I've been tagged to do the following...

1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123.
3. Find the 5th sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people, acknowledge who tagged you.

The Divine Matrix, by Gregg Braden

We can't capture or photograph it. Contrary to what daylight saving would seem to imply, it's impossible to gather it in one place only to use it later in another. When we do attempt to describe the meaning of time in our lives, we're left using words that gauge it in a relative sense.


I'm Tagging:
The person reading this who has not already been tagged and keeps a blog.
If you fit the description...you're tagged.

I was tagged by Dawn D-R
www.mindlib.blogspot.com

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Call Me Snaggletooth

I have been riding my bike to work on Fridays when the weather is nice. Yesterday morning I rode about 3.5 miles with no problems and was a half a block from the office when I bit it - the sidewalk, that is...was wearing a helmet, but unfortunately not on my chin. There was no car involved. I misjudged the lip of a sidewalk ramp that had a puddle of water in front of it (leftover from the previous night’s thunderstorm). The ramp lip was taller than I thought and I shouldda taken it head-on instead of at an angle – the same reason why bike riders are always instructed to take railroad tracks on the perpendicular. I opted to jump to the sidewalk this way when I was suddenly blocked off by right turn traffic ahead, just picked the wrong place and angle to do it. The fall itself wasn't scary at all. What was horrifying was the sound of my teeth crunching like Doritos in my mouth and through my upper lip. I was so stunned and in my own world that I didn’t even look around to see who was walking around me and or even think to ask for assistance. Blood was everywhere, and I just kept thinking, my God, I must look like a total freak right now from the amount of blood I’m dripping. I put my hand to my mouth and spit out a piece of a tooth into my palm. I stood up, uprighted my bike (which remained completely in tact), and walked with it over to a nearby trash can. I leaned the bike against a black, utility box unit while I stood dripping blood into the trash can. I was wearing an exercise tank layered with a lightweight grey shirt. I had my change of work clothes on me in my pack.

My immediate concern was just getting myself presentable enough to walk into my office building without causing a scene. I already had blood on my grey shirt, and was just about ready to take it off to sop up the blood from my face when two very sweet women came over to me, asked me if I was okay and presented me offerings from their purse. One woman had an entire stack of paper napkins and another handed me her entire mini-Kleenex tissue pack. Both women looked at me, sympathetically, and somewhat apologetically, as if to say- I wish I could give you medical attention, but this is all I know to do for you right now. I accepted their offerings graciously, with much thanks and got myself as cleaned up as I could under the circumstances.

Then, I crossed the street with my bike, locked it on the bike rack and walked into the building. I started feeling super light-headed, stopped to rest at a chair and table in the lobby and sat with my head on the table for a bit, just breathing and taking in the coolness of the air conditioned environment, still holding the napkins to my mouth. I was at the rear entrance, so there were very few people around, which was nice. I have nearly fainted in public before a few times and every time I was so embarrassed by it. I hate to be a burden to people, especially strangers. So, I was actually more worried about losing consciousness in public than I was about losing consciousness. After a few moments I regained enough energy to make it to the lobby, up the escalator and to the 6th floor where I immediately ducked into the women’s washroom to assess the damage. I looked like the victim of an intense domestic abuse incident. My lip was already so swollen and cut I couldn’t tell how bad exactly, though I knew it was deep. I wondered if it would require stitches I was surprised that only one of my teeth had shattered from all the crunching I heard. It didn’t look as hideous as I expected. I was missing only a quarter of my left front tooth, now a wavy jagged edge and the entire front section of upper teeth was extremely sore. My chin and left arm were both bleeding and black from sidewalk grit and scrapes. I cleaned myself up a bit, then walked over to my friend Laura’s desk to get her opinion. I explained the ordeal and asked her if she thought I would need stitches. She insisted that she take me to an immediate care center because the lip wound was deep and was also concerned that I could have a concussion. It took me a while before I decided to go with her. I kept thinking I could get some work done and maybe get myself checked out later, but when I started feeling light-headed again, I took her up on the offer. Some gals at the office fashioned an ice pack from paper towels and ice in the kitchen to take with me and it helped control the swelling. My co-worker, Vicki, loaded my bike into her SUV parked outside to return to me later this weekend which was a fantastic help.

