Tuesday, April 30, 2013

4 Swims In-to Bed Head

[The following is by far the worst entry I have ever submitted.  I'm a mess, and so is this attempt.  So I'll let it ride, as an example, a warning, to all other idiots like myself that ever attempt to write something for people to read while a mess physically, mentally and emotionally.  If you, yourself, ever believe you may be suffering from physical, mental, and/or emotional incompetence, yet feel compelled to write something and post it on the web, remember what you are about to read, honestly, and think better of it, and walk away from the computer.  If just one reader manages to avoid a tragedy such as the prose that follows by following this advice, then I guess my shame and embarassment over the following is worth it.  Sigh.]

I got back in the pool last week, three times, and once so far this week (ungodly high winds today).

The song remains the same - extreme progress with rearranging shoulders, hips, with something "new" - core changes (since there is always something "new," it still remains the same, right?), subsequently followed by dizziness, then soreness, then a sleepless night.

I'm too tired of trying to explain the progress, but I'll note it is definitely including aspects of my core with the shoulder and hip changes.  This I do find promising.

The lack of sleep, however, is working me over something wicked.  I have no energy for optimism, though I suppose I am quite optimistic about the weeks to come.

*     *     *     *     *

I have a new metaphor (surprise!), another go, trying to express what I feel like at times.  And true to form per previous attempts, a more literal observation can be taken from the metaphor, I suppose.

The metaphor - unbraided hair.

Imagine, regardless of type, freshly brushed hair is how your body is supposed to be aligned.  Doesn't matter if it's straight or wavy for these purposes.  Just go with your own hair, but make it long if it happens to be short.

Braid it.  Leave it in the braid for a week.  Unbraid it.

So, my body, or portion thereof, feel like a bunch of unbraided hair for a few days after a successful adjustment.  Nothing lies next to each other.  Waves are pushing bends.  Hair goes in every direction.

The only possible comfort is to go back into the braid, but that can't happen anymore.  A genuine adjustment tends to be a one way ticket.  Some segment of me finds it's proper position.  It is not going back, at least not easily.  Yet, all parts connected to it, which had managed to function by creating a braid, are now unbraided.

Enter the opposite of comfort - discomfort, uncomfort, acomfort, anti-comfort.

*     *     *     *     *

So, the above, as I sat in front of this computer trying to work out the prose for this entry (which I gave up on and went free form - my apologies), made me realize what horrible bed head I have known every day of my life.

Well, not every day.  There are all the days, like the current ones, in which my head is shaved.

I don't have a good looking shaved head.  It is not horrible, either.  But this way I don't deal with bed head.

And I should also note that I have ridiculously fine hair, which does make for worse bed head.

*     *     *     *     *

Not anything profound, but the odds are, if your bed head is crazy-every-which-way bed head, as opposed to one-spot-pushed-funny bed head, you are out of alignment.  Granted, you are not likely perverted like my body is/was, but I'll bet you also have restless leg syndrome.

[I would hope anyone that has actually tried to read my rants and ravings can guess my position on "restless leg syndrome."  Yes, doctors labelled a phenomenon and throw a sedative at it when the person is really just out of alignment.  The body wants to be in alignment, and the legs are trying to do so while your conscious self is no longer running the program - very much as I believe is the case with R.E.M., the eyes unwinding the day's work - but that's a post for another day, one I probably will never write.]

*     *     *     *     *

A beyond poor entry, but I've had some issues.

I don't think I can articulate may way into expressing what I know to be true.  It just can't happen, unless read by someone with a similar situation.

What I feel happening to my body, I believe, is so outside normal sensory perception others experience, I can't possibly do it justice.

Consider acid.  If you ever took acid or mushrooms or some other hallucinogen, you can try to explain to someone that has not what it was like.  You could do an incredible job, such that that person might believe they know, they might even be able to parrot what you told them such that others believe they have done the drugs.  Yet, you know they don't have a clue. 

Not until they dose.

It's actually arguable that even those that have dropped acid don't really know what it is like when they are no longer under the influence, as seen by the "oh yeah, I remember this" moment an acid freak has the next time they drop.

