Well, here we are…
…having crossed into the second month of 2021.
What do you think? Are we better off? Do we see positivity on the horizon? Are we feeling better? Healthier? Mentally more stable? Are you at work on any resolutions?
I’m just glad that I’m not toggling between CNN Live and MSNBC 24/7. Although I did appreciate and enjoy the content between 9 PM and midnight—that I had little previous exposure to.
I got my first COVID-19 vaccine innoculation this week. Whew.
I’ve been listening to more music. Mostly 60s and 70s material. Thinking about those times, and missing live music. Very much. No sense looking for 2021 Bands On Tour.
However, I’ve been taste-testing podcasts. Some that I had forgotten about.
Flowers are blooming here in the rain. Time to think about the garden. I decided to dig a 12″ deep trench, 2′ wide, 8′ long. Maybe tomorrow. I want to drop my compost bins into the ditch so the worms can get in through the slots.
Dieting. Semi-successfully. I’ve taken off my “Covid Nine” but am having a difficult time getting past it. Weighing my food and abstaining from alcohol. Boo.
Can’t resist flipping through details of wild places to visit in 2022.
Oh yeah… Definitely writing more and taking Restorative Yoga classes.
Hiking in the woods, alone with my thoughts. Lost. Not Lost. Beating back depression with a trekking pole.
Baby steps. Thumbs up! 🙂
A Covid-19 Survival Story
My mother tested positive for Covid-19 on April 11, 2020.
A week later, she experienced difficulty breathing, coughing, but no fever. After days of being very ill, she was moved to the Positive-Covid-19 floor of her nursing home in Massachusetts.
She was on oxygen continuously for several days, then periodically as needed.
Then– she got better!
I called Mum today, May 23: SIX weeks after that diagnosis and also her 92nd birthday!
She sounded perfectly normal. Mind blowing!
She, of course, is the same baby girl who was born in 1928 at home in a third-floor, walk-up apartment, 2 months early, weighing 2 pounds (or was it 3 pounds?), and swaddled in a shoebox.
The doctor said, “Keep her in the oven with the door open.”
It was a gas oven.
There’s no other explanation. Simply put, my mother is a survivor.
P.S. Due to her dementia, she knows nothing about COVID-19. All she knows is that she can’t play Bingo because “we have to stay 6 feet apart”.
Day 17. Self-quarantine and what have I learned?
Day 17. Self-quarantine and what have I learned?
- It’s not that different from my regular routine. Introvert here.
- I’m not accomplishing as much as I thought I would.
- Gained 3 carb pounds but lost them as soon as I realized I was foraging in the pantry too often.
- Walking the yard is more fun than the treadmill.
- I can listen to my first audio book. (Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez)
- I can do mental gardening, deciding which plants need pruning and such.
- I can even stop and pluck weeds—if I want to.
Biggest achievement: I wrote my first piece of Fiction.
That may sound surprising, but my formal background is in Art Education. Only in recent years have I begun to put my life’s desire into practice. I’m finally growing into the writer that I’ve always wanted to become.
I’m still a tender seedling. I identify as a fresh, green vine of snow peas. I’m pulling myself up by my fragile tendrils and reaching for the sky.
One of our island writers suggested that it might be fun if some of us wrote a piece together. She wrote a scene. Created a list of characters, both animate and inanimate. The first fifteen volunteers would have four days to submit 500 words and she would combine our work into The Flame Flickers and post for our fellow islanders.
I signed right up. Any writing challenge excites me.
(Confession: Self-quarantine makes me an easy target.)
I loved my assigned character, enjoyed the fantasizing involved, and sent it in. Am looking forward to seeing the other writers’ contributions.
Amazingly, I’m pretty sure that I could tackle a bigger piece of Fiction.
Writing Memoir is by design an “all about me” genre. I like the idea of using Fiction—as many writers do—as a way to write about things I’m uncomfortable sharing in Memoir.
For example: XX XXXXXXX XXX XXXXXXXXXX XXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXX.
There. I said it.
Well, I tried, but I just couldn’t rip off the Band-aid.
Linda 2.0
Today is my anniversary.
It was precisely one year ago today that an IV drip began to dose me with the anesthesia that would propel me into a seven-hour surgery. A team composed of two oncology surgeons, an anesthesiologist, and ER nurses worked together to eradicate my breast cancer and put me back together again.
I used to be deathly afraid of anesthesia. It was because of a bad reaction to sodium pentathol decades ago. I was having a couple of teeth removed prior to orthodontic braces. As soon as the anesthesia was administered, I spiraled into a seemingly never-ending nightmare and awakened crying and screaming.
Thirty years passed before my second surgery—for a minor procedure about ten years ago—but that first event at the orthodontist’s office was in the back of my mind.
