Karl T.

Some personal stuff (that isn't my story to tell) happened last week, so I didn't get a progress report out. Quick summary: Within 400 steps of 80k. 63 and a quarter km. Blood sugar was good. Emotionally, the week was up and down. Thursday was a good visit with my cousin, a marvellous walk in SF, and a personal best step-count: 13,800.

For some reason, my phone has not generated a weekly summary for this week. Therefore, this post will not be as numbers-heavy. I did drop below step-count (now at 8k steps/day) once this week, but I did manage to average about 10k steps/day overall.

[Added on Monday: The auto-generated summary was a day late, but did arrive: Total 71.8k steps for the week, for an average of just over 10k/day. Total distance walked: 58.85 km, or 8.4 km/day.]

I had a really bad day on Thursday. That day, plus feeling pretty poorly physically, led me to leave Worldcon early, just for the comfort of sleeping in my own bed. I've been sniffling and coughing off and on since Friday, so I cancelled my trip up to see the family in Point Reyes -- I didn't want to get anyone else sick. I'm also going to stay out of the office(s) this week, until I feel like I'm no longer contagious.

On Saturday my blood sugar was all over the place (low: 65, high: 230) but I mostly kept at it, and was rewarded this morning by a reading of 117. Hard, frustrating, and being sick doesn't help. I need to postpone my therapy appointment because I still feel contagious and I don't want to get my behavioural psych sick, but I also need to get in and talk about this particular confluence of obstacles. I'll try to push for a week's postponement, to next Tuesday the 28th. With luck my lungs will be less funky by then.

Man, have I not missed the wheezy, chesty cough that comes with exercising too hard when my lungs are compromised. I'm hoping this clears up in reasonable time -- it's inconvenient and frankly gives me flashbacks to when I was in much worse shape than I am now.

Still here, still moving. Still scared. But I didn't stay in bed all day today, so that's something.

Onward.

I drove myself to Kaiser's emergency room at 2:30am on Saturday because I was having some chest pain that wouldn't let me sleep. I expected that they would prescribe me a heavy-duty antacid and send me away. However, once you utter the words "chest pain" in an emergency room, things start to happen very fast.

Once they did two EKGs, they arranged to have me packed into an ambulance and transferred to St Rose Hospital in Hayward, "because they have the best cardiologists around." That was when I clued in that this might be serious. Attempting jocularity, I asked the emergency intern, "Is this for the heart attack I had earlier without noticing it, or is it for the one that's in my very near future?" His reply was sobering: "It's for the heart attack that you're having right now."

Once we arrived at St Rose, they swept me straight to the cath lab, where a very animated and thorough cardiologist did what is called a "left-side catheterization" (or "left cath" for short.) I was awake for the whole procedure -- local anaesthetic took care of the entry point at my groin, and there wasn't any other pain. Feeling people fiddling around in my major blood vessels was very, very odd, but I wouldn't call it pain.

The cardiologist informed me in brisk terms that both my left-side cardiac arteries were between 98 and 99% blocked, and that they were going to balloon and stent them. "Fortunately, your right side looks like a superhighway -- clear all the way." So I spent 45 minutes or so getting my cardiac pathways roto-rooted, and spent about 24 hours subsequently at St Rose, 10 of them in ICU and 14 or so in a regular room.

And then, amazingly enough, they told me I could go. I have a spectacular bruise on my right groin, two new stents, and who knows how much billing hassle to go through, but the monster that got my grandfather at age 58 in 1970 did not get me at age 51.

So now I am home and safe, and I will be on blood thinners for the rest of my life, just like my grandmother was before me -- her heart attack was in 1988, when she was 75. She lived to be 90. And when she could finally feel the spring winding down, she sat down and wrote a note to her cardiac surgeon, thanking him for 14 wonderful years.

So for at least the next little while, I will be doing my very best to cherish every month, every week, every day that the cheerful cardiologist at St Rose has gifted me. Thanks, doc. You're brilliant.

