My bones ache. No, it is not muscles. It feels like bones. I first noticed the condition in August. I awoke mid-August and felt an unusual symptom: the bones (tibia and fibula) ached in the lower part of my right leg. I couldn’t classify it as pain. Instead, it was ‘moan.’ Maybe it was ‘moaning.’ Sure, I have sleep disturbances from back pain and sometimes radiculopathy (pinched nerve in the spine), but this was a ‘moan.’
Tag Archive: Faith and Doubt
A little past 6;12 PM, an Information Technology administrator and I exited the westside Chicago hospital. “Care for a drink?”
I nodded enthusiastically.
“I warn you; we have to get past some I.E.D.’s.” He wasn’t referencing the military term ‘I.E.D.’ (improvised explosive device). Instead, his version meant snaking our way through anti-vaxxer protests taking a few hospitals by surprise. “They’ll claim free choice,” pointing toward a small but vocal crowd, “but by blocking emergency services, people who require critical life-saving services are blocked from receiving it.” A ‘contradiction of theology,’ he noted. “One of them [unvaccinated and infected] might breathe in your face and ‘BOOM,’ you’re dead.” Some protests get weird.
I’ve seen many a hurricane in my day. First, super Typhoon Pamela (No, not an ex-girlfriend) produced typhoon-force winds for 18 hours and left 80% of the buildings in its wake. Then was Hurricane Andrew (No, not Gov. Cuomo). Hurricane’s Rita and Katrina, whose one-two punch devastated parts of the southern coast. Last was the remnants of Hurricane Sandy. Sandy flooded everything it touched, but mostly the shores of New Jersey and New York. The flooding was so bad that then-Governor Christie won the ‘I just wanna hug you award’ with then-President Barack Obama. Other not-so-large hurricanes spattered in and out of my life, but none produced lasting memories of those previously mentioned. If there’s one thing I regretted the most from my participation, it was thinking that unless I was strong, I was weak.
In December, multiple women alleged New York Governor of sexual harassment and or assault. The allegations varied between inappropriate comments, forced kissing and groping. For his part, Cuomo took issued a prerecorded video alleging no misconduct. Strangely, I can look at both Cuomo and the victims compassionately. This view is neither thinking in the light that Cuomo’s actions do not have some form of merit nor are justifiable. (Cuomo’s actions are indefensible). I also don’t take a strict form of religious interpretation by reiterating, “Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.” Instead, I look at Cuomo and say, “Cuomo is done. He cannot politically survive.”
One day, Tom Turcich decided to walk the world. He left in April 2015, and except for returning to the U.S. for recovery, obtaining visa requirements, and sitting out the pandemic, he’s continued to hike, covering 39 countries and approximately 19,000 miles. He’s posted many Instagram messages. A December 2016 Instagram message caught my eye, and then my heart.
When I was 16, my parents loaded our Southwind Motorhome and headed west for vacation. My brother and I were allowed to ride along, but I considered of myself only as an ‘accessory.’ “Hey, get me a beer.” “We need wood for the fire.” “Empty the ‘holding tank.” (‘Holding tank’ was a euphemism for ‘s*** tank.’ Since someone has to empty it, might as well get the cheap labor to do it.) Along the route to Glacier National Park (Montana), my father shrewdly traded two cartons of Kool Menthol cigarettes with an Native American for a personal guided tour of the original ‘Camp Disappointment.’ Camp Disappointment was the northernmost point reached by the Lewis and Clark Expedition (July 23, 1806). Lewis referred to the campsite as ‘Camp Disappointment,’ for it meant the expedition was unable to reach 50 degrees north latitude, which would extend the Louisiana Territory. I viewed Camp Disappointment more pragmatically.
I could not sleep last night, so I sat in a recliner from 2:30 to 4:00 AM staring into the darkness at nothing. There was no single thought percolating through my mind. There was no despair, no crying, or regrets—just acceptance. It was acceptance of what’s to come that my body provided warning signs of its declaration of impending death. Through all my life’s shame and successes, it comes to a moment of acceptance of all the mistakes, failures, and everything that regularly haunts me despite denying any such thoughts. And every night, I accept them. And every night, they return. The cycle repeats during only those hours of the morning. It is a time of love. It is a time of hate.
I don’t regularly listen to National Public Radio. In fact, in the past year, I can count the number of times spent listening to anything on NPR on one hand. