Winterfall

                        Dancing lady ginger, Globba winitii Na 'Āina Kai Kauai

Lord, y'all. I suck. The most productive thing I've accomplished all month, probably, was donating blood yesterday. Back in my swimming days I was an amazing donor. Now my veins are kind of shot (thanks, likely, to the understood vesicant nature of both phenytoin and diazepam), but generally after a prod or two they can get er done. I used to be deferred fairly often for low iron, but a phlebotomist tipped me off to eating cream-of-wheat the night before, some years ago, and I haven't been staved off for anemia since.

The blood folks reach out to me regularly since I'm O+ (reminder to self- see, something in me is positive right now!) and despite that pesky Rh factor, they seem to quite enjoy the 'O' types. So, I'd agreed to a set appointment time the day before. Until then my hair had been in a singular, twisted dreadlock for a week or two. It's cold and dark here already - easy to get away with knotting in a bun and putting on a hat, so that's been the extent of my beauty routine. I didn't want to interface with any healthcare professional without washing and brushing my hair though, so la-dee-dah, I can rake a comb through the individual strands of mane now.

I got back about a week ago from a fairly spontaneous trip home (if a haole girl can call it home?) to Kauai where I was fortunate enough, once-upon-a-time, to attend be enrolled in high school (and graduate, somehow), and where my amazing dad and my antithesis-of-evil stepmother live. Things had leveled out fairly well seizure-wise prior to embarking on the trip, but I was still kind of meh, even after all these months since my ICU clusterflock. Also, my shoulder has been separated since August, so I knew i'd be somewhat less activity-equipped. I hoped that regardless, the warm weather, sunshine and family fix would be beneficial, nonetheless. It was, but may have done more to bring to light, rather than dry up, some bits of sadness, and seizures, and shit, which I guess could be a whole post of its own, if i ever get to it.

So, leave it to me to complain about a trip to Hawaii. I still haven't drummed up much on the work front. I did get a few killer offers while on island, which feels great, but realistically... I don't know. I don't know anything. I'd still love to finish telling you about how whacked things turned out to be the weeks following my jailbreak from the hospital, but it's still kind of a muddled smudge of memories and basically petulant drivel.

I did, however, get a new dog. Sheesh. My sister arranged it all. I was, of course, reluctant once it all came to light. We knew we wanted some overlap with Olive, so she can be a positive influence. She came from the humane society down in Boise, and had been identified as a smart girl with service dog potential. She is very smart, but as i expressed to my sister early on, I need a good dog; not necessarily the smartest dog. Ha. Poor Jen (my sister). There will never be another Olive. We both expected a mellower new pupper, though, she's only just a year now. She listens *great*, but she's a handful (zoomies for daaaaaaaaaays). She's a retriever mix of sorts; we think maybe some whippet as she's fairly slight and made to run, but could be springer, setter or saluki for all I know. She's 43 pounds and they don't expect her to get much bigger, which is great by me.

New dog, Tater

I wish I could say i've been getting up with her every day (as she deserves) and jogging a few miles these nice winter/fall mornings, and making the most of my unemployment time, but with the exception of a day or two, of actually fucking rallying, i mostly haven't even got my ass dragged out the door until after noon. I'm depressed. The dogs are good sports about it though, thank goodness. I'm not totally debilitated and do get them out every day eventually. I've been going to counseling. I really don't want to take any other medications on top of the seizure drugs, especially since I'm still stuck right now at the higher doses, and they're plenty mood-altering. I don't really know what else to do. I know I probably need to get more connected and engaged or something, but for me that shit (commitment in general?) can also be stressful and daunting. (Is that a cop-out? Yes. Am I a schmuck? Totally.) Right now i'm feeling anything but brave.

I meet up with my sister and/or friends every now and then, but mostly my days consist of venturing to the grocery store when we run out of one or more of the basics and hitting the trail or a park in between. One of my main concerns was the logistics of getting anywhere with two dogs, but Tater has taken great to running alongside the bike while Olive rides in the cart. She seems to do fine waiting patiently at the racks until the old trusty doggo and I have wrapped up the shopping. Not sure how it's all going to work out in the end, but it's been fairly entertaining in the meantime. Oh, and she is very sweet.

Forgive my absence again. I guess I'm loathe to come and merely complain, but then again, when things are great, I sort of hate to come and gloat about that too. An ungrateful curmudgeon of sorts, I suppose.

Thank you for you. I've been reading and loving you as a fly-on-the-wall from both Idaho and Hawaii, but have dropped the ball in the comments. I over-think everything and words are hard sometimes. Your pictures and stories and tirades are sustenance, though, in these aimless, lonely days.

Love and gratitude from cold and dark North Idaho.