I’ve chronicled many an unpleasant illness and ill events in my life on this blog, and so it is time- yes, it’s time- to talk about my current raging UTI. Nope, not the Universal Trade Institute, not the UTI Bank, I’m talking the whopper of all whoppers: the unmistakable, undeniable Urinary Tract Infection. Know what that really is, folks? It’s when you get E. coli, or some other awful bacteria, in your female innards. It can happen to men, too, and when it does, it’s really REALLY bad, as opposed to just really bad.

So I could talk about the causes, the history, the statistics, but instead, I’m going to talk about the pain. There’s the constant pain- the awful, sharp, cramp-like pain that makes you want to double over, but then also the rushing, frightening pain whenever you visit the loo. It’s dreadful. I’ve really tried to keep my head above water all day, and indeed, I just came from a two-hour meeting that I had to facilitate regarding coaching foster youth (so YEAH, it was kinda important), but now that I’m home, I think, really, that I’m going to go curl up in bed and cry for a while. I really think that would help. Because none of the pain medications are working, and I don’t see my doctor until mid-morning, and I don’t expect to accomplish much in the meantime.

I’m really not so much of a wuss when it comes to pain. I live in a constant state of mild soreness from working out all the time (and trying to work off the fifteen pounds of wine and cheese I gained when I moved to Napa). Indeed- even when I impaled the meaty part of my thumb with a fork tine while trying to wrestle cookie dough from a cold baggie, I didn’t even flinch. (This is a true story, and it happened this weekend. The fork when through the cookie dough, through the bag, and one tine stuck straight into my palm. Fascinated, I withdrew it, watched the blood pool, and then got back to eating the cookie dough.) But this is a scary pain, one that makes me feel very alone. I know help is around the corner, just a antibiotic prescription away, but there are parts of you that just shouldn’t hurt, not like this.

58 days until LASIK.

It’s almost 4:30 on Sunday afternoon, and it’s not yet thinking about getting dark- which gives me so much hope. I am not someone who should be out of the sun, and during the winter months when the world shuts down before 5 PM I have a hard time keeping my spirits up. But today, the winter flowers are blooming, the mustard has gone nuts all over the valley, and the sun has not yet decided to abandon us for the day.

This past week was stranger than even the weeks before it, and I find myself questioning every major decision I’ve made of late. Suddenly I don’t know what I want to do, where I want to go. I know that less than six months from now, things will be different, but I don’t know what brand of different, although, damn it, every time I close a door, I swear another one opens, and maybe that will continue.

Yesterday, my Friend Dan and I spent the day wandering the valley and then for dinner, we made cookies and deviled eggs. It was a superb dinner, one I recommend to anyone, but I mention it only because I was finally able to use a gift sent to me some months ago:

That’s right, a Tupperware tiered deviled egg holder. It is hilarious. It was sent to me by Jordana’s parents because they noticed how I tend to power down deviled eggs at family events. I should be so lucky to marry into a family a tenth as cool as Jordana’s. Anyway, I know I look insane in this picture, but it is a testament to my thanks for such a delightful, thoughtful, inspired, and random gift, sent for no reason other than the opportunity to give.

I have a dear friend who got LASIK surgery five years ago, and she is a little outraged at the number of tests my doctors are running on me. Not because she feels like they are wasting my time, but because she feels slighted. “I walked in, they did a test or two, said OK, then sliced my eyeballs open. WTF?”

Mr. Mildly Handsome was replaced by Super Nice Peruvian Doctor. If not for Mr. Super Nice, I don’t know if I could go through with all of it. He’s the director of the eye care center, and he was gracious, and funny, and honest. He did roughly a billion more tests on my eyes, and then pulled me around so I could see the results on his computer screen. I got to see 3-D diagrams of what exactly is wrong with my eyes- the bowing out of my nearsightedness, the anomalies of my astigmatism- it was SO COOL. And it turns out that the thickness of my cornea is on the high side of normal, which is really good.

They do not yet know if I am a candidate for custom LASIK, because results from two different tests weren’t exactly the same, and apparently that means something that I don’t understand. But I am a perfect candidate for regular LASIK, and they’ll be able to tell the day of the surgery which one would be best for me.

Mr. Super Nice answered every one of my questions, but he also made it abundantly clear that the success of the surgery depends on little more than my expectations. I could end up with 20/40 vision. I could end up needing nighttime driving glasses. I could end up needing a second surgery if they heal in the wrong way. (I could also end up blind or losing an eye or two, although that is extremely rare.) Or, I could end up with better than 20/20 vision and not need to wear any sort of corrective anything until I’m in my forties and need reading glasses. (I’m totally okay with that.) There are all sorts of rare and terrifying possible complications, but I don’t want to write about them.

And the surgery itself lasts all of a few seconds- under a minute for each eye. For two or three weeks prior, I’ll be taking supplements, and massaging my eyes (because apparently my tear ducts are a little blocked- not that you’d know that if you spent any time around me), and of course the contacts come out again. And then after the surgery, I keep my eyes shut for the day (and wear funny-looking goggles) and then I wear those goggles to sleep in for a week and for a month, I can’t swim, can’t play contact sports, can’t do anything that might poke my eyeballs. Because although they seal immediately once they replace the top flap, it takes time for that seal to be permanent… and if my eyeballs get poked during that time, I could get an infection, and that would be VERY VERY VERY bad.

Anyway, this is all the roundabout way to say the surgery is scheduled. March 29th. Plenty of time to chicken out, unfortunately, but the doctor that Mr. Super Nice thinks is the perfect one for me is booked until then. The total cost? Just under $4000. Would have been $5000 but I’m joining an alumni association that gives patients 20% off all surgeries.

I’m scared and excited. And funnily enough, now I hate my contacts. My glasses are off, and put away, but now that I’m wearing these little plastic discs in my eyes again I’m miserable. They itch and they feel all suffocaty and stuff gets on them.

Anyway, two weeks before the surgery, I go back in for the same round of tests I had this last time, to make current maps for the surgeon. So until March, no more eyeball updates… other than just chronicling my fears.

I had my second of three eye appointments last week in preparation for possibly getting LASIK. I noticed that Mr. Mildly Handsome, my eye doctor, doesn’t smile much. But he did say that my eyes looked great, very healthy from not wearing contacts, and unchanged in any way since our last meeting that would affect my candidacy for surgery. BUT… I had to keep my glasses on and my contacts off, in preparation for tomorrow’s appointment down in Berkeley. This is the big one- a solid hour of testing, including the thickness of my cornea and other appetizing readings. It’s an unfotunate hour away, but depending on the results of this round of tests, I’ll finally be approved (or not) for the surgery. They have three different doctors, who specialize in different types of eyes, and who have varied schedules. So first they will determine if I can get the surgery, then which doctor should do it, and then, if all’s well, we’ll schedule the surgery. All this could happen tomorrow.

I’m really nervous about the surgery, but like anything I put my mind to, the decision has been made and I’ll go forward with it. I’m also not thrilled about the debt it will generate, but somehow I’m totally convinced it’s worth it.

However, they best have availability VERY SOON for the procedure because I think something very, very bad might happen if I have to wear these *#^#$)*%)$ glasses one more day. And of course, you have to be out of contacts for what feels roughly like a lifetime before the surgery, and I’ve lived that lifetime, and I’m THROUGH. If the surgery happens, and it is successful, I am going to have a ritual burning of these lenses.

I’ve felt a strange sort of exhaustion all day, coupled with total distractibility. Are those symptoms of something, or just tiredness and distractedness? And am I making up words? It’s odd- my life has been so full of late, and I guess I’m rather accustomed to at least a little bit of emptiness, and even, maybe, I’m fond of that little bit of emptiness. I’m craving it right now, wanting to almost physically push everyone away from me for just a day so I can breathe and think. Maybe I’ll take myself to the coast this weekend, or something, just to get away. Particularly if I’m going to have my eyeballs sliced open shortly thereafter. Cross your fingers for me, cyber-world, in hopes that my cornea is thick enough.

Sometimes I don’t blog because there is just too much I want to write about. This is what one of my colleagues calls “champagne problems”, as in, the kind of problems you want. I write so much so often on so many deadlines these days that the muscle is strong and flexible and ready at a moment’s notice. Of course, sometimes I worry about the quality versus the quantity, but still – this is a problem I want.