Laura and I took a cab to an immediate care center on Michigan Avenue. The staff there was very nice. They cleaned my up a bit more, dressed my arm wound and gave me a tetanus shot. I also had a chance to change into my better, non-blood stained work shirt. After pressing along my face in numerous places, the care center doctor suggested I see a radiologist for a chin scan for fear that I might have a hairline jaw fracture at minimum. They also wanted me to get a c.t. scan to rule out a possible concussion, but I talked them out of that, insisting that the impact was strictly to my chin and mouth and there’s be no reason for that. They called a nearby radiologist’s office, but their chin scan machine was out of commission, so I was instructed to go to the Northwestern ER. On the way out, I told Laura I could handle the ER trip on my own so she could go back to the office and get some work done. She told me she’d call me on my cell to check in with me and handed me two granola bars she’d grabbed that were available in the immediate care center. I’m so glad she thought to grab those because they came in handy later.

I’ve been to Northwestern ER once before when I had a kidney stone issue, so I knew exactly where to go and what the procedures were. I also knew I would be there a while and was bummed that I didn’t have a book with me- one of the many books I have sitting on my nightstand. I take them out of my backpack when I ride to work to lighten the pack load. I tried reading a magazine, but couldn't keep interest in any of the articles. I thought it would be good to try Reiki on myself to ease the pain and help the healing, but the ER environment is so frenetic that the meditative focus needed for that was just not accessible. Once checked in, I was in a room with several others awaiting tests and treatments. There was a man accompanied by his partner who had fallen through a temporary deck structure that was in place while construction of the deck was going on. It was an upper level deck. One foot fell completely through and the one that didn’t was strained so much from the pressure of trying to keep support that the foot broke in half, tearing ligaments. They were awaiting the results of a scan to see if he needed surgery. Another man, elderly and incredibly frail occupied the bed next to me. We were separated by a curtain. I think he was homeless man and may have just come in to get something to eat. A female security guard stood watching over him about four feet from the foot of his bed and he asked her if she could bring him food. She said she couldn’t give him any food until he’s had a blood test and a urine test and asked him if he’d had either yet. He replied no. I learned later that his name was Mr. Smith. I had wished I could share a granola bar with him, but thought it might be against doctors’ wishes per the guard’s instructions. I ended up being there for so long, waiting before and after my scan that I was glad to have the granola bars to eat with the back right side of my mouth. While I was there, several other people that I couldn’t see, but could hear, came into the room to harass the registrar because they hadn’t been admitted yet. I heard people wailing in pain, talking about the seriousness of their infections, screaming, calling the nurses bitches. I realized that the ER people handle an incredible amount of abuse on a daily basis. God bless 'em. I also felt guilty that I occupied a bed that someone else could have and hoped they would move quickly on getting me out so someone else could be admitted.

