, pre the reception, things took another turn for the worse. I felt like a Chinese finger trap and invisible forces were pulling at me from both ends. John and I stopped at the Dollar Store and picked up some Pepto Bismol and ibuprofen, which each cost about $3.74; I nearly puked from the horror of false marketing. Or maybe it was the McDonald's across the street that was inflaming my nostrils. Or maybe it was just me. Either way, the pit stop was useless. We went to the reception and I sunk into a puddle of "muh" and "ughhhhhhh" until everyone was served dinner. I ate about half a salad and 2 green beans before I decided my presence at the party of a lifetime was not doing anyone any good. Back home, I crashed at 9pm and left dear boyfriend twiddling his sweet Californian thumbs with my oblivious and careless parents improving their sedentary ways in front of the TV.

The next morning, after not sleeping most of the night (the crash lasted maybe an hour), I woke up, then asked God to shoot me. Everything was in throbbing pain. My dad called to give me a chore, in which my response was tears and a desperate cry for help. His response was, "talk to your mother." My mom then called to figure out what was wrong and quickly made a doctors appointment with good old Brian Federonko, family medical practitioner. The best boyfriend in the whole wide world took me to meet my fate.

At the doctors, first the nurse said "oh yea, I've seen this" and blah blah blah, like she knew the kind of hell I was in. Then the doctor came in and said, "hum, ho, oh I don't know. It could be Mono!" (John interjected with a fair and classically concerned "she only kisses me, she can't have Mono.) Then the doctor mumbled on, "well, it could be anything. But I don't think it's strep," and proceeded to give me antibiotics (Clindamycin) for strep, plus some simple steroids (Prednisone) to make me feel buff whilst in hell. I then got nauseous, cloudy, and passed out.

By the time I got my prescriptions for death and got back to my parents house, my temperature was 103. I laid limp on the couch and my very best boyfriend ever rubbed my feet while my mom force fed me Pediasure and cooled my forehead with a wet towel. This, I've heard, is really the classic way for your boyfriend to meet your parents for the first time. I'm happy I got to experience it the same way it's done in the movies.

So... la de da, I actually started getting better. The next day John and I flew back to CA, and I stayed on my antibiotics diligently, 2 pills at a time, 3 times a day, 10 days in a row.

To cut short the un-shockingly disturbing part of this story, I'll just say that a couple of weeks went by and I was feeling relatively normal. My poop.... well... it wasn't looking quite normal, but when does a lady like me ever raise concerns about her poop to the public?

Then about 3 weeks post my bout with Clindamycin, the full-hearty diarrhea took siege. And it wasn't just any 'I ate too much cheese and now I've got the runs' kind of diarrhea, this was 'hey look at that - my intestines are in the toilet, they're yellower and more pussy than I expected' kind of diarrhea. And still, as the lady that I am, I resisted showing my concern for another week, until I realized that the situation was making me lose weight. "7 pounds, gone?! That's curious! Something must be wrong. I'll go to the doctor."

Once at the doctors office and 3 hours later, 1 confused and frantic nurse practitioner later, 1 rectal exam and 1 blood drawing later, and 4 viles for stool samples filled later, then 24 hours later, it was confirmed that the cause of my reckless weight-loss and month of disordered bowel movements was the rare and life threatening presence of Clostridium Difficile (or C. Diff) thriving in toxic 'I'm gonna kill you' mode throughout my colon and large intestine. In Amy-talk, what it really meant was that the antibiotics I took so diligently for the non-bacterial, possibly viral infection in May destroyed every good bacteria my colon needed to be happy. Without the good bacteria, the mean old bad bacteria, C. Diff, that many people have in itty bitty insignificant quantities, tore up the house and decided not to leave.

Metronidazol, a different antibiotic, is what my doctor gave me to kill the bacteria my old antibiotic gave me. Medicine is clever. The kicker was that the new antibiotic to treat my nausea, weight loss, and infinite diarrhea has side effects of nausea, weight loss, and infinite diarrhea. So for 10 days, 3 times a day, I took this shit that made me shit. I was too nauseated to eat, so I dropped 10 pounds. And of course, I wanted to die.

