Brain Tumors and CNN - Beware! One Leads to the Next! OR "Hoarders: Brain Edition"

Hello Fellow Travelers!

You have undoubtedly noticed that I have a peculiar talent for trivia retention.  If I saw it or heard it anyplace and if it's a completely useless factoid  I probably  know it, or know where to find  out whatever "it" purports to be.  How often am I correct?  In over 20 years I've never been wrong once, The PS doggedly checks my answers every time he asks me a question. ( Which begs the question:  why ask me the "who-was-in-that" anyway if you're just going to look it up?  Just to confirm my staggering knowledge of all things  small?  I mean really small, like "Tiny Elvis" small.  But that's another story!)

One of my literature professors said my brain was a steel trap.  Where pop culture trivia is present I think of my head more like a lint filter in the dryer - anything trivial sticks!  I remember great stories and paintings, but I also remember the name of the dude Deborah Foreman dumped for Nicholas Cage in "Valley Girl".  I know tons of crap like that.  Tons.  Well, maybe not tons but a lot, too much for a normal brain let alone an "Abbey Normal" one!

What is the #1 activity in Hospital rooms and bedrooms across the country?  TV watching, of course!  You might not share a language in physical therapy but everyone likes baseball!  And kittens!  And puppies playing baseball!  This is America!  We have all that.  And as Americans, we want to share it with the world.  Or anybody we might risk sharing an awkward silence with.

And what does hours of CNN do to a brain already dizzier than Dorothy's spinning house?  I'll tell you!  The lint still gets collected! Even Anderson Cooper, the Silver Fox, falls onto my radar (Have you heard him giggle?  He sounds like a little girl!  It's so cute!)  CNN just makes the lint in my brain collect faster and thicker.  More "facts"?  My brain was already a neverending episode of "Pop-Up Video!  More "facts" I don't need!  And yes, I've turned "off" the TV but it doesn't matter, the trivia seeps through the computer, the phone or the nearest device (Which Keach is Jane Seymour married to?  James.  Stacey and James Keach are brothers who played brothers who were outlaws with the Carradine brothers...)  I could go on for days.  But you get the picture, Arby's says, "We have the meats,"  Well, I have the trivia!  Just ask!  The problem is, what am I going to do with all this trivia? Wait, I have an idea!  "Hoarders:  Brain Hoarding - when your brain has too much useless information sticking in your head!  Next week on AC 360/CNN".

Why Van Halen Will Make Me Walk Again!!

Hello Fellow Travelers!

Another week has come and gone and I'm becoming more impatient to get moving and get out of my own head.  I have always preferred standing to sitting, walking to riding, pedaling rather than driving.  So being unable to walk, is probably the nastiest condition to deal with, for me.  I have every confidence that I just have to try the right solution, and I'll be running all over the place!  In the meantime, sometimes I get "parked" places, which is both surreal and hilarious!

For instance, one thing my PS (Patient Spouse) does routinely is practice his guitar, which I generally adore.  He was on a Beatles tear until recently when he rediscovered his electric axe and the guitar solos of one Mr. Edward Van Halen.  The timeless classics of Lennon & McCartney can be replayed endlessly on an acoustic guitar. Electric guitar and  Van Halen? - not so much.  VH is loud, in your face and very 80's.

As a 3P (perpetually parked person) I'm used to withstanding all manner of audio/visual input.  I don't like VH the same way "Sam-I-Am" didn't care for the colored eggs and pork.  I don't care what decade it was or which lead singer they were on, I don't ever need to hear Van Halen again!  So imagine how much I was loving life when I heard the electric intro to "Eruption" over and over!

When you're unable to walk, you're stuck!  You're virtually a potted plant.  A complaining potted plant, but a plant nonetheless.  Once you're "parked", you're really parked.  Being eye level to everyone's rear is bad enough.  So is wearing a wheelchair!  I don't need to be subjected to noise ala "Clockwork Orange" - I have more than enough to deal with!

I beat brain cancer just so I could see David Lee Roth run all over a stage in Spandex?  I can't.

How Brain Cancer Made Me Cheap! Or a Hillbilly, I'm Not Entirely Sure Which!

Hello Fellow Travelers!

