Currently suffering from a moderate rhinovirus, or something of the kind. This is not a weapons-grade cold, but given that chemo robs me of my usual physical reserves, it might as well be. Oncology clinic informs me I just need to lay low unless I run a fever, at which point head for the ER. So expect little to no on-line presence this weekend while I veg and try to heal.
Posted: 6:23 am Sat March 20 2010 | Comments(1) |
Your Saturday moment of zen.
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lillypond and me in front of the Changhua Buddha on Pink Lotus, in Taiwan. (We’re right of center in the lower portion of the photo.) © 1971, 2010 Joseph E. Lake.
This work by Joseph E. Lake. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Posted: 6:19 am Sat March 20 2010 | Comments(0) |
Monkey Augmentation Suit — Sometimes Get Fuzzy makes me laugh so hard I damned near pee.
Zodiacal Light Vs. Milky Way — APOD does it again.
Jon Stewart on Glenn Beck — Wow. An amazing deconstruction of Beck’s insanity. Worth your fifteen minutes to watch. Politics as performance art. (He’s also making me realize how much Glenn Beck works like a televangelist.)
Why We Reform — Paul Krugman on HCR. Money shot. In every other advanced nation, insurance coverage is available to everyone regardless of medical history. Our system is unique in its cruelty. If you’re conservative, if you’re opposed to HCR, please explain to me why it is fine with you that other people sicken and die for your beliefs? That’s profoundly un-American and inhumane. Just pray you’re never in that position yourself.
Bart Stupak: I Don’t Listen To Nuns — Another conservative forced pregnancy enthusiast happy to dish out to women, can’t take it in his own life. Welcome, Mr. Stupak, to the daily life of reproductive health providers, who are subject to such harassment every day courtesy of your friends at Focus on the Family, National Right to Life, and the USCCB. Stupak may be a Democrat, but like most conservatives in public life he’s just as morally bankrupt and inhumane as the bulk of the GOP caucus. Try a little empathy, Congressman. You might be amazed.
?otD: Why do they call it a cold if I’m hot most of the time?
Posted: 6:15 am Sat March 20 2010 | Comments(0) |
Quick update:
Slept 8.5 hours last night. This is cramping my style, but keeping me healthy. Shedding day has been a two-day affair. Otherwise, doing pretty well.
Posted: 5:01 am Fri March 19 2010 | Comments(0) |
As reported here by calendula_witch, our collaborative short story, “From the Countries of Her Dreams” has been accepted by Fantasy magazine. (Which happens to be running a different collaborative story from us right now.) This new story is in the Green continuity, and takes place roughly at the end of Endurance.
Go congratulate calendula_witch!
Posted: 5:00 am Fri March 19 2010 | Comments(0) |
Your Friday moment of zen.
the_child (at age 9) at Glacier National Park. © 2006, 2010 Joseph E. Lake, Jr.
This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Posted: 4:57 am Fri March 19 2010 | Comments(0) |
Rebellious girl thrust into life of slavery and lots of sex. A review of Green, by Jay Lake — A reader reacts to Green, not so much with the liking.
A rather nifty review of “To Raise a Mutiny Betwixt Yourselves” — The reviewer really got what I was on about.
Four Publishers Struggle to Strike Amazon eBook Deal; Buy Buttons Threatened — Hmm.
Book Marketing Awesomeness — I’m not a big fan of ‘book trailers’, but this one is for the win. (Thanks to Scrivener’s Error.)
With Cancer, Let’s Face It: Words Are Inadequate — Interesting. Need to consider my response to this. (Thanks to criada.)
My old man — Rogert Ebert about his father. Read this slowly, and whem you have a moment to weep.
Black Tie: 1943 — Shorpy takes us down to the tie plant.
Passing Stars and Interstellar Speculations — Instellar travel, the (eltively) slow way, from Centauri Dreams.
Quotes Uncovered: The Full Monty — …when you hear a quote attributed to Lincoln or Jefferson, and it sounds too modern, and it accords with some political agenda, usually a conservative one, you can take it to the bank that it’s phony. What? Wait? Does this means our friends on the Right make shit up to meet their political ends? I though they were the ethical ones, banner carriers of principled consistency and moral standards! Say it ain’t so!
