I'm Living 'Til I Die

You know things are a tad discombobulated when I go eight days without posting. Could the recent solar flare-up have been the cause of the ungrounded feeling I have been experiencing, or was it just Markie messing with my head?

I have responsibilities clamoring for my attention from multiple directions, and the net result is paralysis. That’s what I call it when I am so overwhelmed, that I let my fingers take over, and I either trim cannabis or buck it off the stalks. Mindless, but necessary.

Granted, I tweaked my back more than two weeks ago, when that sheet of plywood got away and came down off the roof of the power shed. I was never really in any danger on the ground, but in moving faster than I have since Gluten-Free Mama announced that the chocolate zucchini cake was ready on my birthday, I managed to aggravate my lower back. 

Together with my surgically-repaired right shoulder objecting from my maneuvering the fifteen sheets of half-inch plywood around, I am feeling some late-summer blues, physically. Sitting at the trim table and watching the entire M*A*S*H series, all eleven seasons of it, seems to iron things out a little.

I should be processing tomatoes; I have to wrap up the power shed over at the Pepper Pot; I absolutely have to prep the cannabis plants for fall weather; and I have to figure out how to cope with the emotional maelstrom whirling around my frazzled brain, like Harvey and Irma together, doing the Tango.

It’s no secret that Gluten-Free Mama has health issues; out of love and respect for her, I do not prattle on about these matters. That being acknowledged, I sometimes find it necessary to upgrade the prattle to a ramble, and focus on myself, or that part of myself trying to contend with GF Mama’s illness. 

A short time ago, she was prescribed medication for dealing with seizures, the result of having suffered one a few weeks back. The immediate result is that there are the inevitable “side effects.” It’s not enough that she is battling the brain tumor itself, but then she must contend with dizziness and fatigue on top of it all, provided courtesy of the medication.

I am powerless to do anything about it except be there when she needs a helping hand. I watched yesterday, as she went to put some runoff water on a plant out on the deck. As she walked out the door, she lurched/staggered into the right door jamb, righted/steadied herself and proceeded out the door.

When she reentered the kitchen, I asked her, as gently as I could, “Did you just stagger-er, bump-into the door jamb?” It’s hard to frame this question in a gentle manner.

“Oh, yeah. I’ve been running into stuff all day.” There was a simple acceptance of the fact that this was the state of affairs. Coming from someone whose mantra is, “I’m living ’til I die,” I am not surprised. 

And maybe it’s that acceptance that made me sad. Does it do any good to get angry? No way, because stress is always a step backward. The last thing I want to do is be the cause of GF Mama stressing out. 

I had to cogitate the situation for a while, my fingers twirling little flowers with one hand, while snipping with the other, before I reached any conclusions. The conclusion I reached is that though everyone “lives until they die,” some do it more courageously than others. 

So whether it is the sun which just unleashed the strongest flareup of sunspots in more than a decade, that is responsible for my inertia, or whether it is life itself, I don’t know for sure. All I know is that I am the pupil, when it comes to learning how to confront adversity with both fists pumping. 

My money’s on GF Mama.