The thing about Northwestern Memorial Hospital is that about four out of every five male doctors rank high on the hot scale. I’m serious. I’m convinced they hold auditions. There are so many attractive doctors there that I sometimes felt like I was on a soap opera, except for being in actual pain. They offered me painkillers, but I had popped an Advil before I arrived and didn’t want to overdo it. I had two doctors, both easy on the eyes. My main doctor was glad to hear I’d already called my dentist and scheduled an early a.m. appointment for Saturday and said he would be applying a tooth coating to protect the broken one in the meantime. Every doc I talked to kept emphasizing that the dentist visit should happen as soon as possible because my tooth and perhaps teeth were very fragile after sustaining the trauma and all were confident that the dental work would be routine and get my teeth back to looking normal. I was glad I didn’t have to see many people with my broken smile before I would be getting it fixed. I had joked at the office earlier that people would believe me now when I tell them I’m from Kentucky. I had a total hillbilly grin going on, when I did smile- which wasn’t too often because it split my lip wound more. Just when I was thinking this, the doctor returned to my bedside with two interns: a woman and yet another attractive guy. “You’re kidding me?” I said “Is it this serious that you needed two more people?” I joked with him. They had come to view the tooth-sealing. The woman joked that she was brought in to hold me down while I screamed which made me laugh and hurt my lip more. The doctor said he brought them in to watch since it was a teaching hospital and hoped I didn’t mind. And thus, he proceeded to use me as a guinea pig for Sealing a Snaggletooth 101. My only issue with this was that I had to keep my mouth open for a long time through the slow explanations of how to count the teeth, the classifications of the three different types of tooth breaks and the actual brushing on of some sort of plaster sealant. It wouldn’t have been so bad had it been in a dentist office, equipped with suction tools to keep the saliva under control. But it wasn’t. It was me, a woman intern, a hot doctor and hot male intern staring down at me with a hillbilly grill, drooling on myself. But, hey, I suppose I did my part for the interns' medical education.

While I was waiting for the results of my chin scan, I noticed that I had also bruised my left leg pretty bad through my jeans and that there is a very small, black piece of gravel stuck deep into my palm that will invitably work it’s way back to the surface in time. So minor I didn’t want to waste the doctors' time with it. Also, while I was waiting, several doctors took turns trying to get my neighbor, Mr. Smith, to have a coherent conversation with them. He had fallen asleep and they needed to talk to him about his symptoms and what he was in for. I could hear them going to great lengths trying to rouse him with little success. The same man I had heard asking for food a half hour earlier, was now speaking only jibberish. When they finally got him to respond, the round of questions went like this:
Doc: “Mister Smith, are you hearing voices?”
Mr. Smith: “ehhhh…yeahhhhh.”
Doc: “Mister Smith, Are you having thoughts about wanting to hurt yourself?”
Mr. Smith: “Yes.”
Doc: “Are you having thoughts about wanting to hurt other people?”
Here there was a long pause. I listened attentively.
Please answer, him, Mister Smith. I thought. I’m interested to know considering I’m the nearest person to you when the doctor leaves, there is only a curtain between us and I like to think I’ve met my trauma quota for the day.
Mr. Smith answered with jibberish.

Needless to say, I was thrilled to get my scan results- no chin fractures- and skip outta the trauma room with a prescription of antibiotics and painkillers. Since then, my friends Laura and Marcia called me several times to check up on me and make sure I wasn't unconscious somewhere from a concussion. They were so great to care so much and look after me.

It wasn't until I was at the pharmacy that I noticed something about my hospital wristband that struck me as funny. My former primary care doctor was a Northwestern physician and years ago someone mistyped on my medical profile that I was a male instead of female. I asked them to correct this years ago, but there it was again on my wrist i.d. that I was a 31 year old male. Apparently this gender mistake is still haunting me. I wonder if it ever royally screws up their statistics that I have an extensive history of ovarian cysts.

Today I was at the dentist and it turns out that more than one of my teeth was compromised with stress fractures, both vertical and horizontal. So, I got a temporary cap-like unit that looks astonishingly real securing three of my front teeth and in the coming week I will be going with two veneers on the two front teeth because bonding would not be strong enough for day-to-day wear and tear given the stress fractures. So, I will see how much my insurance will cover of that. Hopefully a good amount of it. I promise I didn’t eat the sidewalk yesterday with intent to get an all-expenses paid smile makeover. This weekend I am resting and eating rice and ice cream. I will probably refrain from biking to work for a while.

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The Peanut Gallery and The Bad News Bears

Work isn't worthwhile without something to keep you laughing. I sit across from my friend Karen and we recently started referring to ourselves as The Peanut Gallery because we have an opinion on almost everything and we call things as we see it. My excuse is that I'm a Sagittarious and Karen's is that she's a native New Yorker. For this reason, various co-workers are always coming by asking our opinions on this or that: anything from ideas on color choices for bridesmaid dresses, suggestions on what to eat for lunch, how to how to handle certain delicate work relationships, good places to take their out-of-town guests, etc. Another thing that Karen and I share is a work history that goes back about 6 years. She and I worked for those crazy investment bankers together and we often rehash stories of those crazy days, especially since we work in the same building as those guys and see them in passing now and then.

