a million little pin pricks (part two)

Tuesday I spend comtemplating not going back to the acupuncturist’s office. My back isn’t that much better. Maybe it’s all a crock. But 2,500 years can't be wrong. On Wednesday I wake up with a spasm a lesion something painful and lumpy nestled beside my right shoulder blade. By the afternoon I find myself bundling up and walking the Avenue again, towards the woman with the short dark hair and cardigan sweater.

Today the cardigan is red wool. Red is what’s that word what is it it’s killing me…auspicious.

a million little pin pricks (part one)

I’m walking down the avenue.
I’m in Pain.
My back.
My mind.
I try to accept the moment. Try to surrender to the pain. The only thing I have is the certainty of change, the certainty that my back will stop hurting one day. My mind will stop hurting one day. Life changes and that's for certain.
I’ve read the Books. I’ve done the time in Therapy. I know the answers intellectually. Why can’t I integrate what I’ve learned with how I want to be? Why can’t I be better? Why can’t I be Wise?
I’m scared.

I’m desperate.

I see a sign.

The sign says Acupuncture.

enjoy this time

A grey-haired man sitting to my right at Two Boots the other night said as he chinned his face at his adult son and his grandson, "Enjoy this time." I smiled too much and told him I'm trying. I mean, we four did manage to have dinner out together so if that's not a sign of my strength and optimism, I don't know what is. But when I stuck Stella to my breast, the man stopped talking to me. What went wrong?

Bryan said just now, "You need, like, an astronaut's helmet so that when you go into the blogosphere, we all know." Ten minutes before that he said, "Parenting is one part wishing they would grow up, one part wishing they would stay little forever and six parts crazy." After the one about the astronaut he said, "Parenting is like blogging at the commercials." Because The Office is on. It's a repeat but makes me laugh still and laughter is so important in these trying times that I stop blogging to watch, even though I know what is coming next. This way I can concentrate on the nuances. Oh Dwight, you've done it again!

open 24 hours

Bryan said to me this morning, very quietly and nonconfrontationally, “Are you okay? You’re so angry so often,” and I said, “It’s hard,” and we started having a lovely conversation about it. I thought maybe he’d decided that I need some tender listening care. You know, to preserve the marriage. We were interrupted, naturally.
But last night during a collaged dinner of leftover pizza and frozen Indian kofta curry (Hamish had eggs earlier) I told him that more and more, I feel like a waitress on the Friday night graveyard shift at a diner next door to a bar, only I don’t get to take my apron off and go home to a quiet and tidy place to sleep for eight uninterrupted hours. My shift never ends. My life as Groundhog Day. Groundhog Nightmare would be more accurate. In the diner of my life, it’s always right after the bars have shut their doors and the drunks have spilled in. They’re messy and belligerent and they want their food yesterday, but they drop it on the floor as soon as I set it down. And they piss in their pants.

Bryan understands.