Lying
untitled, 16″ x 16″ x 4″, m/m
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Truth be told, in the 10 years I have dealt with MS
There are few times I remember catching the proverbial flu or cold snaking their way through the general population.
Because my immune system is in hyper-drive
I seem to have skirted most of the maladies which befall my friends.
Except I have now been pretty much in bed for three days with the flu.
I am pretty good at lying to myself
About stuff which might very well keep others hunkered down
And playing it safe.
Safety has never really been that interesting to me
As I am drawn to the wider view
And, for better or worse,
Am less taken by the
“In-your-face’ realities
Vying for my attention.
I laid down for three days
Because I couldn’t do other than that.
The thing was insistent
And I hadn’t the interest nor the energy to argue.
And so I gave in to the between-the-worlds
Sort of giddy delirium
And slept.
And I tell you..
I am better for it!
I don’t mean the obvious thing of: ‘when not feeling well..lie down…’
I’m talkin’ the gift of shucking the ego.
(All the ‘shoulds and coulds and maybes and ifs and buts’)
And leaving it at the side of the road
Or at least in the laundry room
And naked in your need
Lie down.
And stay there until you are done.
Really done.
Myopia
detail of painting
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Walking the razor’s edge of chronic illness demands foresight
As well as scrutiny of the ‘WHAT IS’ I wake up with each day.
This can get tricky as it is a changeable creature.
Like moment to moment change.
It is crazy-making for me as well as those I love.
My immune system is in hyper-drive
Which often means I don’t come down with the various winter maladies floating around
That everyone else seems to be dealing with.
So, I really don’t recognize it
When my body aches
And my fatigue level shoots up
As a visitation from the flu.
A friend said: “Cathy, you have an ever-ready bunny body.”
I didn’t really know what she meant at first.
But the gist is that I just keep getting up when I fall;
Keep pushing through the swamp
Just KNOWING the dry land
Is a short ways up ahead.
This all serves me well.
But blinds me to the big picture
When it might behoove me to keep both
My distance view AND near-sightedness at hand.
I am going to lie down, today.
Not waste my batteries on a seemingly pressing agenda.
Carve out a soft neutral-zone
And read a book.
Or not.
I think it is a culturally instilled thing; this inherent insistence to keep getting up…
GO, GO, GO!
PRESS ON! DO YOUR BEST! NEVER SAY DIE!
It’s this constant societal ‘reach’ that I have running in my blood.
Today, I will withdraw my taut and exhausted arm
And lay it down softly at my side
And just breathe.
Warrior Girl
untitled, 2007, pit-fired ceramic, lgst.= 24″h
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A friend said: “Cathy, I see that your warrior-self is working very, very hard. How is the little girl in there?”
I got really quiet.
I actually had come close to forgetting about her, altogether.
The state of envy doesn’t pop up in my reality very often.
But the truth is that I envy those challenged with any kind of shattering to the self they once knew
Who have a partner at their side for support.
This is a hard row to hoe alone.
It takes an inordinate amount of effort to remain connected
To the reality of ‘what is’,
To the outside world as a vital, contributing member ,
To God
And especially to my precious Self.
The gift of free will and choice
Sounds like a tidy little package when I write it
But when forced into the doctorate level
Of putting the theory into practice from one moment to the next,
A girl can get weary, I tell you…
I really don’t cry enough.
Tears have come easily for me watching a film like OLD YELLER.
But if I experience the leaden weariness preventing me from just rolling over in bed,
The warrior girl immediately steps up
With gumption,
Her jaw set just so.
This never-say-die chick has saved my life
On a regular basis.
So regular, in fact, that her costuming is pretty tattered
And her eyes lined.
I love her.
And she loves me.
And we tire of each other
And long for shiny, new company.
And isn’t it the ‘wanting’ of it all that is the problem?
So we step on……
And choose again..
And then again.
Hidden
monoprint, 30″ x 22″, 1993
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I grew up in Michigan.
Summers were spent in a cottage on a lake up north (bordering the upper peninsula).
This morning, here in Santa Fe it is bitter cold and grey.
“The land of enchantment’ as we are called, is not really that enchanting today.
