the quiet revolution

Toni was sick and tired of feeling sick and tired. There wasn't much she could do about that though; the doctor had said it would be another two weeks or so until she began to feel normal again. At least there was one big positive to come out of this whole thing, she thought, being that Graves' Disease sounds far more ominous than it is. The shock on peoples faces when she informed them of the diagnosis hasn't ceased being funny yet. It's also been a great excuse for sleeping in, and Toni had been exploiting that to the full, arriving late to work every day since.

She did wonder how much it all was truly affecting her. Some days she felt perfectally ok and others she could barely drag herself out of bed. After a rough week last week Toni somehow managed to haul herself off to a rave on Saturday night and not come home until 5 o'clock in the morning. Sure she'd felt pretty ordinary for the next few days, but seeing Infected Mushrrom playing live was worth every ache and exhausted day afterwards. Mind you, Toni always has been stubborn, so pushing her body further for a night of fun is completely in character. Her only concession to illness was staying sober for the night, though that was made up for on Sunday night with no restraint shown towards a nice pinot.

As much as she hated to admit it, Toni knew at heart that ill health was knocking her around. Sometimes the little things did it, like being put back on anti-depressants to manage the symptoms. The hardest thing to take though was that she'd been so close to good health. After several years of frequent illness and chronic stress the girl was finally getting on top of things. Truth be told, Toni hadn't felt this fabulous in five years or so. How cruel it then was to slip back down again to serious illness, and how bleak the promise of a life-time of medication.

Currently, our girl's just taking each day as it comes. Some are not so good, but on the whole she's fine and most certainly life could be worse. Her work has been extraordinarly supportive, thoguh the finances less so since she ran out of sick leave. She's been spoiling herself too, with bright bunches of chrysanthemums, cheese and chocolate. She's been spoiling the boy as well, of course, as he's had too many late nights giving massages and cuddles and keeping insomnia company. He's done the dishes an awful lot too, as Toni's been quite the demon in the kitchen lately. Cooking makes her feel better, it requires enough mental attention to be distracting without being draining and provides a creative outlet. Best of all it means she gets to eat all sorts of delicious goodies, though consequently she's running out of clothes that fit.

The week is short and she's grateful for it when every day seems uncannily long. Outside of work her hours are filled with blood tests, trips to the doctor and physio, though at least her back has stopped hurting now. Don't worry, she's still spending hours in front of the computer (too much of it spent incompetenly "fixing" a hardware problem that crashes Photoshop) and relaxing. Toni's decided she needs a little time away from alcohol though. She hasn't had a hangover in over a year, but it's the frequency that's caused concern and when a week without is the the biggest break in a while, drinking needs addressing. (I assume I've alluded that she adores aliteration earlier.) Perhaps she imbibes like her user-name a little too frequently. Regardless, she feels a respite can't do her any harm and added alcohol to her list of (temporarily) banned substances.

The main thing is that our girl and her boy are ok. The novelty of rubbing his fuzzy head had not yet worn off, though he's not complaining. All this health concern has provided an excellent distraction from the demands of university (her boy's been a bit of a slack bastard), but he'll still get full marks from her.

Not long past 4 am, time stood still for a moment. The black edifice of the city rising against burning promise of dawn while the moon lingers full and heavy, in deep communion with the mountain. A three-note call rings out again and again, above the rumble bringing the Monday commerce, and is answered from beyond the undefinable. Deu-lou-dee, deu-lou-dee, endlessly rising and falling, then the sky breathes and the day proceeds.

On Saturday the sky came down, sudden in its heaviness, and we watched in quiet worship of the water gathering, pooling up and spreading over the browning world. All day we sung the praise of the rain in our primordial rebirth; hummed with the voice and wings of thousands set free by the warm arpeggio of rain. In the morrow the air thickened, interminable until the fading memory of March. ( Read more... )