Have I mentioned I attended UC Berkeley.

Anywho . . . my point.

*     *     *     *     *

It may well be that I am better off NOT trying to explain this, at least until some inspiration sets me back to prose, so much as to recommend what others should do.

And with that, here is my first bit of advice -

All children should be exposed to yoga and a form of dance which stresses posture.

Get them to activate all their muscles through yoga, as unbalance increases exponentially otherwise as they grow and live.  Then, get them to realize positions of proper posture, as these will give them moments when there body is most balanced, in effort.

If your not a child, odds are your fucked.

Not as bad as me, of course, but seeing that any well meant efforts could turn you into some fraction of me, I wouldn't recommend it.

Thursday, April 18, 2013

This Is Heeling?

Not sure if I should laugh or cry.

I'll probably do a bit of both.

Probably more than a bit.

*     *     *     *     *

So, for the past two years, maybe more, I've had ankle fissures.  Last year they were pretty bad.

I'm not up for describing them in detail.  Plus, they are not exactly easy to inspect.  If you know them, you know they are painful.  Mine were predominantly former calluses that began to crack, in several places.  Many of the cracks were quite deep, nearly a quarter of an inch.

*     *     *     *     *

I had a "breakthrough" with my doctor last week.  He finally understood the sock metaphor I have used so often.  Written of previously, my adjustments sometimes feel like the moment you fix your sock.

You know the feeling.  You put on a sock, not realizing it is not on correctly.  The heel is to the side or on top, so you feel pressure in some spots of the foot and ankle, great slack in other spots.  It's just wrong.  When you shift the sock into place, it just feels right.  All those oddities, the tensions and slack, go away instantly.

It really is a great metaphor for what I go through, though I can't claim to ever get my body on right.   My muscle and skin is the sock that is out of place.  Once in a while, an adjustment puts something in a whole new place, for me, that just suddenly feels right.

[Something to think on - for nearly 30 years, I wore my socks wrong without knowing it.  Now, trying to slide them into the right place, I've got parts that are stretched out, parts that have shrunk, and I'm in terror over discovering possible holes.]

*     *     *     *     *

And so, this morning, in the shower, ankle fissures acting up even though I used some "heel balm" last night, I realized another almost-but-not-quite-irony.

Previously, the ankle fissures were behind my heels, most pointed straight behind me, varying by maybe up to 20 degrees or so.  Most are currently pointed diagonally, 45 degrees from the back.  [sigh]

They are not new.  No.

They moved.

*     *     *     *     *

I'm embarrassed that I never put it together before.  I presumed all the jogging had brought them about.  Pretty dumb, when you think about it, as I no longer land on my heels.

Nope.  It's just the meat-sock that was has been adjusting.  The calluses that were once protecting an impact point have slid to the side, dried out, and cracked.

On the bright side, they don't hurt that much and have been annoying the hell out of me the past day.  That means every place else must not be hurting that badly, or I wouldn't be noticing the fissures.

*     *     *     *     *

Mentally, I've had just about enough.  The pain and mental exhaustion is bad enough.  Realizing cruel and painful ironies pushes me towards a psychotic break.

I've coined the phrase "Death by paper cuts" to express slow exquisite torture.  These not-quite-ironies are like, well, the torturer takes a break from slicing me with paper to water board me with lemon juice.

Monday, April 15, 2013

Maniacal Laughter

I'm getting closer.

Interspersed between periods of extreme discomfort, I am having moments, just a few, of almost-wholeness.

I am not whole, not yet, not even all that close to completely whole, which, in truth, I doubt will ever happen.

Yet, in these moments, where the creases are pushed to the top, above my chest, above my shoulders, stacked atop my torso, where their compliments are allowed to drop past my hips below my core, my torso feels like one piece.

And I know what it is to not feel segmented.

I know what whole must feel like.

And I laugh like a fucking maniac.

I may actually do this.

