A Most Livable City

1/365: Frank D.

the world is a vampire...

Those words, used in a sneak-attack or surreptitiously scrawled on lab reports, doomed us both to a day of "Bullet with Butterfly Wings" stuck in our heads.  Before becoming physics lab partners I'd only heard his name, but I assumed he was a too-good-for-everyone soccer player.  Imagine my surprise when I discovered he was kind, smart, and wickedly sarcastic.  Best lab partner-in-crime I ever had and the kind of man I'd like to marry someday.  He made physics phun.  Or at least tolerable.

Geez Louise

Work is super stressful right now and everyone is crabby.  I'm trying to keep a cheery outlook, but it's nearly impossible when grown men are whining, yes WHINING, to me (at me?) about the status of the project we're working on, the decision they don't agree with, the blahblahblah, SHUT UP ALREADY.  I will never understand how some people can take work so damn personally.  I work in information technology and I like to keep things in perspective: I am not a surgeon.  No one's life hangs in the balance.  TAKE IT DOWN A NOTCH.  Sheesh. 

Obviously I haven't done a good job fending off the negative energy weighing down the office.  All I can say is that after this hellish week of 12 hour days + a Saturday of work, I am SO CHECKING OUT.  Mentally, that is.  I hereby grant myself a mental vacation from work next week.  Oh, I'll go, I'll do what needs to be done, but I will not stay one minute longer than the 8 hours I am required to be there and I refuse to promise I won't read blogs during office hours.  End of story. 

I badly want to post more frequently, but have been a slave to my spiritual journey (Hi: I am a dork).  I had some awesome learnings last week, but have no clue how to write about them.  Instead, I'm thinking of joining the x365 movement (so not the word I want, too tired to care), where you write a post of a pre-determined length about 365 people who left an impression on you in your life.  The only rule is that you remember their name.  I've been feeling rather nostalgic lately, what with half my high school class popping up on Facebook, so this seems like a good way to get me to post every day.  ish.  Ha. 

In other news, I'm going on vacation this summer, A REAL FUCKING VACATION.  Week-long, beachy, sunny, sandy, bathing suit... thus, I've begun eating carefully and walking more.  Of course, in my world, "eating carefully" equates to a chocolate Top Pot donut yesterday and beer for dinner tonight.  I'm such an asshole.  Also?  I blame work.  And our current administration.  And Metropolitan Market which is the equivalent of grocery shopping in HEAVEN and is the reason I have no food (except beer) in my house.  It's too damn far away, yet I refuse to go to Safeway because I want just ONE MORE HIT from the Metropolitan pipe.  Someone needs to build an M.M. near my house so that I can grocery shop even when I'm working 12 hour days.   

I do believe I'm bordering on drunken rambling here.  Yay Tuesday! 

March 28th

I'm sitting next to the window at work watching gigantic snowflakes fall gently to the ground.  So much for spring in Seattle.

Faceplant

I was down in the kitchen at work with Coworker #1 when it happened.  He turned suddenly and nearly collided with Mr. P.  Now for this to make sense, you should know that Mr. P is quite tall.  I'd say 6'3.  And Coworker #1 is not tall.  I'd say 5'7.  Also, Mr. P has a lot of hair now on his head and his face.  A LOT OF HAIR.  Think Grizzly Adams.  Or Hagrid.  Anyway, there was that whole uncomfortable moment when we all smiled/smirked at each other and then Mr. P quickly scuttled out of the kitchen.  Coworker #1 turned to me and said, "Oh my God, I almost faceplanted into his beard." 

Holy hell, I have not stopped laughing since.  But all beard-face-planting aside, do you have any idea what it feels like to run into your ex-boyfriend at work on a very frequent basis?  To be minding your business at your desk or in the kitchen and suddenly his presence looms into view?  Your stomach lurches into your throat and your hands start to shake, just a little, because every time you see him, you are forced to remember.  In a split second, your entire relationship punches you in the gut and follows it up with the swooping realization that he is married with a 2 month old baby.  And the two of you stopped talking a year ago.  My God, where did the time go?