When I finished the Metronidazol, John was out in the back country being terrorized by devil teens. The 4th of July was upon us so and I went "fishing" with some friends, although we didn't get any nibbles. I was sitting pretty on the row boat when I saw the email from my drug addict landlord who was writing from Eastern Europe on a major bender that told me he needed to vacate my unit so his mother-in-law could have a place to stay when she's in town. The immediate realization that I'd be homeless and only making about 25k a year, before taxes, with my demotion prompted me to detach from my body for the day, dropping some tears on the way out.

When I got home that night to rest in solitude, I returned to my body when I recognized my bloody intestines were projecting out of me again with uninhibited violence. That, and my tongue was gathering a fuzzy white patch near the back, which made me choke and gag as if a colony of popcorn grissels had taken fort in that hard to reach place. I used mouth wash and brushed feverishly to no avail. And the next day, everything was worse.

So with boyfriend in tow, I went back to the doctor, or, I should say, to the waiting room of my doctor's office. It was 2 hours before my doctor actually came in to see me, spitting her emotionless apologies for being so far behind with other, more important, patients. I told her my symptoms, and she looked them up on webmd, then prescribed me a second round of Metronidazol... this time, for 14 days instead of 10. "This should kick it out of you... the website says relapses happen in 10% of patients with C. Diff." So this is what it feels like to be a minority - hmmmm! Exciting. My doc also looked at my increasingly white and fuzzy tongue with suspicion and uncertainty. She gave me some lozenges to take every 4 hours, except while sleeping, and told me my thrush really wasn't that bad. I wondered, "how bad does an oral yeast infection have to be in order to get rid of it? I've been gagging on it for days, that seems bad enough to me!"

So I took the shit that made me shit and want to throw up every night even though I couldn't eat anything all day for 14 days. The lozenges I could have done without. Not only were they unreasonably flavorless (like they couldn't have coated them with bubblegum sweetener?), but they made no impact on my fuzzy tongue at all. The only notice I did see was when I ate a blue sucker and my tongue stayed blue for 2 days, even after brushing my teeth/tongue, rinsing my mouth, and trying to scrape it off with my fingernails. Otherwise, the medications perhaps, maybe, seemed to do something for my digestive track. I lost 10 more pounds.

Once I was through with the antibiotics, again, I went back to my doctors office for a follow up. I wanted to be sure the C. Diff was outty, and to see if there was anything else I could to do demolish the thrush. This time, the office was gracious enough to replace an actual doctor with a medical student wearing a hybrid hipster-professional wardrobe of skinny slacks and pointy black boots. The picture on his ID badge proudly displayed a purposeful 5-o'clock shadow and a once-was dishevelled hair do that was particularly placed with a presumably high end hair gel. The trim hair do he toted to the appointment made him look much more serious. Hipster student proceeded to read my charts and sound out the syllables of my diagnoses, "Looks here like you have clah-clah-clah-strid-eum diff-ih-seal. That's a toxic infection in your colon," which he followed with an eager look as if awaiting a gold star and round of applause. I gave him my renowned half grin and tilted brow to reiterate my obvious disinterest in his presence. I told him my tongue was still bothering me, that my back and joints had become very tender, I now had an excruciating hemorrhoid, and my excrement were still under the weather, to which he told me I'd probably have to schedule a second appointment if I wanted those symptoms addressed. (As Alice in Wonderland would say, "This place just gets curiouser and curiouser...)

At last the real doctor emerged from her lazy day in the staff lounge to give me a new prescription for my thrush before she shuffled out again without question. John, who was once again faithfully and patiently sitting in the corner for profound moral support, practically grabbed her sleeve as she attempted the exit, and we bombarded her with questions. According to this doctor, I didn't need an exam, a test for C. Diff, or a second glance. She told me the bacteria probably still was in my system, but that it was working itself out, and a test would inaccurately show it's crawling departure. "BUT," she said, "if your diarrhea comes back, come back in immediately."

The next day, my diarrhea was back. BUT I didn't let that phase me. 1 day of diarrhea at this point was a good day. And to be disgustingly honest, the runs felt a lot better on my hemorrhoid than the nice solid dumps healthy people take. The day following I was back to being constipated, and thus assumed I was on the mend.

