Silver lining

I suppose having such a messed up weekend at least kept me from going on about the anniversary of the day I went into the hospital and into the ICU and was put on a ventilator. Four years ago Saturday, August 1st.

Except for this short mention that is.

Responsible for my own actions

OK, for personal reasons Saturday sucked. Because of that Sunday sucked. The rain was nice – since we suffered no devastation. It was nice to sit in the storm shadowed house and enjoy the rain. When there are no consequences I enjoy a good storm. Yes, I am being selfish – I do realize that other people did have problems. I take my little pleasures where I can.

So, this was a weekend of failure. Mostly because I am absolutely, monumentally and totally disappointed in a lapse in my behavior. In a familial, but not at home, setting. I was exhausted, I exercised a poor choice of words and I did not control myself well and my actions were not what they should have been – which is an amazing understatement. No excuses, just explanation. These are the some of the things that I am responsible for. This is also something that I am working on. Yes, it is a result of my illness.

As in all cases like this I hope that I can use it as a lesson to better understand myself and improve wherever possible.

Now, how do I apply that to this week? Time to start thinking. Today has already been used running some errands. I know I need to recharge after last week but I need to be as productive as possible.

We’ll see how this works out.

Over, but not quite done with

The hearing in front of the administrative law judge was this morning. It went well as far as I can tell. I liked the judge – and I hope that opinion doesn’t change. My lawyer knows him, says he’s fair, and he also thought things went well today. Unfortunately, my lawyer also says that he does not make on the spot decisions and that along with the backlog means there’s no telling when I’ll find out what the outcome is.

One other thing. The way these things work, you don’t really see your lawyer face to face that much. There are long waiting periods – waiting for the state to do something – so you go for long stretches without even talking much. So, as much as I like the guy, I don’t know that much about him. Before the hearing we were running through things, and he checked out the CD the SSA creates to keep all of my records on. It could not be read.

Now this was no big deal. The people at the SSA office just went and created another one. We had it well before the hearing started, and my lawyer had time to check it out. So he stuck the CD in the computer and expressed his hope that it could be read and that he could see the files. He said that he was looking for wormsign.

I did a double-take. I looked over at my wife and quietly asked her if she had heard the same thing I had. Then I asked my lawyer if I had heard him correctly. I had. And he meant exactly what I thought he meant.

Turns out that he had been re-reading Dune.

That was completely unexpected.

I hope it’s a good thing.

And at warp 10 we're going nowhere pretty fast

There’s a lot going on in the world right now, and a lot going on in my world, and you know, I’m walking right at the edge. Plus it’s one of those days when my neck is so bad my head spins whenever I try to stand up.

No matter how much I try not to think about the hearing on Wednesday, let alone not worry about it, I just can’t keep it from my mind. This has been going on for 3½ years and now that it’s all coming down to this, everything focused on one day, I’m really feeling it.

One benefit is that this has been keeping me from going on about the anniversary date stuff. Well, with the exception of yesterday’s little quip. I have a lot to say, but since I haven’t been able to work it all out in my head I haven’t written it yet. I hope that this gives me a chance to actually get a handle on all of the conflicting issues that I am trying to deal with.

One thing I can tell you – and I am saying this to myself as well as to anyone else – is that this will be the end. For four years I have lived through endless recapitulation of what had happened to me and what was wrong with me. It’s been four years of endless rounds with doctors and lawyers and paperwork and people not believing what I have been saying – as if I would want to even fake living like this. Four years of basing my life off of those two months in 2005 when I was unconscious in the ICU. Four years of constant effort just to tread water and keep telling people the same thing over and over. One problem with only telling the truth is that you just keep repeating yourself. For four years I have been looking back at where I was. No more of that. No more of the past keeping me back.

After Wednesday that’s all over. It’s time to look forward and move ahead. It’s time to look at the past as a starting point and not the finish. It’s damn sure past time to start living for myself, put the past in perspective and look to the future. It’s time to live today as today and not as an echo of some day in 2005.

It’s time to work on having a life.

Now to get back to worrying and setting my nerves on edge and messing with my gastrointestinal system. I need to work on that ulcer some more, and sleep tonight should be really interesting.

I’ll probably post about the hearing tomorrow unless I crash for too long.

Celebrate

It's Call In Sick and Never Go Back to Work Day.

Enjoy.

Or, whatever.






Hey, you knew I had to say something about it.

One small step ...

Stunning. Awesome. Cool. Wow.

40 years ago I was a 10 year old sitting in front of a black and white television marvelling at the sights from a quarter million miles away.

Here's a salute to everyone involved: the engineers who designed everything, the little old ladies* who knitted the computer memory, the women who hand-sewed the spacesuits, the thousands of people who put all the pieces together, the ones who gave their lives, the ones with the vision, John Kennedy, the ones who went there first and only watched the Lunar surface in passing - and the Command Module pilots who all did that and the two who set foot on the moon for the first time 40 years ago today.

40 years later and I still say, wow.



*Historical reference.

We choose to go to the Moon …

Forty years ago today Apollo 11 was launched from Cape Kennedy (at the time) to begin its flight to the Moon. As a child I followed the space program with a nerdy delight. I was a little young when the Mercury program began, but I caught up quickly and I followed everything through Gemini and Apollo. I read the magazine articles on various lifting body re-entry designs, the boosters that were used, the lunar lander and rover concepts, the Agena rendezvous and space walk missions - the works.

I loved it. I was enthralled. I was thrilled by the successes, angered and saddened by the tragedy and sat in rapt attention watching the launches.

July of 1969 was a magical month. It was not, as I hoped, the beginning of an age of space exploration. It was, however, the realization of an astonishing human endeavour. Was it all altruistic? Of course not. It was, however, amazing and magical and for a 10 year old boy – and avid reader of science fiction and lover of science – it was a dream come true. Well, by proxy at least.

It was wonderful to have in the world when I was a child.