check the gate

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[the room is drab and lit dimly by a single lamp in the corner]
[at a small table sits a woman across from a man with unshaven face and crooked glasses]
[a blank expression on his face as she utters in stops and starts her broken narrative]

"I figured one day ...

I'd just wake up and find out what yesterday was all about ...

I'm not too keen about thinkin' about tomorrow ...

and today's slippin' by ...

I guess [sic] I went into a bad time ...

when I was watchin' everything go around me while I was standin' in the middle ...

watchin' it like in a dark theater ...

before they bring the lights up ...

I'm sittin' there ...

wonderin'...

how can this be?"

[phone rings many times]
[neither acknowledges ringing phone]
[man eventually gets up walks out of room to answer and speaks to caller]
[she exits unseen down long dark staircase screwdriver in hand]

- dialogue spoken by Susan in the movie "Inland Empire" written and directed by David Lynch

- scene descriptions by Pyrs

Could someone please bring me...

I am sitting here on my couch, leg elevated, and an extra long heating pad shoved down the right leg of my flannel lounge pants, along the length of my saffenous vein. I am taking 2 Aleve twice a day to lessen the inflammation (phlebitis). The surgical procedure cannot be scheduled until the phlebitis is absent. So I have an excuse to be a couch potato for about 2 weeks. But I live alone and my cats won't make my coffee, cook dinner, do laundry, or get the mail.

I feel like an old man. And if you tell me that yes, you are 44, you are an old man, then I will say... OK I won't write what I would say. When I get up off of the couch I have to remember to unplug myself from the extension cord. I then walk around with a thick electrical cord sticking up out of the waist of my pants, dangling to the floor and dragging along behind me. One of my cats enjoys playing with it. He thinks I'm more fun than ever. Just a big mousey with a long tail.

Prior to this week I thought this stupid vein was a fluke, but I've now been told by the doctor that I'm just unlucky. The veins closest to the surface of my legs will always have a tendency to develop varicosities, and maybe some of them in deeper unbounded locations as well. And when I stand up they have a tendency to flatten out, according to the befuddled sonogram technician. So far it seems that my arteries are OK. I have no problem getting blood to my parts since my heart and arterial plumbing seems to get the job done just fine, its the lousey plumbing I have for making the return trip that is questionable.

Some may wonder what most of my posts have to do with depression. I have pictures of my cats on my blog homepage, and that li'l bit of "cute factor" doesn't gain me credibility I'm sure (especially with some blogger named Stan... LOL). Well I counter, everything in ones life has to do with depression if one is depressed, or prone to be such. And health issues can be especially related. My blog is not a mental health advocacy blog. I'm just trying to make it day to day and sharing my journey, and hanging out at some blogs that actually can justify their existence as being useful to others.

I read yesterday in a blog that was bashing someone else's blog, that any Tom, Dick or Harry can create a blog these days, and garner the traffic of legitimate blogs like his own. (I can hear a sense of inferiority and need for attention a mile away.) It was as if he resented the fact that us little people, or "useless eaters" were simply a nuisance to be discounted. While at the same time assuming that his blog was legitimate and in some way necessary. But wasn't that the original point of the blogosphere? That anyone can do it, and the world is a much richer place because of the diversity of experience to be found there? Well, maybe not, but its why I blog. And its certainly a lot easier to get a blog up and running than an old-fashioned useless website. Anyone who resents the little bloggers having a voice too, should get out of blogging altogether and simply create a website and be a real professional.

But I rant, or was beginning too. And I'm just in a bad mood again. So if your veins are OK, and you can make your own coffee without being in a race to get back to the couch, and not trip over an electrical cord on the way, or over the cat who is attempting to hold on to said extension cord, and then once wrestling the cord from the cat has been accomplishing, remembering to plug yourself in like some questionable bedside appliance... well then you can be thankful.

But of course you have your own set of challenges. We all do (even Stan). In the world in which I meander, there are those with high white cell counts, bum knees that won't heal, daily bouts of nausea and vomiting, those who are banished to their beds by pharma issues, or daily facing the fact that a beloved child suffers in some way beyond their control. And the list goes on and on. And those things are all worse problems than my stupid veins I've been bitching about.

Hopefully my morosity has at least made you laugh or smile a little, and if that happened at during this reading, then it was worth the several hundren words I tapped out to get the job done. If that didn't happen, then you should probably find something better to do with your time then visiting a blog with alienating antisocial tendencies.

So to you and this wonderful little corner of the blogosphere, this is Pyrs, a.k.a Pete or Peter, signing off. Good night. God bless. And may your dreams come true.

A Friend Who Sticks By Me

On Monday I made a visit to the doctor and was sent to have a sonogram procedure done "Stat" to rule out the need for emergency surgery on my right leg. I've been in pain and somewhat immobilized for most of last week through today. I will be looking into a couple of different medical procedures tomorrow. Perhaps I'll say more on that in the coming days.

For now I wanted to post a picture of a friend (above) who has kept me company while I've had my leg elevated on the couch. Shen is a wonderful little critter with a tremendous sense of humor and a warm affectionate heart. I can always count on him to stick by me when times are tough.