America May Truly Be In Decline — Or not. Amazing how much damage the “America first”, “small government”, “fiscally prudent” party has done to our country and our future.
?otD: How much chuck could woodchuck upchuck if a woodchuck could upchuck chuck?
Posted: 4:53 am Fri March 19 2010 | Comments(0) |
Well, yesterday was shedding day, with all that implies, plus a bit more. Ran a little differently this time, though. I never fail to be surprised by my body.
( Under cut for medical and digestive TMI. You have been warned. )
On the flip side, it really has been easier. I never slipped into serious sleep issues, granted that the process is always somewhat irregular for me these days. My right brain woke up on Tuesday and I’ve been very productive on “The Stars Do Not Lie”. My general well being has been more than adequate, which is both welcome and slightly unusual.
I ascribe a lot of this improvement to the “skip” week, which certainly had beneficial medical effects such as spiking my white blood cell count upward. However, I also want to claim some credit for simply being a little smarter and more experienced at this. I tweaked my medications through this last cycle in ways that I expected to improve both my GI issue and my cognitive issues, and I believe I’ve succeeded on both counts. I’ve also tried to stay way ahead of the potential for sleep problems. And I’m listening carefully to my body’s cravings, which I’m trying to take literally. When my gut says “Protein, damn it!”, I don’t make toast.
Mostly, I’m paying attention and trying to keep things on beam. With luck, this learning will carry me through the continuing slow decline of the next seven chemo infusion sessions.
Posted: 4:46 am Thu March 18 2010 | Comments(0) |
I spent a bunch of time discussing my wrtiing with my therapist earlier this week. In the moment, it seemed like an odd choice of topics given everything going on in my life, but I’ve realized now where he was going with it.
I am a writer.
Period.
I may have given up everything from laundry to shaving. I may not drive at night any more. I may not be able to do a fraction of the things I expect and desire from myself some days, and on my best days can only dream of reaching half my normal energy and activity levels. But damn it, I continue to write, no matter what.
This is not my sole identity, of course. I am a traid at the core, I think — father, friend/lover and writer.
What does this mean?
At the first, I am a father to the_child. But fatherhood is as much as state of being as it is an assertive act. She can come to me, I can seek her out, we can discuss homework or the latest school gossip or go eat a meal together. It happens almost organically, arising from (her) lifetime’s worth of habits. And I will always be her father, no matter what becomes of me.
I am a lover as well, a friend, a social being. Those roles are assertive acts, but they are also to some extent states of being. Especially these days, when the people who care for me and about me are going to extraordinary lengths to make sure our connections remain strong, that I am living, eating and sleeping properly, and in general giving of themselves for the sake of what I cannot always do for myself right now. I will return to them in my full strength in due time, and give it all back with interest, as I have always done.
But as a writer? That is only an assertive act. We talk about the habits of writing, but it’s always easier to sit on the couch and rest, or slip a DVD into the player, or putz around on the Internet. Writing does not come to me on momentum and a lifetime of accumulated goodwill. It only comes from me when I work at it. Even now. Especially now.
So this morning I got up at 3:30 and worked on “The Stars Never Lie” for an hour. I wrote about 1,400 new words. That’s a little slow for me in normal health, but on chemo in what is essentially the middle of the night, I’ll take it. This one is coming slow, anyway, as some of my best have. I don’t know if the writing pace is a chemo thing, a story thing, my process evolving, or something else entirely, but it doesn’t matter. When I’m done with the draft, I’ll fix whatever’s wrong, improve whatever’s right, then I’ll write something else.
And that’s what my therapist was getting at, I think, in his directed Rogerian way. I maintain myself through cancer and chemo by maintaining my self-definition. The part of that requiring the most direct, assertive action is writing. That is the one set of behaviors which is not externally reinforced.
I am a writer, so I write. I write because I want to, because I need to, and right now, I write most of all to deny cancer the place it wants to take at the center of my life.
Posted: 4:43 am Thu March 18 2010 | Comments(4) |
Your Thursday moment of zen.
My dad and me, once upon a time. (Long before cancer.) © 1964, 2010 S. Bryant.
This work by S. Bryant is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Posted: 4:20 am Thu March 18 2010 | Comments(0) |