Last Wednesday, I woke up feeling a bit blah. I’ll spare you the details of what we euphemistically call “stomach flu,” but my condition deteriorated rapidly from there. Soon, my whole world contracted to two spaces: my bed and the bathroom. Before long, taking care of myself meant laying immobile for as long as I could, listening with curiosity to my own ragged grunts. I’m not whining; I’ve been sicker and know people in far worse conditions. But, I was more than sick enough, thank you very much.

For days, I had thunderstorms in the arroyos of my guts. They raged from left to right and back again. I sounded like a giant jug knocked on its side, contents burbling out.

Completely drained and wrung out, my worst symptoms stopped and I was left in this limbo of “relatively better.” I measured progress in sitting up for a few minutes longer. I watched more TV than usual — some of the stuff I saw on KNME was so lovely it helped me a bit: pictures of New Mexico and Utah set to classical music and poetic narration. I saw a video I want to loop in my final hours.

I can’t say that I thought a lot that is worth remembering. But I did think about loss of capacity; about being unable to decide for oneself; being so dependent on others.

I thought about aging and the struggle between acceptance and resistance to many things that may be inevitable in spite of our resistance or made so by our acceptance. I’ve come no closer to wisdom.

I thought about god and the atheist’s dilemma in not having anyone to blame or beg. Thankfulness is a different matter — it doesn’t require a recipient.

Being an optimist and not THAT sick, I knew I would recover in time, even after a few false starts. Today, 5 full days after the onset, I feel the best I have since this began, though still weak. I finally *want* food — interesting food. I want to photograph flowers. I want to write. I want a haircut! mjh

photo and haircut by MRudd