I'd like to think that us working in such close proximity is character building.  I mean, hey, here is my big chance to defeat fear, pain, and anger on a damn daily basis.  Yes?  Buddha did it, why can't I?  But in my weaker moments, when I am tired or feeling lonely, I succumb to the anger.  GO AWAY.  LEAVE ME ALONE.  THIS IS MY TURF, MY SAFE HAVEN FROM YOU AND YOU ARE INTRUDING ON IT, YOU ASSHOLE.  Another coworker-friend says my anger is justified and good, that it's about time I got good and angry.  But me?  I am not so sure. 

You see, I don't think my feelings are actually about him, not really, not anymore.  I think it all comes back to me and the guilt I still carry.  Don't get me wrong, Mr. P is a douche, but after spending the last year growing up in ways I didn't expect, I can see very clearly that he was right about so many things.  Seeing who I used to be with the eyes of who I am now makes me feel guilty for all the fights and frustration the old me caused.   

Life is full of irony, irony that I usually see coming a mile away.  When I took this job, the first job I've ever had that I actually like, my only concern was that Mr. P and I would work for the same company.  I thought it would be hard to see each other both at work and outside of work.  He assured me that our paths would rarely cross and if they did, it would be because we wanted them to.  Well here we are, two years later, working on almost identical teams.  If a re-org comes down the line, nay, WHEN a re-org comes down the line, it seems inevitable that we will be on the same team.  And as Mr. P said to me, inevitability is a curse word. 

So I figure I have two basic options.  I can get mad and shake my tiny, ineffectual fist at the Universe for keeping Mr. P and I in each other's orbits.  I can whine and bitch about it here to you fine people and send complainy emails to my friends that are along the lines of "OMFG, WHY WON'T HE GO AWAY, HE HAS A LOT OF HAIR".  (Um, which I've totally already done.  Sorry, friends.)  Or, I can take a higher path. 

I've spent enough time feeling angry.  The way I see it, anger and fear are two sides of the same coin.  (Yeah, that's right, I just quoted Starbuck from Battlestar Galactica.)  I want to grow and learn even more, so I've decided to treat the situation in the manner of the person I want to become.  There are two things I hope to accomplish.

1.  Let go of my guilt. 
(It's time to stop holding myself accountable for my past actions. 
I can't undo them. 
I CAN'T UNDO THEM. 
It's time to let it go and forgive myself.) 

2.  Take myself to a meditative place. 
(A place where the punch-to-the-gut at seeing Mr. P becomes less and less until it's gone completely.)    

I am quite sure I will have my own faceplant into that beard of his as time moves along (because hello, I am human, nice to meet you), but if the best I can do with this life is try, then I'm going to try my damndest. 

Overheard

I was sitting in church on Sunday thinking about how all the pomp-and-circumstance, tradition, rules, and "you will go to hell if you mess up" is so not what Jesus was looking to teach, when I overheard the following exchange between a little girl of about 4 years old and her dad:

Little Girl in her Easter finest:  "I'm done praying."

Dad:  "That's great."

LG:  "I said to thank the Easter Bunny for the gifts he gave me.  And I said to tell Jesus that I hope he had a happy rising from the dead." 

Spring Has Sprung

It's springtime in Seattle.  The trees are starting to show the tiniest hint of green and the cherry blossoms are blooming all over the city.  It's a really lovely time to be in Seattle... which must be why I am in Pittsburgh.  Where it is snowing. 

Dude.

