Photo by Flash Dantz for Unsplash
August 19, 2024 3 a.m. journal entry: Today I feel like I've had enough. I'm so weary from being sick. My mood meme would be: Tired of living but scared to die. Dear God, I know I’m not supposed to ask for myself but I’d like to string a few good days together. For the past couple of months, I’ve been nauseous all the time. Maybe a fast way to lose weight and surely better than Jenny Craig, whose food tastes like cardboard. Cardboard with chocolate sauce. And certainly more efficient than Weight Watchers. What's worse is that not only am I nauseous, I also have acid reflux. I could start my own orchestra with the sounds that come out of me. My friends say I could conduct my own concert. I’m uncomfortable a good deal of the time. My thoughts naturally yearn for yesteryear when my once strong, beautiful legs propelled me through countless practices on a Masters swim team and held me, unflinching, in down dog. Today, those same legs, from my supple knees down to my cute little toes, are covered with bumps. I don’t know what they are nor do the medical professionals. One doctor I consulted about the mystery bumps and my generalized malaise prefers to diagnose me over Zoom. Let’s call her Dr. Zoom, board-certified Dr. Z. She refuses to see me in person. Yay for modern technology. Something is going to get me, but I can’t predict what. Neither can she, especially through a remote "connection." Telehealth, it's called, although it likely tells her very little about how I am really doing. I turn 80 next year, if I make it. If Dr. Z could see me in person, we could explore—even co-create—the Octogenarian World I'm about to enter in all it's inexplicable contradictions. Like why on some days am I determined to push through—to make every day count with the friends I love. And why, on other days, I ask God to let me die in my sleep. My simple cosmic ask is unrealistic, as God would know, since I don't sleep. I would be bracingly honest with Dr. Z, sharing that I want a quick death. I'd reveal that I’m terrified of losing my memory even as there are hints it's slipping away already. I'd state with conviction that I'd rather nod off forever then have hands that shake or legs that can't carry me. I don't do wheelchairs, I'd explain, masking my fear with mirth, because they don't make designer wheelchairs. She would draw me out, beyond the topics of lumpy legs, relentless insomnia and the expensive comfort dog that snores. I'd reject, again, her suggestion to try the dignity-stripping CPAP machine. My sleep is hard enough as it is without trying to do so with a mask-contraption over my face. She might even probe for pain in the direction of root causes by asking me about my childhood, to which I'd respond. I remember the first day of kindergarten like yesterday. I, unironically, had separation anxiety from my mother. She picked me up early from school, brought me home and fed me Oreo cookies. She told me she made them herself. I took the gooey middles out and put them back together in the cookie jar for my brother to find. He was the golden child, with his blond curly hair, bronze skin and a beautiful smile. He could do no wrong. I was jealous so when he wasn’t looking, I broke all of his toys. He never forgave me. He went on to be a successful Neuropsychologist. I went on to have legs covered with bumps and an exercise regime that is limited to making it to the bathroom successfully. Dr. Z would pretend to empathize, maybe even reach over and put a hand on my shoulder while asking something like: "Did you and your brother mend fences over time?" Not so much. He got back at me by putting my baby finger in a bike chain, ripping it off my hand and then somehow managing to blame me...to this day. I think fondly of him each time I look down at my deformed finger. (I would hold it up to show here, theatrically.) He continued to walk on water until he married an Asian woman and my father disowned him. The fallen, nee golden boy, eventually forgave my father for destroying him but never forgave me for taking the middle out of the Oreos. So you see, Dr. Z, it hasn’t been an easy life and my looming 80s are sure to be just as dreadful as kindergarten. But all is not lost, because my parents, in a spasm of thoughtful preplanning, bought a plot for me in a mausoleum. I’ll be next to my mother for infinity. I wonder if I’ll experience separation anxiety when I’m dead. At this, the good doctor would pivot to a new topic: my follow-up appointment by Zoom.
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