a really sad day

I’m planning to hire someone to finish a small digging project that I can’t complete due to the pain. I’m hurting so much that I called Mark (my orthopedist) today about the possibility of a partial shoulder replacement on the right side. The one he did on the left 37-months ago has just recently reached what I suspect to be its full potential for improvement, and I would anticipate just as slow a recovery on the right side, but my condition certainly won’t get any better if I don’t have the surgery. A full replacement would be more likely to alleviate more of the pain (I have no thought that I will ever be pain free), but it would also restrict the kinds of work I could do, and I had rather be in pain and able to work than to not be in pain and not be able to work. My problem now is that the pain is so great that work is out of the question, and I am also concerned that I have now worked myself into this level of pain a few times, and I am beginning to worry that I will eventually do so much damage that the increased pain level will become permanent and maybe even unbearable. I’m also concerned that Mark either won’t operate at the hospital my insurance will send me to, or else he will pronounce the joint too far gone for a partial replacement—and maybe even for a full one (joints can deteriorate to the point that the only option is to either do nothing or else to fuse the bones). Then again, I might feel better in a few days, and say no to another such nightmare.

Today is a lovely day, and as I look out the window at a project which I can’t finish, I am practically in hysterics. If it was work I hated, I could live with hiring someone, but how do I live with giving up things I love, one after the other? Depending upon one's perspective, there are many valid ways to interpret life, but certainly one of those ways is to regard it as a slow—or sometimes fast—fall into ruin succeeded by death, and that’s the one that is before me at the moment.

Sidney, the baby that I call my grandchild, was here yesterday. As I reflected upon the growth she has experienced in her first two months, and the growth that she will continue to experience for nearly three decades, I envisioned her as a flower that I will never see completely open, but I also remembered that her growth will someday turn to decay, and she too will increasingly fail until her life finally comes to an end. I then recalled a song that goes, “he not busy being born, is being dying," and since it's from my favorite movie, I put it up top. 

What to do? I ate some pot, but it made things worse. Pot quite often does that. I never know what it will do from day to day or even from morning to afternoon, but when it’s bad, it can take whatever is bothering me, multiply it by a factor of ten, and rub my face in it as if into fresh shit. Getting high on pot should not be taken to imply that the user will necessarily have an enjoyable experience.

The picture is of my Grandpa holding me in 1950. While holding Sidney, I remembered that picture, and I knew that, despite his dour expression, he must have felt with me somewhat as I was feeling with her, for I know he loved me. There is something so hopeful about new life that I can't imagine anyone not loving it, although my cat, Brewsky, certainly gives an excellent imitation.

Things that go bump in the night

I’m going to betray a tree that has provided me with beauty and shade for the 21 years I’ve been in this house. The tree is a Ponderosa Pine that stands ten feet from my back bedroom. Fifteen years ago, an ice storm sent limbs crashing from that tree like artillery shells. For three days, I slept at the other end of the house while Peggy remained in the very bedroom that was most likely to be hit (this is the same woman who worries that airplanes will fall on her). After the ice melted, I told her that there was no way I was going to pass another winter wondering if an evergreen limb four inches in diameter was going to impale us in our bed. She objected strenuously to my pruning proposal, but I used her old mountain climbing gear to get myself to the top of that 80-foot tree, and I pruned it anyway (I’m a woos about crossing Peggy, so this constituted a rare act of defiance). I thought the tree might die from such a severe pruning, but it didn’t even slow down, so last summer, I had to do the same thing again. The tree still looks healthy, but it’s none too pretty, what with most of one side and twenty feet of its top gone—and even after all that, there’s still the possibility that it might heave our foundation.

So, I’m going to have an arborist give me one estimate for cutting the whole thing down and another estimate based upon me cutting the limbs and him cutting the trunk. Ten years ago, I would have rented a chainsaw with a long bar and done the job myself, but given how bad a shape I’m in anymore, even the limbs—which will have to be cut into sections and lowered with ropes—are more than prudence dictates that I tackle, although I probably will.

I’m not doing well with my ever-worsening health situation, but I must say that I’ve gotten enormous comfort over the years by reflecting upon other people’s misery. Based upon my own experiences and what I’ve read, I’ve learned two things about chronic pain: there’s often very little that doctors can do to alleviate it; and the only limit to how much pain a person can experience is determined by the point at which he passes out, and even then he has to wake up again. I’ve read about people whom, if I were them, and had I been able to use a gun on myself, I would have run to that gun. I draw two conclusions from such somber reflections. One is that I’m lucky compared to how bad off I could be. The second is that to truly allow the knowledge of such pain into my heart has made life seem a lot more serious. When I was young, I pretended that life was simply a game that I would someday tire of, and then go back to my real existence; but, no, our lives are as real—and sometimes as horrific—as when a leopard crushes the windpipe of an impala.