Happy St. Patrick's Day (aka "If You Knew My Real First Name, You'd Know I'm Really Irish")

I didn't think I would bother going out this year for St. Patrick's Day because it's MONDAY and I don't do Mondays.  (I also don't do "observed" St. Patty's Day, so Saturday wasn't doing it for me either.)  But Coworker #1 invited me out for a drink with his friends at an English pub and at the last minute, I decided I'd be doing my Irish heritage an injustice by not consuming beer on the best drinking day of the year.  (Let's not discuss the injustice I committed by going to an ENGLISH pub to do so.) 

Coworker #1 is an innocent soul, someone who I believe is on his first life in this universe.  Even his friends said to me tonight, "You have to love Coworker #1 because he doesn't have a mean bone in his body."  And ya'll?  He doesn't.  He is nothing but light, that boy. 

I have to be honest.  Sometimes, at work, he annoys the shit out of me.  I think, "How can someone be that naive?  That hopeful?  That optimistic?  That deluded?"  It drives me batty that he can't see the world for what it is.  But on nights like tonight, when I was feeling a tad bit lonely, having someone be so genuinely glad that I came out really touched me.  It made me realize that I might be too jaded, too focused on the negative in this world.  It was nice to be out with someone who is a genuine friend, who has no motives. 

There are so many people in this world.  On this lovely St. Patrick's Day, I am grateful for the friends I have who remind me that things aren't always bad.  I'm also grateful for the friends who see the bad and laugh about it with me.  And I'm grateful for Coworker #2 who said (in response to my saying, "I swear a lot for a girl"), "honey, you swear a lot for a sailor".  I'd like to think I'm doing my Irish ancestors proud.

Time for one more beer before bed.      

Second Verse, Same as the First

I got a letter in the mail yesterday from my worthless General Practitioner.  It was one of those standard forms they send out after a doctor reviews the results of your blood tests, for example.  "Your iron levels are in normal range.  Things look good!"  Or, "The small bowel follow-through shows further narrowing of your intestine.  Please come in and see me, we need to start Remicade ASAP."  Those are a few of the standard forms I've received from my Gastroenterologist, that last one being a particularly crushing moment in the history of me. 

Anyway, I found one of the aforementioned forms in my mail yesterday and I shit you not, here's what it said (AND I QUOTE):

"no incisional hernia"

That's it. 

Um? 

That's it?  Wait, wait, there's something more... "DON'T BOTHER ME AGAIN".  It was subtle, the subtext, but it sure was there.

I sometimes feel ashamed for how much of big damn deal I make out of my medical treatment, for the ranting I do about doctors and medical procedures, but in moments like "no incisional hernia", I don't feel so bad about the fuss I made.  Apparently, despite the bulge next to my old incision and the minor pain I've been feeling, I do not have an incisional hernia.  And because I do not have an incisional hernia, I no longer have a referral to see a surgeon.  Which leaves me.... where, exactly?  Something about creeks and no paddles?

I feel like I should be launching into another rant about The Evils of Western Medicine, but you know what?  Who has the energy?  "no incisional hernia"  That was a $20 copay well-spent.   

Drama Queen

So I have this incisional hernia.  We'll call it "Joe".  Joe is a fond memento from my bowel resection six years ago when, during my recovery, I made the mistake of shutting a heavy car door.  Stitches pulled and it hurt and lo and behold, Joe was born.  I most certainly went back to my surgeon and said "HOLY CRAP I THINK I HAVE A HERNIA I DON'T WANT TO HAVE SURGERY AGAIN HALP HALP HALP", and for reasons unbeknownst to me, my surgeon said, "That's an incisional hernia, don't worry about it."  "We don't have to fix it?"  "No, it's fine, it's an abdominal weakness." 

I am not sure, but I'm starting to wonder if he lied to me, figuring that by the time I realized I should get it fixed, he'd be halfway to Mexico.  Either way, no harm, no foul, because Joe and I lived together in harmony for six long years with no more evidence of his presence than a slight bulge on the right side of my stomach. 