Friday, April 5, 2013

A Dark Matter

[I have wanted to write this one for some time, multiple versions exist, most probably better than this one, but incomplete.  Here, I am going short.  I am throwing out one of my theories into the world that I believe is at least more correct than current beliefs.  Why now?  Well, first it is not one of the ones I hold dear.  Yet, it's kinda big.  Also, I just had my first EKG yesterday.  So, mortality, the odds on never getting better, and the odds of never being able to articulate the things I would like to, have me lowering the bar.]

It is ironic.

Dark matter is light.

Well, in many forms, I'd presume, but for the most part, it is light.

We look up at the stars and see these pin points, hundreds and thousands of light years away.

They are not spot lights shining only at us.  They emit light in all directions, each of them, and they have been for a really long time.

Stars die.  Why?  They use up their fuel.  Where does it go?  All that mass?  Hello, conservation of energy.

So, yes, I am saying a light wave has mass (Personally, I'd bet light is a wave that can become a particle, more than the "it's a wave and a particle" argument, but either way).  It may be extraordinarily minute, but in mind boggling numbers over vast areas of space . . .

I could be wrong.  I'm probably wrong to some degree, possibly substantial.  Yet, in all the information I have seen (admittedly little, and I have not done much research on the topic given my own issues), all that light, all that energy, travelling over great distances, all the time, is not really discussed.

It's funny to me.  Light only illuminates what it's hitting.  So, I guess all that light is dark.

But if it turns out to be a substantial portion of "dark matter," and all those big brains were missing it all this time, that's funny.

[Okay.  Back to my unwinding.  Should someone decide I am onto something, perhaps they'd be kind enough to go out on a limb that I am also possibly correct on my theories of what I am dealing with, and that perhaps, with the ear of the right people, I could help revolutionize the understanding of the human condition.]

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

42 on 4/2

Happy Birthday to me.

Adjustments to my shoulders-collar bone-neck-jaw have left me with dual "ear infections" that NARCO barely helps.  Major shifts in the jaw muscles, it hurts much differently than the classic ear infections I have known my whole life.  It is much more about swelling of the head at the base of the jaws that puts pressure on both ears.

My glasses are tight. 

My hats all squeeze my head, currently shaved, to a point of great pain.

And the mental pain of a wasted decade taxes on me so as another candle hits the cake.

*     *     *     *     *

But it's my birthday . . .

So, I'll plug my ears with vasolined cotton balls and try to enjoy a dip or two in the spa.

I'll try to find something good to watch on TV.

I'll probably visit Skyrim for a few ours.

I'll hope for something yummy for dinner.

I'll search the channels for a game played by one of my teams.

Wait, this is like every other day.

*     *     *     *     *

Not entirely.  Maya is still under a watchful eye.

My Maya, a crazy dominant Lab-Boxer female, 80 lbs. and a week or two shy of 14 years old, is clearly on her last legs.

She has pneumonia.  We are treating it the best we can, but fear underlying conditions are the root cause.

I had a tear filled day last week waiting for a vet trip I was convinced would be her last, but the anti-biotics have picked her up substantially.  I can't say things look good, however.

My gut says she'll pull through and have one last summer.

When it was at it's worst, I empathized far more than anyone should.  She was not happy.  She was in great pain.  She'd avoid moving rather than continue the struggle.  She'd given up, the only difference between the two of us.

I fear there is brain damage.  Why else would I not give up?

*     *     *     *     *

On top of it all, the Giants gave LA a wet dream opening day yesterday.  That would annoy me to all end, but for the delusional fans that kept arguing the Bruce Bochy had no role in the loss, far more annoying (and predictable) than the loss itself.  The God of Bullpens, yet when he screws up they all give excuse after excuse. 

Now they are 0-1, with another game in LA tonight.  The Giants record on my birthday is, at least as memory serves, poor.  I don't recall any wins, in fact, just losses, even when not yet the regular season.

The only thing I know is that a loss tonight will not be Bochy's fault.  It will still be early in the season.  It will only have been two games.  Yada.  Yada.  Yada.  I can hear (er, read) them already.