I suffer greatly from the "Rip Van Winkel" syndrome,after having brain surgery in 2011.  What I mean by that is my knowledge of the world and it's trends stopped short when I checked into the hospital!  (Or was rushed to an OR, with sirens!)  Everything from the pricepoint of food and clothing or a gallon of milk  along with home prices and the cost of shoes is based (for me) on what I saw in 2011.  Those prices have not adjusted  upward at all.  Certainly, my memories of '11 pricing have not kept pace with inflation. So "Holy Sticker Shock, Batman!"  My PS finds my dated recollections of objects and how much they cost humorous and slightly quaint.  Like he's thinking  I'm thinking, "Back in the old days, before new-fangled things like smart-phones came along, a gallon of gas was $ .75!"  Like, "Awww!  Isn't that cute?"  and "Gee, her brain is really damaged!" And, "See, I told you!  That's why I handle everything financial!"

The world and all it's associated costs will forever be priced in 2011 for me!  And you know what?  I'm inclined to leave the prices in 2011!  I'm getting  really cheap!  I've never been cheap before and I'll always reward superior service, but I am regularly gobsmacked by how much regular, boring, junk costs now!    What effect this annoying-yet-inevitable upswing in the price of everything from plane tickets to graham crackers has on me is that I never cared much about it and this petty unilateral increase just reinforces my conviction that money is simply a tool.  And one I'm not very adept at using.  When I was a kid, I'd buy things in foreign countries and haggling over the price (which is expected) was so unbearable for me I couldn't do it!  I've more always been uncomfortable talking about money, now more than ever!  In fact, it's always been one thing I've been only too happy to relinquish all control of all financial decisions to the PS.

I look at things (gadgets and cookies mostly) online and the prices seem a little less egregious, on the computer.  It's a lot easier to just not think about it, ignore the items altogether as unnecessary and useless.  So, the increase in the cost of everything should really come as no surprise to me. After three years the price of everything will undoubtedly rise.  Instead of reacting with my usual "Whatever.", I refuse to accept the inevitable, dogmatic increases in sundry goods.  I'm turning into Larry David.  "What, $4.00 for a cup of coffee?  I don't think so!"  I refuse to pay!  I'd rather think about paintings or look at a star.  Or think about a tulip. Something stunningly beautiful. Anything other than ponder the rising of the "filthy lucre".

It Was The Best of Times - Really, it was!

Hello Fellow Travelers!

As I suffered through yet another advertisement for "comfortable and discreet catheters", ("Why Sesame Street is worthwhile viewing!  Or "Why I love the Cookie Monster") it occurred to me:  Nothing "small" or "ordinary" ever seems to happen to me.  I don't get "Crohn's Disease or "gout" or anything cured by Humira.  No, I get a brain tumor! And it was huge!  And it  hurt!  A lot!  Once it was skillfully removed from my brain, (Thank You, HA!), I didn't recover in a year.  I'm still not "recovered".  But I am "cancer free", whatever that means.    I am reborn!  I have never been as impaired (I'm blind/unable to walk or speak) but you know what?  I feel great!  Never better!

And I'm still changing, physically, every day. I'm a little lighter, a little stronger.  Any source of discord I can't tolerate.    I don't waste a second thinking about anything negative.  Every day I wake up planning how I can be better for my family. I only consume water.  Nothing darker than clear. My glass is completely full.  I work on the weights and machines with unflagging energy and purpose.  I have nothing but joy in my heart and a light in my mind's eye.  I'll keep working for neuroplasticity until I find it, and then I'll work even harder!  PS is plainly in awe of my "mutation", he goes running and barks at my form on the equipment at the gym, I focus on relearning all my basic skills and getting stronger and he focuses on everything else.

And that's OK.  My PS reminds me of Pai Mei, Uma Thurman's "old-school" karate master in the Tarantino movies.  Pai-Mei would smack Uma over the head every time she made a karate error with his stick.  And by the end of their Kung Fu montage, the smacking had stopped and Uma and Pai Mei were training together.  Eventually her wily master's lessons would save her over and over.

Likewise,  my PS is trying to make me stronger, longer.  And it's working!  We can see it!  I am no longer drowning in excess skin like a really weird chicken!  I've developed lots of new muscles.  I can do things I've never been able to do before.  I'm profoundly glad just to be alive!  And endlessly grateful to my PS even if I can't say it.   His knowledge of science and innate bossiness have proven invaluable in this process!  Like Beatrix Kiddo getting trained by Pai Mei, I don't ask any questions and just go with it!  This is a temporary situation, and the lemonade aspect I've created (or lemon snaps!) is the way I "embrace the suck" on this journey.

Getting through this is what I'm supposed to do!  It might be insignificant in the grand scheme but success post-cancer is all I hope for.  That, and quality baked goods.  I always hope for those...