On Being Sick

Aw, boy.  Being sick is a drag.  I can can stare out into nothingness for 10 straight minutes, come-to again and not recall one thought that went through my head.  Keeps you in check though.  Keeps you grateful that you don’t regularly feel woozy every time you stand up, you don’t have excess fluid in your eyes and throat and you don’t want to fall asleep every other hour.  

My entire body has been sensitive to all elements.  Last night I put a fork full of food in my mouth and my whole mouth tingled — my taste-buds were doing backflips!  I think my eyes even watered.  When I shower, my skin is so in love with the hot water that I can’t bring myself to get out — a moment out of the hot water is frigid when you have fever-like symptoms and if you stay in it for an extended time you feel faint afterwards.  

The transition from sick to healthy can be so subtle and rest assured we all take it for granted.  The health usually shows up in the form of energy; you laugh more easily, you stand up from sitting with more spring in your step and you want to get out a bit more.

I’m feeling the subtle energy tonight.  I’m going out for dinner and I’m not sure how it’s going to go.  Either way, it’s a good step.  I’m putting myself in a setting with more energy than I can find at home and I’m feeling a bit more energetic as well.  Hopefully, the restaurant and I will mesh.

Tsunami Dreams

I’ve been planning a trip to Hawaii with my partner for the last few weeks and I dreamed about being there this morning. The other day I was thinking about what we’d do if there was a tsunami while there, whether or not a 2nd or ground floor condo would be wisest and if we could run to higher land in a snap. These are the things I think about. Call me a worrier. I just like to cover all my bases. This way, nothing ever surprises me.

In my dream I was swimming in Maui’s waters and, out of nowhere, a lifeguard starts to rope off an area about 100 feet out from the shore. The rope had these small red triangle flags on it. Apparently, there were strong riptides and he didn’t want people venturing out. I got out of the water and waited for conditions to change. About a minute later the waters were calm, so I jumped back in. Suddenly, there was an enormous ebbing of the tide and I was on the beach, no longer underwater. I knew what was happening. Then I saw this beautiful, smooth, horrifying wave that had gathered up strength and was preparing to crash. I ran down the beach looking for my partner and found some of my girlfriends who said that he was okay but that they couldn’t locate him. I woke up abruptly and felt as if I had been forced through some time barrier that had thrust me into the present: March 31st, 8:30am, San Francisco, California. The good thing is, I found my partner. He was getting ready for work and completely unscathed.

Dreaming Every Night

Being unemployed, I’m sleeping a full night’s sleep. When I was working an 8-5 job, I would go to sleep around 11:30 or 12 and get up at 6:30 in the morning. That’s around 6 & 1/2 or 7 hours of sleep and it never felt like enough. Waves of sleepiness would hit me frequently throughout the day. I knew it was too little, but I never tried to change it.

Now, by body is getting (and telling me that it wants) almost exactly 8 hours each night. I don’t use an alarm anymore and my head pops up at the 8-hour mark every morning! It’s wild! So, if I ever have another 8-5 job again, I gotta remember this and give my body what it wants: eight long hours.

And along with all this sleep has come all this dreaming. I haven’t dreamed so consistently in years. It’s really amazing. Is it attributed to the fact that I’m getting 1-2 more hours of sleep each night? Is it that I’m more well rested…cumulatively? Is it that I am going through a lot of change and my mind is taking in a lot of new ideas and thinking many new thoughts? Is it that I spend much of my day alone and don’t get to release what’s going on in my head as often as I was able to before, when I interacted with humans? Well, that’s one of the reasons I decided to start Sweet Strain. Perhaps my dreams will start to become less vivid once I really get on a roll with this blog. I sure don’t want them to lessen, but I’ll try to stay aware of it. And then I’ll have to make a choice: dreaming every night or writing Sweet Strain?