On the gurney, ready to roll to the ER, my fears were intensifying. Tears began sliding uncontrollably down my cheeks as the nurse pushed the gurney through the corridor.
She brought the gurney to a stop.
“Why are you crying?” said the nurse. “Are you in pain?”
I shook my head “no”.
“Are you afraid?”
I nodded “yes”.
“Oh, honey, you’re going to be just fine,” she said. “Listen, this is what you’re going to do. When the IV drip begins, I want you to think of your happy place, the place that makes you feel the most happy and secure.”
Her instructions were like a much-needed hug. At the appointed time, I went to that happy place, glanced up at the IV, saw the fluid moving and the next thing I knew, I was in a recovery room with no ill effects.
Last January—the surgery for the big one—there were extensive discussions with my surgeons and anesthesiologist 24 hours before the big day. They explained everything I would experience, step-by-step, and answered all my questions. Then the surgeons drew circles, arrows, and dotted lines on my torso with a black Sharpie, along with cryptic notes-to-self. I still regret that I didn’t take a selfie!
This time I was totally prepared and relaxed.
I woke up fresh as a daisy.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that preparation can make even the biggest challenges easier. Recovery wasn’t a walk in the park, but one deals with it.
As a child, I had no support system. I navigated too many terrifying situations alone, and yet, those lonely times created a resilience that continues to serve me today. I can’t think of anything that I’m afraid of.
To be clear, I understand the difference between Fear and Danger. Fear is imaginary—the monster under the bed. Danger is real—walking alone in the bad part of a city at 1 AM.
I know what constitutes Danger and do my best to avoid it. Fear is something I can control.
Today I’m all healed.
I’m Linda 2.0, the new, improved version of myself—back on the trail, back in the saddle.
I’m in my happy place.
Linda Summersea riding Rising Star. Banana Bank Horses, Belmopan, Belize. #BananaBank
Cancer, the Lesser of Two Evils
I have a friend—a fellow writer—who sold it all, packed up, and moved to a foreign country this year with her nearly blind 90-year-old mother and a little French poodle named Prose. Impressive, right?
Alison took it all step-by-step, sharing the ups and downs along the way with her Facebook followers and newsletter subscribers. Mostly “ups” because what’s not to love about beautiful scenery, village life, starting over, and being inspired to write about it? And, living in the country where the subject of her historical novels takes place.
In a recent newsletter, she shared how she’s dealt with a series of recent “aggravations”.
1. Alison was robbed of her cellphone, wallet, charge cards, and their passports in one fell swoop.
2. The US Social Security system says that they overpaid her and now they want their money back.
3. Half of her newsletter subscribers were “unsubscribed” in one day by a glitch within the system of the very well-known newsletter service that she uses. Zap. Gone.
Being an eternal optimist, Alison focused on positive ways to dig out from under this mess without getting discouraged. She told herself these were merely aggravations. They weren’t real problems.
“Cancer is a real problem. Your house sliding down a hill is a real problem,” she wrote.
That got my attention.
“Cancer is a real problem.”
But you know what? I’ve had cancer, and I’d rather have had cancer than those three “aggravations”.
Why? Because when I learned I had cancer, it felt like it was happening to someone else. My general practitioner gave me the news over the phone on the Monday after Thanksgiving.
“OK. What do I need to know? What do I do? What’s first? ” I responded.
I listened carefully, made a list, and proceeded to research the “who-what-where” that were going to help me.
After the research part, I was able to trust my decision and give the responsibility for the cure to my health providers. Done.
I didn’t even cry. Not even once. Some people might think that’s not a healthy response, but for me, it was important to think of my cancer problem as something survivable by means of educated professionals doing the hard work while I lay there receiving the care—not quite like a guinea pig—but sort of.
It’s been six and a half months from diagnosis to completed healing.
A few days ago, my last open wound has sealed and healed.
Of course, it hasn’t been easy. Parts of this cancer stuff are a real bitch. I’m still fairly new to the place where I live, so I didn’t have a support system here. I spent a lot of time lying alone in my bed, waiting for sunset.
I love to read. I love to write. I had no motivation to do either. I couldn’t even enjoy watching Netflix, and I haven’t yet turned on the TV in 2018.
But still, if I had to deal with a robbery, a federal department screw-up, and a computer glitch with negative ramifications, I’m pretty sure I’d have taken to my bed, having a good long cry under the covers.
The difference between dealing with cancer and dealing with bureaucracy is that I would have had to deal with the bureaucratic issues all by myself.
Does any of this make sense?
I guess what I mean is that I never felt fearful or stressed about the cancer, but I’d feel very fearful and stressed if I had to make a lot of phone calls (I hate phone calls) and push a lot of sensitive paperwork to restore my life.
I know that Alison (Check out her website here: www.alisontaylorbrown.com) has probably gotten it all sorted out by now because she has an amazing attitude when faced with high seas.