Aside from The Peanut Gallery, we've named the far corner of the room The Bad News Bears (or The BNB) because there is an woman who works within our earshot and seems to be connected to major life crisis on a daily basis. Every day there is something tragic going on that she's grumbling about aloud. So-and-so is sick and in the hospital, so-and-so was in a car accident, mom fell down the stairs and hurt her hip, a friend got a serious infection after cataract surgery, so- and-so's brother-in-law was found murdered, so-and-so was diagnosed with cancer, she's limping today 'cause she broke her toe, etc. We've decided that she must be the caretaker of several older relatives and the entire family is having an exceptionally rough go of life all the time. The problem is that it has become comical to us that, without fail, there is a different tragic incident to discuss in detail every day. Woody Allen's formula of Tragedy + Time = Comedy should be amended to read: 236 Tragedies/365 Days= Comedy. (236 being the number of working days in a year minus vacation and holiday). I never imagined I'd be laughing at people's misfortunes like this, but myself and several others in the vicinity can't keep from snickering at the mention of the day's tragedy from The BNB. It's terrible! Today she has been on the phone giving a dramatic account of the gory details involving someone's bleeding throat tumor and I am trying so hard not to laugh that I am biting my tongue and typing with tears streaming down my face. I can't even look at Karen, but I hear her stifling a chuckle. I swear, I'm usually a pretty sensitive person when it comes to people's hardships, but the writer in me cannot resist imagining the SNL sketch one could script from the comic gold that could be mined from this corner vortex of dire misfortune. I keep joking about coming in super early one day to burn sage in The BNB corner of the building to chase away the evil spirits.

I am reminded to appreciate that I am healthy and people I love are doing well.

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Reiki, the Corpus plays, and Riget

I’m not really one to make New Years Resolutions, but as the year changed over to 2008, I made a small promise to myself that this year I would study about something unrelated to writing or theatre or dance. I decided to learn about energy medicine. And since energy medicine is something you can really only learn by experiencing, I wasn’t going to stop at just reading about it. I needed to decide exactly how I was going to experience it. At first, I debated about going to a Reiki Master for a healing session. But, instead, I opted to dive in with a level 1 certification course. After completing a 14-hour course over a weekend in April, I am now certified in Usui Reiki 1, a form of Japanese energy healing. (Step 1 of 3 to becoming a Reiki Master)

I couldn't help but wonder if any supposed results from so-called energy healing are created by a placebo effect on the basis of suggestion (a.k.a. a complete load of malarkey). What I discovered is that something does occur in energy healing. It may not be healing as you and I know it, but I learned that energy healing is supposed to healand strengthen the spirit body, which is in direct relation to the physical body. Many times there is a definate physical response such as heat or vibration sensations, which I experienced both when two people did a reiki session on myself and also when I did a reiki session on another reiki student. It was really amazing. A 'healing' session could also involve helping a dying person's spirit crossover into the afterlife peacefully when their time has come, versus conjuring a miraculous recovery back into life as they knew it.