At some point last week, Joe started to hurt.  It was mainly when I was sitting down, slouching, or crossing my legs.  It hurt a few times when I laughed, but only when I laughed while slouching with crossed legs.  It was all very complicated and I didn't know what to think, so I reluctantly took Joe to the doctor.  I knew very well what was going to happen, but I went anyway, like a big schmuck. 

And sure enough, my absolutely terrible general practitioner said, "That's a hernia.  You need an abdominal ultrasound and a general surgeon."  She was neither sympathetic nor nice about it, just matter of fact, as though she had merely prescribed me amoxicillan.  She also refused to call him Joe (I mean, COME ON, we've been together SIX YEARS).  I got exactly 4 minutes of her time, after waiting 40 minutes to see her, and she had no desire to answer the questions that had been giving me severe anxiety for days.  I was PISSED.

I have been the biggest drama queen about the whole thing, going on and on and ON AND ON about ALL OF MY VERY IMPORTANT QUESTIONS, WHY WILL NO ONE ANSWER MY QUESTIONS?  You see, I did some Googling, which led to horror stories, which led to me being a high-holy-hell-drama-queen.  I know full well that they can most likely fix Joe via laparoscopic surgery with a mesh net of sorts that holds everything together.  But I can't help but wonder, what happens when I get pregnant?  And the lovely mesh that was designed to hold my stitched-up abdominal muscles together when my belly was flat as a pancake gets all HUGE and STRETCHED?  Doesn't that sound like a nightmare waiting to happen?  A nightmare that involves tearing and ripping and OH GOD THE HUMANITY?

Anyway, I had an ultrasound done this morning and turns out?  It's common practice not to fix incisional hernias unless they are causing a person pain.  As my ultra-cool ultrasound tech told me, lots of things can get stuck in there: fat, muscle, and intestine.  Intestine is the one that hurts and is cause for some fixin'.  But in an odd twist of -- wait, no, AS PER USUAL, they couldn't actually find anything wrong.  You know me, if I can be a medical mystery, I go for it with gusto.  The tech showed me the screen, explaining what she was doing as she went (and, if I may digress for a moment, I have found no nicer healthcare professionals than the good people in Radiology.  I have met the most lovely radiologists and techs who have always been thorough and happy to answer my questions) and by the end of her lengthy prodding, she concluded it all looked ok.  I was all, "um, I'm supposed to go see a surgeon" and she blanched a bit, commenting that I should talk to my doctor and suggesting an MRI or CT Scan might show something the ultrasound did not.  Like a tiny tear. 

Dude.  If I have a tiny muscle tear, shouldn't that be able to heal on it's own?  I think I need to go lie down now, my inner drama queen is tired.

The Internet is Cool vs. The Internet Sucks

The Internet is Cool:

I can order a sandwich, chips, cookie, and drink from an excellent, but super-busy sandwich shop and pick it up in a ready-to-grab bag in 15 minutes.  No lines.  No dealing with annoying people.

The Internet Sucks:

People can stalk you on Facebook, Myspace, your blog and YES, I know it's my own choice to sign up for those "Social Networking" sites, but I'm a sucker when peer pressure is involved.

The Internet is Cool:

I can stalk people on Facebook, Myspace, their blogs.  Ha.

The Internet Sucks:

Your mom can Google you.  Or, at least, my mom can Google me. 

The Internet is Cool:

I can make changes to my insurance, find information, and answers to my insurance-related questions without ever having to call the insurance company, listen to elevator music for 45 minutes, and talk to someone who most likely hates their job and -- by proxy -- me. 

The Internet Sucks:

It scares the ever loving-crap out of me when I look up details on incisional hernias, surgical repairs of, and pregnancy after surgical repairs of.  No, I'm not pregnant, but someday I might be.  And I think I'm going to have to have abdominal surgery (AGAIN, FUCK) soon.  Though, that's based on my own diagnosis, so one might say I'm jumping the gun a bit.  It's what I do.

Goddamn Crohn's Disease, always trying to have the last laugh.  What a bastard.