I Gots Nuthin'. Whats you got?

Kipper doesn't always make the best decisions. Fortunately, what he lacks in intellect he makes up with enthusiasm. Goof-dog insisted on carrying his moose like this. Walking down the stairs was a foolhardy choice and fortunately didn't end in a trip to the vet. Like my dog, I make foolhardy decisions. Most recently I decided to blog every Thursday. You know, exercise my writing muscles, create a habit. But this week the well ran dry and I have nothing to say.

I Got Nothing.

I could blather on about how much I enjoyed Milk and experiencing what it was like to be a gay man in the 1970's. I was seventeen when he was killed and I vaguely remember his assassination as just another news item. But it didn't really mean anything to me, in part because I was seventeen, but largely because I was living in the Bible Belt and most of my peers sided with Anita Bryant and thought those dirty homos were going to Hell. Actually, if I think too hard about Bryant's opinions and how much they threatened to shape my own, I throw up a little in my mouth and cringe for my classmates who knew in 1978 they were gay but didn't dare come out. I didn't have a clue I was queer and even when I ran into a teacher at a gay bar my senior year, it didn't register I should be shocked, upset or outraged. I was completely oblivious to gay people until I was in college and came out for the first time. And I was happily oblivious to discrimination. I suppose it was easier for me in Lubbock Texas because I'm categorized (grrrrr...) as a Femme. So I can "pass" as straight. The whole dichotomy of femme/butch makes my head hurt so I need to change the subject.

Is the gym eating my brain? I've been accused of becoming a gym rat and up until a few weeks ago, I used every excuse in the book to NOT exercise. Hell, I even went to work on my day off to avoid the gym! Now I look forward to my exercise routine and wish I had the energy to go after work in the evenings. But it isn't like I stare blankly into space, feeling the burn when I'm exercising. I listen to uplifting podcasts while I row or walk. I still think riding an exercise bike is a glimpse of Hell. B-O-R-I-N-G. Especially at my gym, where Fox News is the television station of choice. But I love to row. I crave rowing. I remember years ago when I was visiting a dear friend in Kailua Hawai'i and being amazed at the strength it must have taken for the Crew teams to skim those long boats over the rough water. Picturing Kailua as I row lulls me into a peaceful state. It could be the gym...

The economy would be easy to blame but I've chosen to ignore the meltdown and just live my life; go to work, pay my bills, have some fun. TG's industry is changing; health care is changing and how we do what we do now, will be vastly different in ten years. And this isn't a bad thing because I will be forced to grow and change. Like this picture of my chunk of photo optic glass, everything is changed but the end result remains the same.

My life's work isn't eating my brain either. In fact, the mix of patients we have has been interesting and each possess an interesting or poignant story. I wish I could tell them, they would individually make for an interesting blog. It has been a welcome relief to be able to actually manage and care for my patients without feeling as if any minute I was going to miss a crucial detail and fail at keeping them safe. Nor are they aren't a bunch of addicts who ran out of Oxycontin and just need a legally sanctioned fix. We are seeing a lot of abdominal pain. People hurting in their core and usually without a readily identified cause. We take X rays and CT scans and MRIs and ultrasounds and come up with nothing. Like my imagination, they got nothin'. My therapist once told me belly pain equals the fear for survival. It can also be a way the body deals with emotional/sexual/physical abuses. One of our young physicians and I discussed this and how we do a terrible job of screening for these things. Dwelling on their pain makes my heart hurt.

I blame group malaise for all of this belly pain. Everyone on the planet needs to take a day off from the news. Everyone. No one reads the news or listens to the news or looks at the news. And then we all need to breath deeply. Collectively for 17 seconds, concentrating on what is right in our world and in our lives I think the malaise would lift and the economy would begin to improve. The belly pain would resolve without a milligram of Dilaudid IV push. Breathing does so much more to increase the vibration of the soul than opioids.

Tomorrow is the first day of spring. Sometimes we have snow, sometimes we have sun. It looks like sun tomorrow. Frankly,I'm the only person in the US who wasn't upset about the time change. It's chilly here in the evenings but it's light outside so I don't have the dual burden of cold and dark. Just cold. And we are back on the the clock in Kipper's belly so he doesn't start asking for dinner at 5:00.

Flowers are gracing the kitchen table. A birthday present a couple of weeks ago that are now celebrating the equinox. Coincedently we are having dinner with the Divine Ms. A on Saturday. The weather promises to be nice enough to start out on her lovely patio in her garden. Spring is better than Christmas because it's about flowers and lengthening days. Spring means summer--sweet lazy summer--is just around the corner. The promise of summer exchanges limp brain cells for flowers and promises.