2006-11-29

What a day! It was a time of working quite actively with accepting, embracing and cooperating with the present moment. That is because absolutely nothing in my day was as I expected it, except the weather, which remained glorious for just one more day. We can see the first arctic front moving this way! But today was in the 70s and felt like spring.

Jim went, after our Morning Offering, to fulfill a busy morning of chores for various customers. Increasingly this week he has been helping people get ready for the holidays, hanging wreaths in windows and so forth.

I came upstairs to write my article for UPI and was quite unable to do so. Instead I practiced laps along the hallway to the bathroom. Mid-morning I got a call from the U of L Digestive Health Center. They wanted to schedule me for the colonoscopy which I had been quite unable to arrange on my own. Dr. Aboud’s insistence had moved them along and I expected them to schedule me for the hospital procedure sometime in December, but Dr. Aboud must have gotten persuasive indeed, for I am set to have the procedure done tomorrow.

I did what chores I could today. They were few indeed. I went to Labcorp in Middletown, just a mile away, to give blood for my monthly labs for Dr. June, thinking how odd it is to get this lab test done when tomorrow; the hospital will undoubtedly do the same testing all over again.

I took Stanley Outback for his pre-trip check-up, which he successfully passed. That feels very good! We’ll be driving almost 2,000 miles this next week or so. It is good to have the car all set to go.

When I found myself unable to gather the sang-froid needed to think creatively, I dropped back and punted with editing the Sunday channeling session we had on November 12th. The session seemed very good indeed. I credit Monica L’s questions for eliciting excellent material. She had written them from the heart, and I had tweaked them to include requests for spiritual principles which applied to her concerns. I sent the finished rough edit to Ian so he can get the session on line, and also to Monica.

I have incredibly kind associates. When I wrote Larry M, my editor at UPI, he told me by all means, remove all concern for writing this week and get through this colonoscopy. I can write for UPI after that! At first I hoped against hope that I would be able to collect myself enough to write the article I had in mind, but by late afternoon, I knew that my time had run out, and so wrote to let him know I would write for him next week.

Pam the bookkeeper was here today, after only three weeks moving through the books very quickly. I am so grateful we found her. She expresses the same feeling towards us. She has three children either in college or getting ready to go, and is glad to have the source of income. We talked a bit about upcoming changes she would like to make in the office. She likes laser checks, which QuickBooks can write from within its software when it is set up to do so. She would like to retire the paper registers completely. I gave her the go-ahead on that after she explained that if I needed to take a check with me, I could do that too. She also wants to revise our filing system so that it makes sense. I OK’d both changes and we talked about ways and means to do those things.

My last act of the work day was to let Lisa, St. Luke’s choirmistress, know that I would not be attending choir practice. I knew that I had some serious drinking to do, a true binge! So I devoted the evening to that.

The colonoscopy prep procedure was a new one to me. The protocol was to drink glass after glass of Gatorade – the brand is specified in the instructions, as well as the flavor – “clear” – along with some 32 Osmoprep tablets, plus a laxative. Throughout the evening I polished off 64 ounces of the Gatorade. In due time, of course, the pills worked and by bedtime I was dashing for the bathroom even more frequently than usual. I cannot say that I ever went to bed, actually, for the theme of the entire night was FFFFFFFLUSH! I am clean as a whistle!

It struck me how ironic it is that in order to investigate a condition which has me going to the bathroom overmuch, the preparation involves causing me to double and triple that distortion. I was extremely glad to know that most of my work for getting ready for this test is now done.

On our first day with the announcement about the matching funds offer up on site, we received a total of $1320.00! It is a wonderful start to this campaign. I have every hope that we will, indeed, raise the funds needed to keep me writing for the next six months!

Romi, who had meant to come over yesterday evening but who had a cold and decided to stay home, came for his visit this evening, feeling much better after a day of rest. He had the beginnings of a cold, but believes he has nipped it in the bud. He got me all set up to go to Nebraska with my laptop, Traveller. It is now programmed for the dial-up connection which is all that Mom McCarty has available. And I can take my small printer with me. He gave me the protocol sheet for unhooking it here and hooking it back up in Nebraska.

This is the first time I have taken my work with me to visit Mom. Usually I treat this time as vacation. And I know I will enjoy a relaxed schedule there, with lots of sleeping, reading and spider solitaire, my favorite diversion on the computer and a Godsend when I am ill and unable to focus. The simple gaming moves lull my worried mind and enable me to regain a wider perspective which finds that faith, thanksgiving and joy that tends to flee the human personality when it is faced with distress that cannot be controlled.

However, with A Book of Days in its final stages of production and with Jean-Claude’s latest venture on the drawing board, with me included in the planning of the web site he has in mind, I want to be very responsive right now. So many wonderful things are happening!

As well, I will work in Nebraska on finishing my altered outline for all three Choice books, and on finding all the references and quotations I wish to use as I write The Choice 101. I am also carrying with me the Christmas cards to finish, a scrapbook to make of my MacDuffie reunion experience and several snail-mail letters I would like to answer. I shall have work aplenty there. So I will continue making journal entries throughout the visit, given that I can figure out the mechanics of doing so on the computer– always a question with me!

I greatly look forward to the trip, regardless of my condition. It will mean time with Mick – extended time, which we both love. I love being on the road with him. With “Depends” to help me deal with the inevitable difficulties I am having at present and some baby wipes for cleanliness en route, I think I will be just fine.