Life kept going on: I went to my other best friend's wedding in Michigan and actually avoided getting violently sick that time. I managed to chug down two-thirds a glass of wine over 3 hours, I danced the Macarena with gusto, and I even caught the bride's bouquet, so all in all, things were starting to look up.

THEN, last Thursday (drum roll please), the slippery slimy smelly mess started sliding out of me all over again. The mere thought of a second relapse made me imitate the effects of Metrodinazol with gags and fatigue. I held my breath hoping it was just a fluke day and I'd be back to my happy constipated self on Friday. Naturally, that was not the case.

Friday morning I woke up and jetted to the bathroom. Describing the experience exactly would probably be too much, but I would say that it felt like a stampede of angry bulls with nails on their hooves were running through my intestines and taking a swipe of every tender, red thing they saw. I'd sit down, let the bitches fly out of me, feel a little better, stand up, feel a second stampede kick off, sit down, and repeat. For. Four. Hours. Throughout the day I watched the chaos tear through me over 20 times. Many bull fighters met their maker in the process.

Saturday. Doctors office waiting room for 1 hour. Doctor visit for 15 minutes. It once again was full of joy, if joy were a synonym for being raped in the rectum and being rushed off to the lab to get blood drawn and get viles for another thrilling poop sample. Luckily (and I mean this part with sincerity), this doctor actually felt inspired to help me. Since I had been on a waiting list for a GI specialist at UCSF for 2 months, my new doctor told me she'd make some calls and get me into a specialist on Monday. I didn't completely believe her but...

On Monday the doctors office called me a few times and explained their annoyance with the receptionists at the specialists, which I empathized with completely, and that she had made an appointment for me at the East Bay Center for Digestive Health on Tuesday at 1:30. "Well, I'd have to reschedule my hair appointment, but I guess could make that work."

And when Tuesday rolled around, I was off first to my gynecologist for my regular thingy ma-bob since I've had pre-cancerous cells show up in the past. My gyno was an hour late and came in emotionally spitting her exhaustion and the set backs of her day. I reminded her to look at my chart, see I am a fucking C. Diff patient, and told her to get over herself, which she promptly did. More or less. Then she told me I have Mollescum, a skin virus that kids and HIV patients get. Then she told me the yeast infection I thought I had was not yeast, but bacteria. Yes..... I said bacteria. Not C. Diff, because if you know anything about the vag, it does not easily accept bacterias from other parts of the body. Vaginas have brick walls and are reinforced with cement and a whole lot of rage, so I knew that this unexpected situation was a problem all of its own. But what does my emotional gyno want to prescribe me? CLINDA-FUCKING-MYCIN! I told her fuck no, and held my breath to gage her reaction. She said "ohhh.... I can't, you're right." When I explained WHY I will never take Clinda-fucking-mycin again, (remember? Because my retard doctor in Michigan gave it to me blindly and gave me the toxic-turn-amy-inside-out syndrome?) her face, like all my other doctors, got all scrunched up and she judgingly and appropriately proclaimed, "He gave you THAT for THAT? That's odd." Then she was about to prescribe me Metronidazol, but she saw me break down into a puddle of bacteria ridden tears. Instead of a new antibiotic, she told me to buy... get this... Boric Acid on Amazon.com, put it into capsules, and keep that in my vag for a month.

From Wikipedia:

Boric acid, also called boracic acid or orthoboric acid or acidum boricum, is a weak acid often used as an antiseptic, insecticide, flame retardant, in nuclear power plants to control the fission rate of uranium.

Well alrighty then. I think I'll get a second opinion on that.

Later on Tuesday I skipped over to my new GI specialist, who looked at me and asked, "What is a healthy 26 year old woman like you doing in my office, and how do you get C. Diff?" Well wouldn't you like to know, Doc! He explained it all... what my colon was sure to look like (yellow and pussy), why my shit was green and slimy (sorry, this is a graphic novel), why I've relapsed again (if you relapse once, you're bound to relapse again), and what the plan was for me to get better (3 more weeks of really really expensive antibiotics, called Vancomycin, and perhaps an eventual fecal transplant, which is exactly what sounds like). It must be nice to be a specialist... you can talk shit about all the doctors your patients have seen before you, then charge them an arm and a leg for talking about shit for 20 minutes. I may have my new career plan laid out right there!

