Had to skip Wound Care this morning. Was feeling very under the weather, including a cough and a runny nose.

And not only do I not want to spread whatever I have to my fellow sick folk at the Community Care Clinic, there would have been little point in going when I would have had to answer yes to the whole “do you have any of these COVID symptoms….?” prompt upon entry.

Not sure what happens then. Presumably they tell you to go die at home.

Of course, in my imagination it would go like this :

So once I was on the phone to the CCC, I agreed to just skip today’s Wound Care and wear the same dressings till my next scheduled Wound Care appointment, which is at 9:30 AM on Monday.

I’ve done this before in similar circumstances. My bandages are pretty bedraggled looking by the end, but otherwise no harm is done.

Otherwise, nothing new to report. Being on my feet continues to be torture. Can’t really tell if it’s getting worse because it’s already so bad.

When you are in a great deal of pain. you don’t really have the mental bandwidth to figure out if you are in 8 percent more agony than yesterday.

All I can say is that it seems about the same. Which is better than it getting worse.

No work from Doc Chao about my x-rays yet. He’s probably forgotten all about me. Sustained interest is not his long suit.

After all, why would he keep working after the patient leaves? Nobody pays him for that!

So I will call tomorrow afternoon. Just a friendly little reminder that I exist and you have my future as an ambulatory primate in your hands, so….. be a doctor?

Not that I’m bitter.

Why should I be bitter just because I have to nag doctors into doing their goddamned jobs? So what if I seem to disappear from their minds the moments I am not physically present, like they have medical degrees but not object permanence? Who cares that this really feeds into my feeling of being worthless and disgusting and not worth the slightest bit of time or effort or oxygen?

And that pisses me off. You people are supposed to me making me feel BETTER!!

Speaking of which. my depression has been stable but bad. I find myself alternating between short bouts of seething rage at the world and long jags of black despair.

So I try to keep busy. Well, distracted, anyhow.

Busy implies productivity.

Days like these, I just want to stick my head out the window and scream at the sky.

Just scream and scream and scream until I can scream no more. No words needed, I just feel the need to express my frustration at how life had treated me in the past and how it is treating me now.

Trust me, there’s a pattern.

How dare life steal my strength just when I could put it to good use?

Is this my depression’s dirty dealings?

If so, how do I get it to stop?

I don’t fucking know. And there is nobody to tell me.

Guess I’ll just die, then.

More after the break.

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Every single step

And now we’re back to every step being agony.

I was in this state once before, and it left me wondering if I was going to have to call 911 because there was no way I could walk to the car in that state.

And now it’s back. The “cramp” has returned. Son of a bitch.

Well last time it went away on its own after I slept. This time it only showed up after I slept. Hopefully my next nap will toggle the goddamned thing off again.

Won’t be calling 911 just yet, anyhow. Not when there is a chance it can be avoided.

I am, technically, crippled right now. Hobbled. Just making it to the toilet and back hurt like hell because every step results in a brutal stab of pain that goes right to the bone in the center of the bottommost edge of my right kneecap.

Mental note : somehow, describing it precisely like that made me feel a little better. Contemplate future self-therapy of describing all my injuries and ailments in excruciating detail for further relief.

Don’t worry, dear readers, I won’t expect you to read it.

Anyhow, yeah, crippled. As in, just getting to the toilet and back was torture. And it’s only like nine feet away.

Getting to the kitchen and back to get myself some supper is out of the question. Luckily, I have a little bit of popcorn and almonds left over from lunch, so I at least have enough food and water to take my evening meds.

Ooh, and i have a cookie too. Score. Thank goodness for my inability to finish meals.

If it hadn’t been for the leftovers, I would have been in dire straits. I would have had no choice but to call Julian on his cell and hope he picks up.

Might seem weird to call someone who is probably in the same apartment as me, but it’s a damn sight more civilized than hollering for him.

Now if he hadn’t picked up, I’d have to holler.

Or just call 911, I suppose. Explain that they are going to have to come all the way to me because I can’t meet them part way.

Which I did before. When I thought I was having a heart attack.

It is possible that I am too accommodating for my own good sometimes.

What can I say, I’m eager to please.

Of course, my leftovers only get me so far, I have no clue what is going to happen if/when midnight rolls around and I still have this “cramp”.

Can’t see how I can make it out to the living room like this. Not without a LOT of pain. And sooner or later, I will have to ask one of my roomies to bring me food and water.

And maybe a pee bottle. 🙁

Is this a preview of my future as a full time cripple?