So do I write about the date I went on with the nutty leftist extremist two nights ago? Or the black tie event I attended tonight where my boss and his wife and I talked smack all night? Or my ongoing realizations as to what happens when I am unapologetic about who I am?

I choose door number one. Because once upon a time, I had a laundry list of what I wanted in a man. It was long, detailed, and there were a number of non-negotiables, one of which was politics. And while being with someone whose politics are aligned with mine is still important to me, I’m realizing that arbitrary decisions (like, the one I made about never having sex with someone who voted for Bush) just don’t always work. It always makes me sad how religion can separate people, but I’m realizing how extremism in any form has the same effect. So I went on this date with someone whose politics were completely in line with mine, but I couldn’t bear his assumption that that was the case. We’re not even into the first drink and he’s ranting about how “petrol” is the greatest evil, except for maybe being “slave to the dollar” was the greatest evil, and on and on about his “love of the earth” affects all of his choices, and how “weed makes the world a better place” and on and on and on- I’m really not doing it justice, but my brother Sean would have HATED him because he’s one of those liberals who lack nuance or reason, and Sean hates those folks more than just about anyone. I mean, he was largely right on, but what if I had been a moderate or a conservative? How dare he assume that a) I’d have the same views as him and b) that politics was ALL I wanted to talk about?

He also lacked curiosity. In two hours, he might have asked two questions, both based on information that I managed to slip in while he was talking about backpacking through South America. I mean, once upon a time, this guy might have been someone who would have lit my fire, and instead, it was all I could do to try to find a gracious way to leave. I’m very busy, I love my friends who I’d sacrificed seeing to get a drink with this guy, and I wanted OUT.

But instead of fleeing, I pushed back. I went outside, took a deep breath, went back into the bar, and asked him why he would assume that I share his politics. I told him he seemed very extreme in his views, and that I thought that was dangerous because you cannot have a rational conversation with someone when your panties are always in a bunch. (I should know- I’m the one who is usually retarded about politics.) I told him that more than ever, it was important to be curious, important to listen, important not to be so damn divisive because no one on either extreme side is ever going to listen to each other, and that is bad. I told him I agreed with most of what he said, but that his delivery was dangerous and based on assumptions.

And it was if no one had ever said these things to him before. He was fascinated. (Cue Michelle inwarding rolling eyes so hard they hurt.) I’m not going to meet him again, because I don’t have the time or energy to fight this particular battle, and even a friendship with him would be exhausting. Also, even going on this date was perfunctory, done because I thought I should, not because I was excited about it. But it reminds me how rarely people really talk to each other, really listen, really take the time to challenge and question.

Then, tonight, I poured myself into an extemely tight dress and went to a black-tie function. I don’t know which night was less fun.

I spent a wonderful day with my friend Rachel today, a perfect way to cap off a rather extraordinary weekend. I really think I’d be more productive if all weekends lasted three days. Or, I’ll tell myself that, and keep pining for such a shift to happen.

We wandered around the town of Albany, which is right next to Berkeley, and then we headed into the city and didn’t even get too terribly lost. We decided we needed two things: fish and chips, and to see the sea lions, so we went to the uber-touristy Fisherman’s Wharf.

this pic taken immediately after fish, chips, beer, and clam chowder… oy…

and then off to see the sea lions and the city at dusk.

It was a peaceful, most excellent day, even though we spent a great deal of our time together discussing all the various complications in our lives. Nothing, really, in my life, is set in stone, nothing is certain, and while I suppose it’s been that way always, I think I’m starting to become more aware of it, and perhaps more curious as to what it means. And why I’ve chosen it to be that way. And wondering if I want it to change.

But anyway, back to Lucy! I’ve not written about the delights of the time I spent in her company over the holidays, mostly because just thinking about her makes my whole chest ache with longing to be near her. She’s really tightly bonded to Tessa right now- reluctant to have anyone else take her for any extended period of time, and it’s amazing how aware she is. If we tried to distract her with toys or spoons or even our own silly faces, she’d smile and play along but only as long as mom was within eyesight. Perhaps the greatest gift I got this Christmas, though, was Lucy’s willingness to spend time with me. I got to feed her Christmas eve, right before the big family dinner, and the mere trust she had that when she opened her mouth, I’d be there with some tasty green glop, and if she looked to my face, I’d be there to smile and kiss her, was about all I needed for it to be a terrific holiday.