I love the desert so very much and seldom feel myself hankering after a more humid climate.
It is the space.
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And clarity of the air and sky
That continue to soothe my soul.
Except this morning I am hungry for dirt.
The kind of earth I had as my best friend summers in Michigan long ago.
Earth so fragrant one almost didn’t dare to take as big a breath as you were able,
Not to appear greedy.
Imagining tightly green and curled things gestating just below the surface
Tended to by worms aerating the dark soil.
It just floors me..
This thing happens each year:
When my body is seared by the bitter winds,
Exhausted from negotiating ice
And my perpetual cold toes,
A new and impossibly green thing
Makes it’s choice to appear.
Against all odds
We are graced with THE RETURN
Of that trembling, half-blind fern frond.
I feel like that..
On good days.
On good days, I have it in me to begin again as I wake.
Take the time I need to wriggle around and challenge my blood to move toward the numb limbs it has abandoned during the night.
And I try to stand up,
Adjusting my eyes to the half-light.
Taking as much time as I need to acclimate to the world once again.
I love this life.
And it is hard.
And yet.. I keep doing it.
Keep rising each morning reaching for the light.
Trusting that somehow I will find the fuel I need to wind my way higher
And lift myself from the ground.
And onward I go…
With a prayer of gratitude for what it takes to keep stepping.
The Lure of Liberation: CCSVI
detail of monoprint
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My friend Marc, over at his fab blog called WHEELCHAIR KAMIKAZE
Keeps his diligent finger on the pulse of the medical community and all it’s machinations regarding the MS world.
He is my go-to guy when it comes to filtering through the whole medical system.
Today, I am essentially piggybacking on his post
Which includes two short videos in lay person’s terms that I think are worth watching about CCSVI – The Liberation Procedure.
I am so grateful to Marc for culling through the morass of information out there and helping to make it palatable for me/us.
Here’s a synopsis of the filmed CCSVI event:
click below to watch the videos…
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On January 10, 2011 the CCSVI Alliance sponsored a presentation by Dr. Michael Dake of Stanford University entitled “CCSVI and the MS connection”. The event was held at Brandeis University, in Waltham, Massachusetts.
Dr. Dake was the first Interventional Radiologist in the United States to treat MS patients for CCSVI. On January 10, he presented a broad overview of the evidence supporting a connection between the vascular abnormalities collectively known as CCSVI and Multiple Sclerosis. His presentation was followed by an informative question-and-answer session with the audience.
Video of Dr. Michael Dake’s CCSVI Presentation at Brandeis University
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My Sister (and her rockin’ husband)
detail of ceramic sculpture
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In my lifetime there have been a few precious marks in time
During which I was fully aware things would never go back to ‘normal.’
I’m talking pivotal shifts in the architecture of life.
The one I’ll share here today ranks right up there with the very best of them.
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A GOOD STORY – by Cathy
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Once upon a time there was a girl with a tattered grey Subaru.
The seat covers were worn and the paint was peeling.
It was a well-loved car but tired and quite small.
You see, this girl sometimes used a wheelchair; powerful and black and very, very heavy.
The girl liked this chair as it gave her freedom
But her little car would not hold it
And so…
She left it at home and didn’t get to go to the Farmer’s market or Target
Because there was too much walking involved in those excursions.
And so,
She swallowed and moved on to other things.
One day not so long ago,
The girl’s sister called to say
She and her husband had shipped the kids off to college
And had a shiny, black Honda MINIVAN THEY WANTED TO GIFT THE GIRL!
They lived in New Jersey and sent the beautiful van on a truck to a place in Albuquerque
And some guys there installed a very cool lift that automatically grabs her wheelchair and smoothly eases it into the van.
The girl couldn’t use her right leg very well anymore
And the guys put in a foot pedal powering both the gas and brake from the left
So she could be safe and strong and feel sexy driving in her new shiny black van.
This gift means freedom to the girl.
There is nowhere she can not go.
She feels proud and very, very loved driving this shining and elegant automobile
Sent to her from her sister (and her rockin’ husband).
It was a GIANT love present!