My course consisted of learning the history of Usui Reiki (several versions), some meditation techniques, learning all about the main seven chakras and several minor ones, the importance of practicing gratitude in all aspects of life and eliminating stress, fear, and worry. Also, there is an etiquette to reiki - you must never attempt to give reiki to someone without their permission. However positive, it's still frowned upon; you'd be essentially violating them spiritually. And there are ways to do more harm than good in some cases, which is very interesting in a kind of 'be careful what you wish for' vein. In fact, in reiki healing you are encouraged not to focus on a person's health issue at all or any other specifics, if you can help it. The energy has its own 'intelligence' per se - much like the Christian 'holy spirit'. And distance healing is totally possible, in the same way that people see amazing effects when being prayed for. It's the same concept, but a more clear one, I think, when it comes to the nature of how someone should be prayed for to see the best results. There is a strong emphasis on performing self-healing all the time in order to be able to assist in the healing of others. Just like everything else, however, I keep putting it off. I've actually had moments where I'm thinking I could do a reiki session on myself to give me an energy boost right now or... I could eat something chocolate. And lo, I opted for a Snickers bar. For shame, I know. It's crazy. You can also reiki non-living things and get results, supposedly (like fixing your car or kitchen appliances, etc). Diet is also important, of course - lots of veggies (not so many Snickers), healthy stuff as you can imagine, though meat is not forbidden. Also, I received my level I attunement from a reiki master, which is a kind of spiritual ritual of initiation into the reiki 'club' per se.

I've been learning a lot about spirit and the nature of spirit from stories originating with various sources. Some of the interesting stuff discussed in my reiki course was how some people's spirits do not fully inhabit their physical body. I had heard this proposed as an explaination for autism, but never thought about it much as far as the everyday person goes. Rick, my instructor, was giving expamples of people he's encountered whose spirit might actually be very condensed and hiding on one side of their body from years of fear and insecurity. Often this person is very shy and depressed and may even physically hold themselves inward. Reiki for this person might just be about helping their spirit body inhabit more of their physical body. Others, of course, have full-bodied spirits (not talkin' whiskey here) and large auras and astral bodies. I've had two strangers and one person who was a family acquaintance, women who considered themselves to be psychic or spiritual seers of some sort, who have told me I have a very large aura. I always assumed this is a good thing, complimentary. (Far better, I assume, for someone to remark how big your aura is than to say the same of your ass, otherwise why would they feel compelled to tell you, right?) These were people who actually 'see' auras, which I'm not able to do. Maybe someday I will be able to. I can feel energy fields from people, sometimes very intensely, but it's a physical 'feeling' sensation versus a visual and not for every person I encounter.

So anyhow, I'm all into reiki and energy and reading about the divine matrix and remote viewing and lots of crazy, kooky, weird shit that I find completely facinating. I have even been able to try reiki on Mars, who started to experience what appeared to be arthritic pain in his front legs for several weeks. First the right leg for a few weeks, then the left. Each time I was able to assist in alleviating his pain enough to get him back and walking on his legs. It hasn't returned since, but it still might. I can't help but be skeptical, though. I wondered if he just injured the right leg and after if started feeling better he simply started up on the left to see if he could get just as much attention and food rewards for being such a sport. He's been known to be manipulative that way.

I've enjoyed tying energy healing study to mind-body work in pilates and how the mind process of body mapping affects us physically. In fact, I had a rather passionate discussion Wednesday night over dinner about how cool the concept of body-mapping is, but I think it was also due to the two margaritas I had. (We are finally seeing some margarita-drinking weather around here!)

Creatively, I have put aside the full-length play I was working on. I tried to get through it without interruption, but alas, another project came calling- one more definitive for me. I am completing the second act to the two-act collection of Corpus plays. THEY THE PEOPLE is Act One and DEAD MAN WORKING will be Act Two when I finish it, both taking place at the ficticious Corpus Communications company. I'm considering calling them CORPUS DUO (a play on the latin Corpus Deo). The plays could be done together or separate.

I also feel compelled to mention that I bought both Season One and Two of Lars von Trier's The Kingdom (Riget) and was completely riveted. This may mean I am a very twisted person, but I am willing to accept that. I am so bummed that there was never a Season 3! (I know the actor who played Helmer died before Season 3 could be made, but this can't be the only reason I am left hanging.) I have never seen anything like it. It's an absurdly, horrific, dark comedy series with fantastic elements of religion and philosophy. But didn't we already know I'm a LVT fan?