There were rooms of forgiveness
In the house that we shared
But the space has been emptied
of whatever was there

There were cupboards of patience
There were shelfloads of care
But whoever came calling
Found nobody there.

After today
Consider Me Gone

In lieu of the things on my mind, I quote Mr. Gordon Matthew Sumner, who recently found his way back to me.

And a few pics:

My dad in the AWESOME smoking jacket that my sister Melissa gave him for xmas…

And yours truly, the librarian (these are for you, Warrior):

(Note no toothy smiles. Because I HATE wearing glasses. This last one was taken at work when I was dreaming of drinking beer in the sunshine, rather than, you know, working for a living)

Last night I dreamt I was waiting tables again. It was the “Server’s Nightmare”, not unlike the Actor’s Nightmare, which every actor has actually had (and, of course, there’s a play about it as well). In the Actor’s Nightmare, the actor suddenly finds himself onstage, in the middle of play, but he doesn’t know any of his lines, and doesn’t even know what play he’s in. In the Server Nightmare (any many of us have had this one too), suddenly, you are on the floor, in the middle of service, but you don’t know which tables are yours, you don’t know what course anyone is on, you don’t know what’s supposed to be happening, but there are hundreds of people clamoring for you and you can’t escape. That was my dream last night, except it was all the worse because I was me now but I was back to waiting tables. It was horrible.

And then today, my mom got in a really bad car accident. In real life. She’s totally fine, the car is totally totaled, and I just feel so incredibly far away.

I feel torn and scared about many things in my life. I mean, I’m thankful that I have these sets of problems, versus sets of problems I’ve had in the past and I’m sure I’ll have in the future, but it’s still scary. Although I have to say I do feel extremely present, extremely aware, extremely- if you’ll forgive me- alive. But my heart has been racing for what feels like days now and I can’t seem to slow it down, because things keep coming my way to make it go nuts.

You know, it’s crazy. I’m sitting here thinking about everything I’m feeling and I realize it’s growing pains. Twice in the past couple of months, I’ve begged certain people to stop telling me about the things they care about, because I felt like I couldn’t care deeply about one more thing. I care so much about my family, about my close friends, about my coaches, about my organization, about the arts in my community, about the new foster care center and all the kids I’m working with there, about the state of this country, about the victims of all of last year’s disasters, you know, blah blah blah, and it seems like the more you care about things, the more you realize there is to care about. And it’s like I don’t know how to control it, I don’t know how to pick my battles. Or I don’t know how to graduate my care, assign it levels, at least when it comes to the amount of time I spend on any thing in a given day. And twice, when someone started to tell me about YET ANOTHER THING that I was clearly going to care about, my heart started racing and I begged them to stop. Because I honestly thought my heart would burst, in a totally bad way.

But then, if I sort of give myself time, I find that my heart didn’t burst, it stretched just a little bit. Ye gods, crucify me for this silliness if you must, but it’s like I’m able to internalize that one more thing just a tiny bit, without getting totally overwrought, and I find that I can care about all sorts of things, I just can’t *do* something about every single one of them.

Boy howdy, am I glad it’s a three-day weekend coming up. In the meantime, it’s 8:30, and I’m going to go to bed.

About a month ago, I figured out that I can’t really save the world if I have to stop and clean my contacts, so I’ve decided to swallow my fears (and a fair amount of debt) in order to get eye surgery. It’s all still pretty confusing to me how it works- I mean, I understand that they cut a flap of my eyeball and then squirrel around in there and then replace the flap, or somesuch other ridiculous thing- but if it means I don’t ever have to buy contacts again (or at least not for a decade or so), if it means I don’t have to put a small plastic disk onto my eyeball just to function every single day, the it’s worth it.

The first misconception about LASIK is that it’s become cheap. WRONG. There are hacks up and down the country willing to do it for about $500 an eye, but do you want a hack near your eyeball with a laser? Nope, not me. I’m going to the highest-rated doctor in the Bay Area, someone who has successfully sliced the eyeballs of three different people I know. The cost? Just under $5000. I don’t know if that really works out- I doubt I’d spend that much money in the next ten years on eye exams and contacts, but maybe. And considering the events I’ve missed, the hours lost, because of a dropped contact or the lodging of a plank between my contact and eyeball, it is well worth it. And as I said, I can’t save the world if I have to stop to buy saline solution. So LASIK it is.