So, to wrap this shit up (and yes, I'm using the word poignantly and adding this explanation in parentheses just to exhaust your eyes that much more), I am currently the valiant carrier of:

• Clostridium Difficile, though the poop samples actually came back today saying I was negative for it, everyone holds the firm belief that the tests are not accurate anyway, and I must still have it.
  
• Bacterium Vaginitis
• Mollescum Contagiosum
• Thrush... it came back
• Lactose Intolerance
  
• and an Ear Infection

It was confirmed I do not have (though how much should I believe the tests for this?):

• HIV
• Parasites
• Salmonella poisoning
  
• Celiac Disease
• Ulcereal Colitis
• Crohn's Disease
• or any STDs (holler!)

In the past 4 months, I have so far taken 2 different antibiotics for a total of 34 days, and if I'm able to find and afford the new prescription, we can make that count 3 antibiotics for 55 days. I've taken 2 different drugs for thrush, and 2 of those medications failed. I took steroids and got weaker. I've been prescribed to buy Boric Acid on Amazon... that's worth repeating. I've seen 8 different doctors (including one hipster). I've sat in waiting rooms for roughly 8 hours. I've spent nearly $300 on co-pays and prescriptions. I've had 2 total strangers stick their hands up my ___________ (madlibs). I've lost 20 pounds. I've embraced the fact that Hell frozen over looks a lot like San Francisco in July.

But with perspective, I've been to 2 of my best friends' weddings. I've moved in with my best friend. I took a little time off work. And I was inspired to write again. Like the ceramic key-holder decoration my mom got me says, "There is always, always something to be thankful for."

I am thankful for my support friends and family, and especially for those who dared read through this colossal blog post. I am thankful that I now have a doctor who will advocate for me until I am better, and then will probably advocate some more. I am thankful I have a place to live and enough money in my accounts to buy soft, easy to digest baby food. I am indebted to my boyfriend who has loved me through this entire ordeal and has sacrificed with me to ensure I get healthy and happy again.

Today I am sick. But, shit, I'm grateful!

Yesterday

Yesterday was a beautiful, crisp October day. If it wasn't for the lack of bold and earthy colors and the whiff of sea salt in the air, I would have thought I was back in the heart of the country. In a molasses style meander in my backyard, soaking up the fresh air, a memory of the days before took siege of my consciousness; without any effort I stood taller there, next to my redwood facing Golden Gate Bridge, feeling as though my heals were roots stretching deeper and deeper into the sands of time, rebirthing ceaselessly into the past as if it were so recent it was now...

I swing open the screen door like a matador flailing his red cape away from the charging bull with grandiose exuberance and I bound, the ball of one foot briefly resting on the sand stone slab, then I bound again to where both feet plop onto the sun-baked grass. The blades are sharp on my soles at first as my body presses into the Earth and gains stature, but I can feel the comforting last bits of soft moisture in the soil where my feet press the most - at the heal - just as the day is about to reach it's hottest peak. I jump a short jump again in the same spot to see if I can hear the faint squish of mud and muck beneath the grass, and I do.

From the edge of the yard I can see a playground stretching an entire continent long, the whole thing covered in inevitable grass stains. These late summer days surrounding me fill me with a confidence that this yard is my kingdom - I - the royal Queen.

I step slowly around the border of my country, making sure I never lift my feet high enough to leave the uncut grass; it slices between my toes and tickles in just the right way that makes me feel warm and more me. I feel one with the land, and that seems important for a queen.

In one corner of my kingdom lies a mighty jungle projecting high into the clouds made of silver-gray bars, 2 swings on chains, and a slide where in the ladder leading to the top lives a nest of bumble bees. They stung me once in the belly button, a few months ago, but I am still not afraid. When I have friends over to play and they get scared of one, and they always do, I reach out my hand and let the bee land on me, then I slowly walk it to the garden. I am a powerful and protecting queen, and i am one with the land and the creatures in it, which seems to me to be quite important.