One of the things I miss most is the ability to believe that I will ever again be strong and healthy. Life just seems too damn sad most of the time, and what joy I find comes in little pieces, and most of them when I’m writing (I write far more than I share) or spending time with Peggy. I figure that as long as I have her, I can put up with almost anything. I’m 62, and I’ve never been alone or even wanted to be alone. In three months, she and I will have been married forty years—we met in August and were married that December. Scores of people have passed through my life since I met Peggy, but somehow she has remained.

Just as I finished this, a blogger who is surely a lot tougher than I posted her own update (http://black-horse-design.blogspot.com/). It will give you a taste of the kind of cold comfort that I get from other people’s suffering. Bloggers like Carmon almost make me ashamed to complain at all. Yet, I can’t find the strength to bear my lot in silence, and besides, my greatest supporters have often been those who were worse off than I.

Dead Men's Tales

The trouble with choosing people older than yourself for friends is that they sometimes look at you with a wry smile, and you know they’re thinking that you’re just too young to understand _____. The condescension runs both ways. I only remember one time in my entire 40 years with Peggy that her father made an honest effort to act like my friend, and I turned him down—not in so many words, of course—on the basis of him being a member of an old, naïve, and completely out-of-it generation. I simply couldn’t believe that anyone who didn’t love my music, my movies, my writers, my marijuana, my hairstyle, and my slang, could possibly have anything worthwhile to offer.

Two of my best friends—K. (that’s him and me in the 1983 photo) and B.—were years older than I. Both started out as my teachers, in one way or another, but as our affection grew, the Southern-style deference that I paid them because of their age fell away. Then, we loved, drank, fought, hiked, traveled, botanized, theologized, philosophized, smoked pot, ate psilocybin, and loved some more—and no, I don’t mean sexually, despite the fact that B. made a determined attempt to rape me (I was so much stronger that I laughed as I fought him off).

While K. was awaiting trial for running the biggest marijuana farm in the history of the Southeastern United States, he and I went through a cemetery to find him a new identity, and the name we came up with that matched his birthyear was Robert _____. K. wrote off for Robert’s birth certificate and social security card, and got a driver’s license in Robert’s name. I don’t know if illegally changing your identity is still that easy. Probably not, eh?

K. and B. are dead now. B. was a likely sucide (he hit a freight truck head-on while driving at high speed in the wrong direction on the Interstate), and K. was a twice escaped felon with a doctorate who finally disappeared from my life for good 23 years ago. He was a homeless alcoholic with signs of liver failure by then; that’s why I feel sure he’s dead (besides, if he wasn’t dead, I would have heard from him by now). His letters are in the drawer beside me, but I never read them anymore because it would make me too sad. Life can sure hurt sometimes.

Things I love—a sequel to “Things I hate”

I love Peggy. She is kind and wise, and the best thing that ever happened to me.

I love baking crackers, cornbreads, and biscuits. I also love making soups and pancakes.

I love to write. I also love to read but not nearly as much as I love to write.

I love my new cat, Brewsky—aka Fuckface when Peggy isn’t around (“Isn’t that just like a man?” she would say.)

I love it when Peggy massages my shoulders each day.

I love the fact that, although I am in pain, I can still see, hear, and get around.

I love it that pain has made me stronger.

I love it that modern medicine has kept me alive when I would otherwise be dead.

I love camping with Peggy in remote areas.

I love learning about rocks and native plants.

I love oatmeal and mayonnaise but never together.

I love it that age has enabled me to give up most of my idolization of women. I love it that Peggy stayed with me during all the years before this was true.

I love having Ellie for a neighbor.

I love to dig. If I had my health back, and if digging didn't make such a mess, I could do it everyday simply for the joy of it.

I love living in the city instead of in the country.

I love it that I bike more often than I drive.

I love Peggy’s room, especially her “rabbit shrine” and her glass crystals that catch the sunlight and throw hundreds of rainbows.

I love PBS (Public Broadcasting Service).

I love a lot of Western movies and TV shows from before 1960 and a few after 1960.

I love it that I’m mostly unconcerned about what people think of me.

I love being able to do almost anything to a house that needs doing.

I love how much Peggy enjoys her button collection. I also love how much she enjoys her music collection and her Christmas ornaments.

I love my blog buddies.

I love Busby Berkeley dance numbers.

I love the beach, the desert, the forest, and the mountains.

I love keeping my house clean, orderly, and in good repair.

I love dark chocolate.

I love the bliss of narcotics in the middle of the night when pain awakens me.

I love the taste and the warm glow of hard liquor.

I love Baroque music. I also love cowboy music, both old and new.

I love the sound of an electric guitar.

I love my dog, Bonnie Blue, and I love my memories of dogs that have died.

I love cuddling in front of an old movie with a bowl of popcorn on a cold night.

I love having gained in prudence, knowledge, and wisdom over the years.

I love spring, summer, and fall.

I love coffee, strong and black.

I love making my yard look nice.

I love going to the nursery with Peggy to buy plants for our garden. I also love it when we go to Costco and say we’re having a “date.”