-ciao

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Taking Inventory of the Junk Drawer

In my earlier post, I used an image of a broken heart to describe something I was experiencing. While this was partly to symbolize that there was a recent end to a romantic relationship, I feel it is more accurate to say that the broken heart was a symbol, not of myself having lost that particular relationship or really about my feelings for that particular gentleman (who is still a lovely person in my eyes) but rather to describe a general sense of brokenness that I have identified with in the area of my life titled romantic relationships. If this were embodied in a container, a drawer- let’s say- labeled Jen’s Past Relationships- it might look like the junk drawer that everyone has in their kitchen. It’s messy. It’s not really well-defined. It has a little of this a little of that. There’s not really any one theme. It has a sound of containing broken things when you open it- all clanging together. This is a box of items that came in handy at the time they were needed and for some reason I decided I needed to hold on to them: rubber-bands, pieces of hardware, an appliance manual, an expired coupon, a take-out menu, a few twist-ties, a match book, a chip clip, a key ring, a yogurt lid I never mailed in (sorry, breast cancer patients) , etc. You probably have something like this in your own kitchen or office: the all-purpose, miscellaneous drawer. Well, I recently decided to take inventory of my relationship drawer and remember what purpose each had at the time prior to landing in the drawer. I made a list of all of the guys I’ve had fairly substantial relationships with and what I was able to take away from that relationship.

My newest concept that I’ve been playing around with is that we have a natural attraction to people that embody the very side of us that we hide from the world because they give us permission to be something we secretly want to be. Some people may even refer to this as our shadow-self. But in taking inventory, I noticed that each guy I dated possessed the exact traits that I wished I had I myself, but did not: they were strong in areas I was deficient in. Some say opposites attract, but the more I learn about polarity the more I realize we are really attracted to the other side of our same coin. For example: It was noted by a dear friend that I had a pattern of dating guys that the rest of the world would consider to be over-confident or even cocky. At the time, I didn’t see this as valid. I saw these individuals as confident and considered their confidence to be a pleasant, rare find. But really, I was counter-balancing my own extreme insecurities. Outside of these relationships, I would feel tremendous guilt if I exhibited any sign of personal pride in anything. In fact, I was genuinely very embarrassed to have anyone compliment me in public or bring attention to me because I identified that as inappropriate and sinfully prideful. Yet, when I was dating a guy who was totally comfortable with public praise- even to the point of seeking it out- it was as if I was given permission to indulge in this myself via association. I don’t know if that makes as much sense to you as it does me. But, from those relationships, I actually became more balanced. A little bit of their extreme rubbed off on me. Another example of this is from my first (and longest) serious relationship with a guy from high school to early college. During the course of the three years we dated, I went from being a complete type-A personality to being much more relaxed and balanced because he was so completely laid-back that I would sometimes check his pulse to make sure he was still with the living. Almost EVERYTHING rolled right off him (and this one didn’t even smoke pot- habitually, anyway). Some days I thought I could kill him for what I thought was complete apathy or even laziness. I stressed out about his life more than I did my own. Still, any way you slice it, by the end of our relationship I was a changed person. You can’t be seriously involved with a person who embodies this without learning something very important: that people who don’t plan for anything in life still actually get by just fine (even though you sometimes wish they didn’t just to validate your own obsessive behavior). In fact, they get by with a lost less worry and stress than those of us who do plan and obsess and organize. Of course, people like me help them out a lot along the way, but, there’s still no getting around the lesson. I learned that this relaxed approach can be about choosing to be peaceful and accepting of a situation and that this is actually a more beneficial approach on many levels. I am so much more tolerable to work with now when compared to my former obsessive, type-A self. Co-workers have recently spoken of my ‘gift’ for maintaining such a calm demeanor all the time, even in the most intense situations. They have no idea from whence I came, except maybe when I worry aloud about something I have no business worrying about. Thanks, Glen. These are just a couple examples...

So, I made my inventory list of the items in the relationship drawer and realized that, although this is a filled with items that never made glass showcase status, it is nonetheless a drawer of some very useful things I have collected over the years. Plenty of stuff that’s not really junk at all, just things I have needed along the way. And for this, I am grateful.

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