At the far end of the jungle I bend my knees, dig my toes into the dirt (which has dried out completely in the time I've taken to walk the eastern perimeters), and in a giant burst of life I extend my body and my fingers protrude into the sky and my soles finally lift of the ground like tail end of a rocket. As barely as could be, the tips of my fingers touch the first monkey bar and enough magical strength is procured to get the rest of my miniature palms firmly around the shiny rod. This is a procedure I've attempted countless times and have only succeed in two times prior to now, so in celebration I bob a few times, kicking into the air in front and behind me and refirming my grip for good measure, then I allow my body to dangle like dead weight so I can get a good look on how high I've jumped. I can feel my arms loosen out of their sockets ever so slightly which is a sensation I'm fond of even though it shortens the distance between my toes and the ground and dulls the affect of my epic feat without the aid of a ladder.

Thirty seconds or so pass in my outstretched position before a rush of gravity hits me and I fear I may lose all that I have worked for, so I kick and bob once quick, then jet my right arm out to take hold of the next bar. This sudden change in space creates a great momentum behind me, and instead of reaching my left arm out to the next consecutive bar, I skip one and reach a little further. I get there easily enough, but some tiny brownish-orange flecks of god-knows-what trickle down from under my right hand and into my hair and eyelashes; the toxin nearly paralyzes my pendulum between the spread out bars. The presence of the unknown substance so heavy on my eyelids sends me into lightning speed, and without any forethought I am swinging to each metal bar before me, more little flecks dropping down like bombs each grasp of the way, and I promptly exhale when I make it to the the last bar, then the ladder to the slide.

I'm safe and no bees come out.

I dust my face and hair to remove the brazen spots before I clap my hands to get the smell of rotten medal off them, then I exhale again with a light sigh mixed in, and I climb to the top of the ladder and rest on my butt. Immediately I learn how hot the medal is today and it sends a red urgency from under my checkered skirt to pointy tips of my pig tails, so I push myself forward and head down the slide. It grabs at my skin a little bit on the way, so the motion is more bumpy than smooth, but at least I'm not on fire anymore.

Back on the grass I continue my queenly duties and patrol near the sandbox next to the shed where I used to make mud pies with my neighbor (who's secretly my boyfriend but no one but me knows). The day I got stung in the belly button he got stung on the chin, and since then he won't play in my kingdom; the mud pies have long dried out and are now just messy piles of sand that rest on the ledge of the box. They certainly don't look edible now, so I keep walking.

Around my mother's gardens - one, an vegetable patch, and the other filled with flowers - are thin wooden beams that I hop on to extend my gymnastics lessons. On the balls of my feet again I tip toe around the brimming garden, watching for large splinters dangling out, but not worrying much about the tiny splinters I'm sure to get. When I complete the tour of the vegetable patch I bound over to the other planks to finish the rotation in the opposite direction.

My swirls around this part of my kingdom kick up a happy aroma of lilac, daffodil, blackberry, dirt, and a hint of dill. The constant scents of grass and maple leaf linger in the back of my nose and the concoction, all together, gives me an indescribable sense of freedom and sweetness, and brings me to reminisce about the last summer, and the summer before that. Somehow I know right here and now, this is the happiest I could ever be.

I end my walk around my kingdom with a slight detour around my neighbors willow tree and I love the way the branches wipe over my entire body when I walk beneath them. I figure eight around my dad's newly planted trees and their surrounding mulch, but when I'm around it my nose tickles in a really uncomfortable way, so I briskly skip along, up to the deck next to the sun porch where my afternoon began.

I sit there, on a step, and cast a soft, open gaze upon my vast countryside. The sun is warming me and I feel a light vale of sweat on my forehead, but it's not heavy enough to bother me or make me wipe it away. I can hear robins chirping in the trees and bells on bicycles from a block away. I can smell a grill and kosher franks cooking from the Jewish house two doors down. I can whiff a delicate top layer of the growing corn from the field even though it's an entire bike ride down the street, I swear - I cross my heart I can smell. God is carrying the smells to me here on this, the day of all days, and everything in my kingdom is as perfect as could be. I choose now to remember this feeling forever and carry it the pit of my heart always. Someday it will be useful to recall just how precious a sunny promenade is... how precious life is.