When one does not have freedom
And in the next moment it is there,
“THAT! ” said the girl,
“Is mighty good medicine…”
And with that, the girl who had tastefully rouged her face,
And painted her lips red,
Sat in that minivan
And smelled the leather seats,
And wriggled in pleasure as those seats heated up
Warming her in the bitter winter chill.
She popped that van into DRIVE
While she cautiously pressed down on the new left-side gas pedal
And thought about the wide aisles at Target
Where she was headed that day
Just because
She could.
Mercy Me
40″ x 40″, m/m
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“Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are.” – Chinese proverb
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That really says all I want to say and so I think I’ll leave it there..
xxx….
Going
detail of installation, ceramic, sand
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GOING – a poem
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Two friends are going
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To a southern beach with shells.
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I try not to want.
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-CA
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Three Miracle Day
untitled, 1993, 10″ x 10″, m/m
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My body is stiff and scarily weak of late.
This awareness is the threshold into a downward spiral
I know too well.
But it bores me…
The downward motion.
So… yesterday I practiced RADICAL SURGERY
On my weary mind.
I am retraining myself toward pleasure.
Living with the weight of chronic illness is not for the faint of heart, surely.
But my poor heart needs some smelling salts.
SO! THE THREE MIRACLE DAY!
I began the day by watching for three miracles to happen.
This can’t be a WISH.
It has to be a KNOWN in order for the thing to work.
Carrying this awareness through the day was just the fuel I needed to realign with what I call GOD.
1. My first miracle was 1/2 hour in the very wee hours of the morning being with my dog, Olivia.
She knows when I give her only a portion of my attention.
Or I am stroking her just for my own pleasure and solace and not hers.
The level of love was pure between us and exceedingly mutually beneficial.
It was big love.
And it was there because I took away MY NEEDS from the equation
And approached our time together from the awareness of the pure gift of the thing.
That piece of time turned timeless.
And qualified as a miracle, to me.
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2. I received my first check in the mail for a public speaking engagement.
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3. I lost the key to my storage unit and called the place to find that I had ‘miraculously’ left a spare key with them and thus avoided the expense of a locksmith.
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You may be thinking these are very small things to have register as miracles..
They fit my criteria
And that’s all that matters here, really.
The fourth miracle was that I set my intention to have three..
And because I expected their presence
There they were.
It sounds painfully ‘airy fairy.’
Except there was absolutely no pain what-so-ever.
And that right there was the fifth miracle.
Friendship
textile designs, 1988, silk menswear
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Many years ago, a friend told me: “Cathy, you want to have this friendship on YOUR terms.”
It was not a compliment.
I’ve always wondered about that statement.
Was I doing something that evoked this ‘either/or’ kind of comment?
Sometimes, I think I am a high-maintenance friend.
I am a very connective person by nature.
But in order for me to do that well, I spend an inordinate amount of time alone.
People who know and love me are cued into the fact that stopping by my house unannounced is not a good plan.
I find it too startling to shift my consciousness from the unguarded state I am in within my home
To welcoming an unexpected friend with a civility I can’t and often don’t want to conjure up.
It has nothing to do with them.
It IS about the preciousness of cultivating my Self as the authentic woman I am becoming.
I am phone-phobic and prefer email in communication.
Does that mean I am hiding out?
Is that bad?
Honestly, I really haven’t the stamina to be that concerned about what people think of me.
On a very basic level I am trying to stay alive and functional.
My life IS on my terms.
I claim it as the ultimate gift I have been given.
I take great pleasure in spreading around any gold I might come across
As I try to do in this blog.
In fact, the sharing of my achievements and failures has proved very good medicine for me.
As I negotiate the hall-of-mirrors this lifetime has laid down as a challenge for me,
It seems to take a good deal of effort on all fronts as I shatter one mirror after the next to reveal the unadulterated ‘Cathy.’
Likely, there are prickly shards of glass stuck to my sweater as I exit the funhouse and head for bed.
My friends and family get nicked along the way.
I’m fairly certain, though,
That I’ll show up for the next round with my lips stained a berry red
And a lean silhouette dressed in well crafted clothes.
“Tell me all your stories,” I say…
And we sit down together for a cup of tea,
Enjoying each other’s company a an elixir
To the re-calibrating
We’re ALL having to do these days…