She’s an inspiration, and that’s what we all need: inspiration from other people, showing us that if they can do it, we can do it, too. We may not be side by side, but we’re virtually together on this planet. At some point, we all need inspiration from someone like Alison to get us through the deep water.
I’m hoping for the water to recede soon.
Thanks for listening.
Do me a favor?How about “Liking” me on Facebook?
I do sincerely appreciate all the likes on my photos and posts, but the Like button under the cover image is the one that measures my writer page like-ability. Thanks!
Seasonal Blues: Eventually It All Comes Together
Except when it doesn’t. But hang in there—this isn’t a blog about pain and misery. It’s about life’s surprises.
When I was diagnosed with breast cancer in December 2017, I actually wasn’t too freaked out. My first response to my primary care physician, who was delivering the news from the other side of the country, was “OK. What do I do to fix this?”
We had the conversation about oncologists, surgeons, reconstruction and hospitals. A few days later, I returned home to Washington state and began the interviews, appointments, and education process. A lot to learn! A lot to take in, and more importantly, a lot to decide.
Fast forward to today. My first surgery is eight weeks behind me.
Where did the time go? It’s almost as if it never happened. Or maybe it happened to someone else. I did, very often, feel as though I was watching someone else’s life. Except for the long voids of empty space in time. The long period of not writing. All the blog posts that I never finished. The long period of doubts and fears and alone-ness (not loneliness).
My point is: when you’re in this situation, the one thing you realize is that you damn well need to get rid of anything that isn’t working because you only have this one life to live (that I know of in this current space in time) and you’d better make this current life the Best it can be.
Then, just when I could do the simple things that were forbidden for weeks—rolling onto my stomach in bed, enjoying a hot restorative bath, easing into a hot tub—doubts crept in.
Yesterday I was seriously— and I do mean SERIOUSLY—considering leaving this writing stuff to the next generation. Maybe, I thought, maybe I was meant to have more time for walking on the beach or binging Netflix. I’ve been reading Ann Patchett’s The Getaway Car: A Practical Memoir about Writing and Life, and I’m watching other parts of my life teetering on a seesaw each day.
I hadn’t re-read my manuscript since pre-diagnosis and yesterday was the day I was going to put aside the delays of the past three months, open Scrivener and see what was there. It was HARD. I did everything I could to avoid it, including walking 7,000 steps in the cold. (I’m on the other side of the country again.)
But then, after nervously consuming multiple items that were beyond a reasonable person’s calorie count for the day, I did it.
That is, I opened Scrivener and re-read Chapter One.
I found a couple of words that needed replacing because they echoed each other’s sounds in a non-complementary manner. I re-shaped the first two sentences to remove any triteness and draw the reader in. I was careful not to change anything just for the sake of changing it. Then, I renamed the chapter to reflect more depth of the content: From a blah “My First Memory” to a significant “A Fierce First Memory”. In short, this three months absence from writing was beneficial. I’m back in the saddle.
Fierceness is my strength. Some people might call it stubborness, but, no, I say that it is fierceness. Tenacity. It’s what has had my back throughout these sixty-seven plus years. I can see now that “A Fierce First Memory” at age three is all about everything that would—and will—keep me together for the rest of my life.
I fell asleep feeling pretty good. Feeling as though I’m on the right track and able to assess the memoir content from a reader’s point of view.
This morning, if any doubts were lingering, I was surprised to greet three reinforcements from the Universe:
- A person I do not know, and who does not know my Polish heritage, was in touch with me, and she is from Poland.
- When I clicked on a New York Times article about tackling difficult challenges to self in one’s later years, I found that the subject was Polish and had much to say about tenacity. The article was a revelation for me because I only know the Polish-American point of view. Aleksander Doba reveals something I had not ever heard:
“The more you don’t believe in Polish people, the more determined we are. To prove themselves, Polish people will endure everything. If you aren’t willing to suffer, you can do nothing. You can sit and die. This is the only one thing you can do.”
Doba has a deep, almost performance-art-like sense of this. You can be made small by life or rage against it. “Nie chce byc malym szarym czlowiekiem,” he told me. “I do not want to be a little gray man.” This is a common expression in Poland — and a good motto for us all. (*Dziękuję, Mr. Doba!)
- I had an email from John Guzlowski’s blog. He is a poet, a Polish Chicagoan whose Catholic parents survived Buchenwald. Until chancing upon his blog a couple years ago, I hadn’t even known that the Nazis had rounded up any non-Jews.
I accepted this trifecta of Polish-ness as a positive message because I rarely come in contact with much that touches on my heritage, so I am happy to acknowledge this as a happy accident of communications.
Seasonal Blues. Eventually It All does Come Together.
*Thank you, Mr. Doba
PNWA
EPICwritersLOGO