Tit For Tat, This and That

There's an idea wrapped around a painful emotion in my mind today, and it's circling around itself, spiraling, in fact, and it's about to jet out in splitters and fractioned sentences. I'm not sure if I can get it all out on one neat page the way my perfectionistic self would like, but here I am trying despite myself. And despite the words I emit, as much of a toxic stream of consciousness as it may seem, I hope you think I'm more clever and artistic than hopeless and strange by the end of this post. I may need proper validation of that. Of this.


I've been thinking about communication. What is it? How do I do it? It is a thing with so many minute parts, and there are so many versions and approaches to take to make it real. Sometimes I don't think I can put it together right. Even though I love writing, and some people say it's the strongest skill I have, and writing is obviously one way to share the innards of a mind, I've always felt that speaking my inner truth is strenuous, difficult, at times agonizing work that I am just not good at. No one really taught me how to do it... I always heard words and expressions and "I feel" statements, but those words seemed to echo as if it was just the residual effect of hitting on a hollow drum. I've always sensed that there was more to be heard at the heart of things, but I never did. And hence, I've learned to echo the echoes, and keep my feelings hostage within myself, protected under thick glass. The truth is in the bell jar.

In learning other languages, I've noticed a difference in how well I can hear the words versus how well I can speak them. In early stages of French speaking, I could hear it much better than I could let it out. My voice was timid, my accent was nonexistent, and the idea of speaking up promoted an anxiety my English-speaking mind had never known. It was through many painstaking years and classes against my will that I could come to a shift in French communication, and suddenly I could speak it with much greater ease than I could comprehend it auditorily. My professors would put on a very simple cassette recording and my ears would freeze over. "Je ne comprend pas! J'ecoute rien!! Zut alors!" I'd screech to no avail. Only after a few more intensive classes did I start to tie the two skill sets together, and hear and speak with equal mediocrity, though I still never trusted myself in what I heard or said. I'd question the words and myself constantly, "vraiment? vraiment?" I finished 6 years of study and 2 trips to Paris with a B average, then called it quits on French. I never really came close to mastering the art of listening and speaking with confidence.

I'm seeing now that my English skills are not so much up to par either, at least not to where I think they ought to be. I remember screaming at my mom when I was a teen that she was not listening to me. I'd bark, "I know you can HEAR me, you HEAR my words, but you are not LISTENING to the meaning of them!" Of course I'd say this relatively wise statement at the top of my lungs so the only thing my mom could actually take in was the speed of my verbose wind and a brief shower of sharp spit. I was convinced she just didn't care about whatever I had to say, it never occurred to me that my ability to say what I had to say was equally important, and even more to blame.

As I left my angst and rage and grew into adulthood I continued to tango with my communication skills. My listening abilities led often, but other times my voice could not be stopped. From where I stand now, I just hope that grad school will teach me the delicate dance and partnership between actively listening to sharing my point of view. I certainly don't have it down yet.

Example: I frequently entertain my urge to tell my roommate how to live in our apartment. I think a lot of my requests of her are valid, like when she has dinner parties and leaves the dishes over flowing in the sink, or when she leaves spilled coffee on the counter, or sneakily takes my personal travel mugs with her to work; all that said and felt, I recognize I'm still an asshole for telling her how to do things my way. I *try* to be sweet in my approach... I try to make small talk with her before I stab into her hygiene. I try to put my demands in the form of a question, like, "Can you please keep my scissors in the kitchen and stop taking them into your room," and if these petitions are left on padded paper and stuck to the fridge, I almost always conclude with a smiley face and a "love ya!"

I don't think she hears me in the way I think I'm speaking. She seems to keep taking my things and disrespecting my desires. She seems to refuse my need for control. I guess I can't blame her - my mode of wants and needs is probably a bit harsh, and in the land of the free, who really wants that kind of dictatorship?