I had my first doctor appointment before the holidays. The doctor I’m seeing for the first two appointments is the referring doctor, not the slicer, but he also came highly recommended. He’s young, mildly handsome, very well coiffed, and minced no words. He turned down the lights, handed me the thing shaped like a flat ice cream scoop and asked me to put it over my left eye. Even with my contacts in, I could barely make out the top line on the wall. Next, the scoop went over my right eye, and then I was lost. Even so, he said that he was stunned that I could see as well as I did, considering a) the amount of guck on my contacts (gross!) and b) how massively misshapen my left eye is (oh, astigmatism, how delightful thou art not). I asked him if I needed a new contact prescription, and he said no, that I was seeing as well with these as I could see with anything else.

Then he popped out my contacts, and the quiet terror set in. I can’t stand being blind, even if it’s to sit and talk to a doctor for fifteen minutes. He spent a fair amount of time running all the usual tests (including putting that yellow crud into my eyes to check for various problems). At the end, he told me I was the candidate (because of the size of my pupils) for the most advanced type of LASIK. It doesn’t cost any more, but apparently they shoot about a billion fragments of light into your eyes, which is measured by a laser, which makes the surgery even more precise.

Finally, we were almost done when he dropped the bomb. “Now, before your next appointment, you’ll need to take out your contacts and leave them out for three weeks. You have a good pair of glasses, don’t you?” I think the horror on my face was crystal clear, because he backed up and said, “Okay, how about two weeks? We can’t go any further until we test your eyes again, and we can’t test your eyes until you’ve not worn contacts for at least two weeks.” I told him I’d see him two weeks after New Years, that there was no way in bloody hell I was going to wear glasses on my vacation.

So here I am, one week into wearing my glasses. And I’m utterly miserable. I hate that there is this thing, hanging on my face, this metal contraption that makes me feel all walleyed. I hate that I have no peripheral vision. I feel like I can’t really see people, that I can’t really connect- how could I? There’s a metal thing on my face! And to be honest, it makes me feel shy, and odd. I’m scared I’ll step on them, but at the same time, I want to jump up and down on them, smashing them to pieces. I don’t feel like myself. A friend, trying to console me, told me I look like a hot librarian. But I don’t want to look like a hot librarian, I want to look (and more importantly, FEEL) like me, which I don’t. It’s strange how strongly I’m reacting to these glasses.

My next appointment is a week from today, where Mr. Mildly Handsome will dilate my eyes, and where I’ll finally be able to reinsert the dreaded plastic discs one more time. And, if all goes well, I’ll be able to set the date for my pre-surgery exam down in Berkeley, where the slicing will take place.

And yes, I’m terrified of the complications, and uncomfortable with the debt, but it is still 100% worth it. Just to be able to wake up, and see. And to be able to save the world.

Sometimes I’ll be sitting in a room, and I’ll look around, and I’ll be struck by how beautiful everyone is around me. This doesn’t happen often, but when it does, it’s intense, and wonderful, and warm. It’s one of the few times that I actually relax, that I actually let go, because somehow I’m able to include myself in that feeling- if everyone here is beautiful and good, I must be beautiful and good!- and it is a profound and delightful feeling.

Today, at work, I was walking to my car, thinking about a number of things- a voicemail I got today, the dinner I had last night, an evening I had a couple of weeks ago, and I suddenly felt that way about every man in my life. I had a rare and gorgeous moment of loving, loving, loving every man I know. Everyone from my boss, who is so committed to me, to my dad, who left me the sweetest voicemail about my work with the Red Cross, to my brothers, who were each separately awesome over Christmas, to the man I had dinner with last night, to the man I talked with yesterday, to my dear friend Jon who made me laugh so hard during our Holiday dinner, to Matt who loves Elizabeth so much- all of you absolutely gorgeous men. I haven’t always had good men in my life, and it is so nice, so refreshing, so exhilarating to look around and feel love.

So this short little blog goes out to all of you- all of you who took time this last week, however little time, in however ways large and small- to let me know that I matter to you. I’ve made a lifetime of making a lot happen with very little, but this week, you have all filled me. Thank you.