It was lovely to see the parade walking down Market Street from the Castro. (I'm sure there are plenty of pictures floating around the Internet; I didn't feel the need to take any.) So many hopeful people.

I am thankful to be living and working where I am, and to be reminded that we can work together to make life more livable for one another.

If you have been marching, handing out flyers, agitating, and generally raising awareness about the right to marry and have one's relationships legally recognised: Thank you. You have my gratitude and my admiration.

[Anonymous commenting has been turned on for this entry; you don't need a DW account to comment. Please do sign your comments, however.]

Ten days ago, I was sitting in my mother's living room, listening to her tell stories about her mother and worrying about the pain she was in from a compression fracture in her spine that was not healing quickly enough to suit her, while a dear friend of ours was cooking for us.

A week ago, I was sitting at dinner with my wife and a friend, when I got a call from my cousin. She said, "We're at Sonoma Valley Hospital. Janet has leukemia."

Last night, just after midnight, I got a call from Marin General Hospital. My mother had slipped away in the night, sparing my cousin and me the agonizing decision of how to let her go when it was clear there was no hope.

This is what I wrote in the immediate aftermath:

If I have ever been gentle with you, ever been kind to you when you needed it, been a friend or a support or an ally to you, then raise your glass tonight and drink a toast to the woman who taught me how important it is that we love one another, that we keep one another as safe from harm and as cherished as we possibly can. Remember the good she has done in the world, and tell stories of it to your children and your loved ones. And go forth and make your love manifest in the world — love daringly, defiantly, completely and totally.

Thank you, Janet, for giving me life, and love, and for teaching me to cherish others as you have cherished me.

RIP Janet Roberta Barnes Thiessen. Born December 30, 1940, in Kentfield, California. Died June 13, 2012, in Greenbrae, California. Loving mother, devoted daughter, stalwart friend, passionate believer in justice and fairness, and all around hell of a human being.

Naps taken: 2.
Friends seen: 4.
Productive thoughts about interesting problems: a whole bunch.
Incidents of anxiety, anger or raised voices: 0.
Snuggles given and received: lots.

More like this, please.

Happy New Year, folks. Thank you, each and every one of you, for your friendship and your love. Last year was a rough one, and this one will probably be even rougher. Let's do what we can to keep one another out of the Slough of Despond, eh?

I have shaken hands with Ursula K. Le Guin. And had a few very brief, very meaningful (to me, at least) conversations with her. She was gracious, warm, very human.

Yeah, Potlatch was worth the price of admission.

I'm still floating; you can probably tell. All I can think of is "At least I got to tell her thank you, and know she heard me."

Thank you again to Molly and Mara for urging me to go. This was a lovely experience.

R. Scott Collins
Timothy Collins
Cheryl Collins Near
Thomas Chase
Mark Chase
John Hampson

Richard Hall
Theodore Ellis
Robert S. Toland

James Macdonald
Terry Karney
Bruce Cohen
ginmar
Markos Moulitsas Zuniga


Thank you for your service, and for your continuing commitment to making the world a better place.

I never knew how he did it. Maybe just his manner: all the good bits of Southern gentility, without the racism or pomposity. There were always at least four girls sitting with him at lunch, loudly razzing him, vying for his attention, or just soaking up his kindness. He didn't date much that year -- his sweetheart was a year older, already at college. But oh, how they loved him. And for one sweet, blessed year, I sat with them, trying like hell not to make a fool of myself as I learned what it was to be a gentleman.

They went with the other guy.

Turns out maybe I was right to be afraid to want it this much.

I'm sure it's a sign, but of what I don't know.

I've turned off comments on this entry for the moment, because I think I'll just crack wide open if I get expressions of sympathy. I may re-enable them later.

Thanks to each and every one of you for your good thoughts and vibes.

On edit: Comments now re-enabled. Thanks for your patience.