It's funny how much easier it is for me to tell her what to do than the vice versa. She left me a note the other day in thick green marker that read "leave me your mail key so I can make a copy for myself" (she hasn't had her own mail key since she moved in 4 months ago), and underneath that message, in a different sized font and color, she wrote "and put a new trash bag in the bin after you take out the garbage." Never mind that the bin has been soaking in bleach to remove the mold spores, and that the absence of trash bag was quite intentional; never mind that she's been piling up coffee filters on the counter and letting the fruit flies have a field day; her communication to me left me bitter and a little extra spiteful. I tore the note off the fridge. I crumpled it and tossed it on the pile of coffee grounds. I left the bag out of the bin. And apparently I'm not very good at listening either.

Tit for tat, I suppose. Communication is a game of war masked in day clothes and dirty dishes. It's a mindless echo of things that don't really matter. I'm holding onto empty words and sticky notes and ignoring the heart at the center of things... or that a heart should be at the center of things.

I just can't seem to master my own language. I can't hear what I'm saying and I can't say, for sure, what I hear. I don't really know what I want to say, which means I don't really know how I feel, which is a pretty evident problem.

To make this matter worse, I'm also realizing that my emotional language might not be the same language or dialect of those around me. Ok sure we mostly speak English, but that doesn't mean we all "get" each other. My great friend Laura pointed me to Gary Chapman's 5 love languages, and although it stems from a Christian agenda, I found its basic concept interesting and basically true.

Chapman claims that there 5 ways (languages) people communicate their needs and wants and love, and each individual maintains just 1 general language... whether it's well received by others or not. The languages or styles are as follows:

• Words of Affirmation, in which bearers of this language feel love when they are complimented, encouraged, and appreciated.
• Quality Time, in which speakers desire personal and focused attention with their loved ones, that is void of distraction, and in which people can share thoughts and make memories.
• Receiving Gifts, in which people of this style feel most loved when they are given valuable symbols to associate love; the symbols could be of monetary value or not at all, but they are visible reminders of love.
• Acts of Service, in which random acts of kindness, as simple as doing chores without being told, or as detailed as planning a special getaway, give individuals the strongest feeling of love.
• Physical Touch, in which a person responds best to actual contact more than words or ideas. People who speak this language prefer hugs to advice, and can have very specific tastes on other touches from handshakes to sex.

I feel that I know a little bit about each of these languages; I can see myself in different scenarios where I'd respond in different styles. My first thought, though, if I had to pick just one way of loving, is through Quality Time. I'm comfortable taking someone aside, alone, and discussing all the bits that make me me and learning all the bits that make him/her her/him. Getting to know, say, a potential partner through a group outing or public effort makes me uneasy, as if I'd be on display. I like individualized attention - I like to give it with intention.

Unexpectedly however, the more I divulge this, the more I might be keen on symbols of love. I don't consider myself materialistic at all, and I always thought words were still more important to me than things. But... refer to previous posts and there is enough evidence to prove I do want love in a tangible form. The idea of love is hard for me to grasp, maybe because I've never really heard it before. But if someone could show it to me... and say, "Hey! This is it! This is something for you. It's something small. It's something cheap and manmade. It's something no one else may care about at all, but it's for you because I care," then I might be able to "get it." I don't want expensive things, but I think I want visible signs of affection. A mixed tape would suffice. Roses would work, too.

Do I want to give physical things to another as a display of my love? Well, not really. I'd still rather give my very attune attention and mind and voice. So STILL it seems I don't give and take, hear or speak, at the same accord. I'm an anomaly and an oxymoron. Maybe I'm just a moron. The verdict isn't out on that one yet.

The virtue in this long and ramped mind-tramping is that I am learning more about myself (hip-hip, hooray!) and that maybe if you know me, you are learning me even better now. Maybe I or you or we can make this or that better from this point onward... whether this or that is how we communicate, how we get along, how we understand each other, or how we don't.

It's a bit of type-vomit, I admit. What I'm saying is certainly not a pretty package. I'm frankly still confused and wanderlust in my mind. Maybe all this contemplation of talk and perception and love is just one monotonous note to get through the day. Maybe tomorrow will be even worse. Who can say?

