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Saturday 9: A Little in Love (1980)
3 hours ago
Showing posts with label changing seasons. Show all posts
Showing posts with label changing seasons. Show all posts
08 April 2015
13 January 2012
I Don't Want To Lose Him Yet
I'm feeling a bit gloomy, to say the least. The day started with rain and turned into one of those dreary winter afternoons smothered by cold gray clouds. And Charlie's getting sicker and sicker.
Back in the Spring, he'd lost some weight. I brought him to the vet, who said that his kidneys were slowing down. She prescribed a medicine that seemed to restore his appetitite and energy.
Now I've noticed that since Christmas, he lost even more weight than he did in the Spring. And he seems to be losing his energy even more precipitiously. The one good thing in this is that he always wants to be in my lap. And, when he does, I don't care about what I'm wearing, even if its a black wool skirt like the one I wore yesterday.
He was rescued from the street. I adopted him six years ago--a bit more than two years after I started my life as Justine. So he has been with me through my physical and emotional changes, as people and things have come and gone. He curled on, and cuddled, me every day of my recovery from my surgery. And he has rubbed his nose on, and licked, my hands, toes and face more times than I can count.
I'm going to stop now: I don't want to write his requiem just yet.
Back in the Spring, he'd lost some weight. I brought him to the vet, who said that his kidneys were slowing down. She prescribed a medicine that seemed to restore his appetitite and energy.
Now I've noticed that since Christmas, he lost even more weight than he did in the Spring. And he seems to be losing his energy even more precipitiously. The one good thing in this is that he always wants to be in my lap. And, when he does, I don't care about what I'm wearing, even if its a black wool skirt like the one I wore yesterday.
He was rescued from the street. I adopted him six years ago--a bit more than two years after I started my life as Justine. So he has been with me through my physical and emotional changes, as people and things have come and gone. He curled on, and cuddled, me every day of my recovery from my surgery. And he has rubbed his nose on, and licked, my hands, toes and face more times than I can count.
I'm going to stop now: I don't want to write his requiem just yet.
20 May 2011
Near The Finish Line
Been so tired this week. I've been reading papers practically non-stop when I'm not in my classes. None of it is really new: I have long known that I will have no life for much of May or December every year. However, I feel more tired than in years past. Maybe it's just because I'm getting older. Or it could be the long, cold, dreary winter and almost non-existent spring we've had.
But I feel something else is happening: This fatigue I'm feeling is the kind that comes when you're near the end of something and you're hoping that you have enough left in the tank, so to speak, to get you there.
But I feel something else is happening: This fatigue I'm feeling is the kind that comes when you're near the end of something and you're hoping that you have enough left in the tank, so to speak, to get you there.
03 April 2010
Healing In The Mist
I climbed the arc of the bridge from the Queens "mainland" to the Rockaway Peninsula, a long strip of land wide enough for only two roads that run its length. One skirts the bay; the other, the ocean. Between them is an elevated railway that's part of the city's tranist system.
However, I could see none of it from the arc of that bridge. I know it's all there only because I've cycled there so many times before.
Sunshine accented the thin, wispy clouds that streaked the sky as I left my apartment for my ride. But as I rode closer to the bridge, clouds gathered and thickened until the sky was overcast and the air filled with cold mist. I've spent enough time around seashores to know that, in spite of the dense sky, there was no danger of rain. The air and sky often grow gray--actually, almost silvery--by the ocean, especially at this time of year.
By the time I reached Rockaway Beach, a spring day had turned almost wintry. That's not unusual at this time of year, because even though the temperature reached 68 F (20 C) today near my apartment, the ocean temperature is still less than 40F (5C). That difference in temperatures was, of course, the cause of that mist that braced my skin.
For the past eight months, I've been keeping myself warm and have swaddled myself in soft, cushiony layers. That, I am told, is normal after surgery, even in the summer. And of course we are now just emerging from winter.
Still, I enjoyed feeling the cold mist against my face. I didn't even mind when it grew denser and became a fog thick enough that I could just barely see the railings, let alone the sand or the ocean, as I pedalled along the Rockaway Beach boardwalk, or that I could only see a couple of cars from the Wonder Wheel when I was asecending a ramp only a block away from it.
And I didn't mind that everything had turned gray, for it was a silvery, if not steely, hue. It was actually very pretty, especially when I could see ocean at Coney Island well enough so that I could see the white of foam dissolving into the silvery mist as the tide spilled onto the beach and rolled back into the sea.
The cold, gray and mist felt like a sort of healing. It may have had to do with the way it all felt against my skin: astringent, but not stinging, much less painful. It was as if something was leaving my body, and spirit and a kind of serenity, if not joy, was taking its place.
True healing is not all sunshine and rainbows and puppies and kittens. (And, yes, those are a few of my favorite things: No apologies to Julie Andrews, or John Coltrane!) It is uncomfortable at first but, once it's underway, bracing. And it opens as it cleanses; thus, one has to be willing to be opened in order to be healed. At least that's been true in my own life.
And my gender transition has been about healing myself from a number of things, including the scars from the sexual abuse I experienced as well as the ways in which I internalized, and expressed, the hate that was part of my life.
After those things, it's almost odd to say that I was healing from my surgery, as that was part of my healing.
However, I could see none of it from the arc of that bridge. I know it's all there only because I've cycled there so many times before.
Sunshine accented the thin, wispy clouds that streaked the sky as I left my apartment for my ride. But as I rode closer to the bridge, clouds gathered and thickened until the sky was overcast and the air filled with cold mist. I've spent enough time around seashores to know that, in spite of the dense sky, there was no danger of rain. The air and sky often grow gray--actually, almost silvery--by the ocean, especially at this time of year.
By the time I reached Rockaway Beach, a spring day had turned almost wintry. That's not unusual at this time of year, because even though the temperature reached 68 F (20 C) today near my apartment, the ocean temperature is still less than 40F (5C). That difference in temperatures was, of course, the cause of that mist that braced my skin.
For the past eight months, I've been keeping myself warm and have swaddled myself in soft, cushiony layers. That, I am told, is normal after surgery, even in the summer. And of course we are now just emerging from winter.
Still, I enjoyed feeling the cold mist against my face. I didn't even mind when it grew denser and became a fog thick enough that I could just barely see the railings, let alone the sand or the ocean, as I pedalled along the Rockaway Beach boardwalk, or that I could only see a couple of cars from the Wonder Wheel when I was asecending a ramp only a block away from it.
And I didn't mind that everything had turned gray, for it was a silvery, if not steely, hue. It was actually very pretty, especially when I could see ocean at Coney Island well enough so that I could see the white of foam dissolving into the silvery mist as the tide spilled onto the beach and rolled back into the sea.
The cold, gray and mist felt like a sort of healing. It may have had to do with the way it all felt against my skin: astringent, but not stinging, much less painful. It was as if something was leaving my body, and spirit and a kind of serenity, if not joy, was taking its place.
True healing is not all sunshine and rainbows and puppies and kittens. (And, yes, those are a few of my favorite things: No apologies to Julie Andrews, or John Coltrane!) It is uncomfortable at first but, once it's underway, bracing. And it opens as it cleanses; thus, one has to be willing to be opened in order to be healed. At least that's been true in my own life.
And my gender transition has been about healing myself from a number of things, including the scars from the sexual abuse I experienced as well as the ways in which I internalized, and expressed, the hate that was part of my life.
After those things, it's almost odd to say that I was healing from my surgery, as that was part of my healing.
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