Still here

Briefly:

#1) Tyra Banks on Gossip Girl. Glorious. Over acting, wigs, wig changes. Hilary Duff. Who knew. Lizzie McGuire infinitely more suited for Dan than Harriet the Spy.

#2) American Splendor. I realize the movie came out in 2003 but it was fabulous. Am now interested in reading Our Cancer Year by Harvey and Joyce...

This post is kind of epitomizing my life now. I could choose to blog about the things I'm learning which are really interesting and at times controversial (just like I could choose to be doing my homework instead of watching internet TV in my underwear and drinking coffee at 2pm). I could fill this blog with well crafted thoughts on healthcare, social services etc... But for some reason I'm not.

Anyway, I still get like 14 hits a day because people everywhere (all over the world!) are googling "sexy topics" and clicking on Inertia. My cancer has been mostly quiet lately. The weather is changing and my neuropathy is getting worse. I am ready to be done with treatment and resentful and bitchy about the fact that it isn't over. I miss Dr K, Swedish, my nurses, Chris and Michael, Billy and Yusef, and the guys in the parking garage who would propose to me. Friday is treatment #6 in the countdown.

My insurance company continues to pay, I continue to suppress my immune system, my hair is growing back, and it feels like all around me folks are getting bad news about Cancer. It's a weird place to be.

This last month I was at a yoga class where the theme was the harvest. This is fall. We are harvesting what we have reaped over the last year. A couple weeks ago was Yom Kippur and Rosh Ha Shannah--the turnover of the Jewish year. All of this stuff asks us to consider the year behind us and the year I'm reviewing was excellent--for me. It was full of positive momentum: feeling better almost every day, getting into Berkeley, having a wild 6 months of partying in Seattle, saying goodbye to my job and Community, and moving on to another situation full of Promise... It's like the happy montage at the end of the movie.

I'm trying to celebrate and acknowledge how wonderful this is and balance it with the tragedy that defines the year of other people. It's not just cancer, but unemployment, the failure of our legislature to actually look out for constituents, the hurtling of our culture into End Times... Anyway. I find myself using the same coping mechanism I discovered with in treatment: realizing that life is transitory, mysterious, ever changing, and still wonderful. Believing in transformation, challenging myself to be open to what can be good...

Once, in a yin yoga class, my teacher Janell gave me this meditation to help me focus on holding a pose for a long time while remaining present:
In Breath: This is the perfect moment
Out Breath: This is the only moment