But I'm letting my heart out of the bell jar here. This is my emotion in the truest way I can show it. I hope it’s decent looking enough. I hope you didn't mind. I hope I can move forward now, and continue this honest and in sync mode of communication.

If it's not good enough... well... I'll write more again soon. This will be this. And that will be that. tit for tit, tat for tat.

the era of burnt - creamsicle sky

If you asked me today what my favorite color is, I would indefinitely tell you that it's turquoise (not gray, as I often tell people, or as my previous bloggings would suggest. Those were lies.) Turquoise is deemed a color of protection, healing, attunement, fortune, and connection of the body to soul, earth to sky. Upon learning these details 4 minutes ago via google search, it makes good solid sense that I've recently been re-drawn to the color, albeit subconsciously, in my jewelry and clothing selections, for I may very well be spiritually shifting again and in need of an umph in protection and balance.

It was also not really any wonder that I pumped up the jets of my hot tub tonight after a grueling and - I'll put it bluntly - infuriating day of work today. I was too exhausted for dinner, but the bottle of Honey Moon sufficed as I slipped into the 99 degree and rising, Brominating cauldron on this hump-day's cold and foggy night. I kept the stereo off, the jets to a low to moderate oscillation, and the glowing underwater lights to the color setting turquoise.

The first 10 to 20 minutes in my bubbling turquoise pot was used for grievances and bitter sighs, and of course, beer bottle clenching. Seriously folks, I had a bad day. The idea and sound of 'getting in my hot tub' still seemed better than the actual result. If I were Yiddish, it would have been a rather ferklempt moment. My mind reeled and ruminated on the days events; my skin acclimated quickly and I was already absorbing more fog than steam; the alcohol had not yet hit my calorie deprived system. I was a bummed out gal in a luke warm bath.

But then I turned up the jets just a tid-bit higher, and the turquoise aura began to glow a little softer under the swirling chemical foam. I let my head rest back, and the rest of me floated upwards, bounding and buoyant. As my sight rested on the fog-ridden sky, that's when the world changed.

Perhaps it was my imagination... perhaps it was the booze... perhaps it was the magic of cone and rod polarization, but above the turquoise pool and me, the dark, cottony sky burned orange. It reminded me of sherbet, or a summer's creamsicle treat, just tainted with a burnt-out and tired hue, where exhaustion met Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory (sans the chocolate). So I gazed in awe and my brewing body buoyed.

I believe this time of my life to be an epic era of self discovery and spiritual transition. Although it sounds a bit egoic, I can sense that even my greatest challenges and frustrations - with work, living arrangements, minimalist income, relationships, and et cetera what-have-yous - are lessons towards my degree in wholeness. I may struggle at times; I may struggle often, as viewed from my parents, but I am learning and stretching and demanding more of myself in ways that cannot necessarily be seen. Chaotic? A bit. And chaos is my be.

Pema Chodron writes in When Things Fall Apart that there are 3 ways of dealing with chaos such as mine. You can 1- let chaos and suffering go (I envy anyone who can do this effectively and will pay money to be taught); 2- you can change your attitude about suffering, and use every day/moment with chaos and discontentment as a tool to learn compassion. Chodron states, "Instead of pushing it away, we can breathe it in with the wish that everyone could stop hurting, with the wish that people everywhere could experience contentment in their hearts. We could transform pain into joy." It may seem a little masochistic at first, but worth trying in the end; and 3- acknowledge and accept that darkness is a little bit everywhere always, "whether we regard our situation as heaven or hell depends on our perception."

The sky was burnt-creamsicle and perhaps a tad demonic at the end of a wretched, painful day. But then again, it's actually quite logical that the creepy, Gene Wilder-esque color was simply an opposing projection of the turquoise protection swirling everywhere around me.

I sat on my knees in the middle of the jacuzzi like in the eye of a tornado, calm, collected, while blue-green lit water hugged me from every direction. If this era of my life isn't profound or tale-worthy, in the spirit of a big-picture perception, than I simply don't know what is or would be.