God I hope not.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.

Gee, there’s so many topics to choose from. Global politics, how the streaming revolution has changed television, the plight of the indigenous peoples of Indonesia, alienatingly frank facts about my sex life, maybe even a bon mot or two about the latest celebrity scandal or political brouhaha….

Nah. Too corny. Let’s mix it up a bit and talk about how my legs are dying.

I’ve been trying to grapple with the subject rationally, using this big ol’ brain of mine. What could possibly account for these symptoms?

Nothing minor,. I am afraid. Because whatever it is, it’s weakening all my major leg muscles and inflaming all the joints at the same time.

And it’s progressing. So it can’t be any sort of simple injury.

It could definitely still be an infection. In which case it’s been raging out of control for a really long time now and someone should really look into stopping it.

One would think that if it was an infection, it would have been detected on one of my many visits to the ER.

But I dunno. Maybe it’s some weird kind of thing that doesn’t show up on normal tests.

That would explain a lot.

An infection is the only thing I can think of that would account for how non-localized it is. A tumour would obviously have a locus – the tumour. And a degenerative disease would surely have more symptoms than just leg death.

So it must be something more subtle and/or complex.

It could all be fundamentally neurological. Highly likely given my unchecked diabetes and all the feeling I have lost in my feet.

Plus subtle little things like half my face and most of my left hand going numb.

I have a strong suspicion that I might be in very poor neurological condition indeed. There’s also the random serious pains I get out of nowhere.

Those probably means something is dying.

And yet I still can’t motivate myself to get the shit done I should be getting done. Calling the company about my POS continuous glucometer and getting it working. Calling Ray at Coastal Sleep about my CPAP machine making me wake up gasping for air about thirty minutes after I go to sleep.

That’s very bad.

That can probably be fixed by increasing the pressure a bit. Clearly it’s almost working. Air is getting through, just not quite enough. Kind of like having a slow leak.

If I fixed either or both of those things, my life would undoubtedly get much, much better, and I would be a much happier, saner, and stronger individual.

Maybe that’s why I can’t do it. That’s too much change.

Sounds glib but there might be a lot of truth to that. Even positive change can be very scary to a weak and frightened soul like mine.

The caterpillar can’t know for sure that it will become a butterfly. Maybe it will just die instead, and what could be worse than that?

But I don’t want to be the world’s oldest caterpillar any more.

I want to pupate and grow up. I’ve lingered in this form far too long and it’s gone to see. I need to move on to the next stage so that I might be reborn anew.

But first I need to let that little piece of me die.

And I am not ready for that yet.

I’m not ready for that…. yet.

More after the break,

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Something that just occurred to me : it’s called a vacation because you vacate your usual home to go on it, thus leaving it vacant.

This changes everything.

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My addiction to lunch meat is out of control… I’m going to have to quit cold turkey.

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The paradox of genius

I sometimes wonder if my life would have been better if it had been way harder.

In a lot of ways, being born with a sky high IQ is like being born rich or good-looking. A lot of things are going to come to you with very little real effort on your part and as a result you never need to learn to work hard and overcome yourself.

Then sooner or later, the real world happens, and you reach your limits, and there you stay because you have no experience of ever overcoming your own limitations and so as far as you know, this is it. Those limitations are carved in stone. Anything that doesn’t come easily to you is something you just “can’t do” or are “no good at” and that can never and will never ever change. It’s a fixed attribute.

Compare that to someone who struggles academically. They have no choice but to learn to work hard, focus, and overcome their limitations because otherwise they will fail. Their lot in life is initially much harder than mine.

But there’s a reason it’s the dropouts who go on to found and run Fortune 500 companies and end up rolling in enough dough to make a gingerbread man the size of King Kong’s older brother.

It’s because hard work and focus and drive are way more valuable than being clever.

Yup. Turns out your parents were right. Sorry.

So brains are great and all, and I really appreciate mine (more often than not), but it is clear to me that I might well have been better off having to work for things.

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I can be more than I am.
I can me more like who I am.

I can be upright, and focused, and strong
I can write my own ticket and sing my own song

I can choose who I am, where I go, what I do
I can live my beliefs and see everything through

I can run with the dogs, I can play with the rest
Because I AM good enough. Matter of fact, I am blessed

So farewell to the shame from just being alive
You’ve kept me from living. From now on, I will THRIVE.

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There goes that poetry thing again.

I rather like that one, though.

Maybe I will even submit it to something someday!

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.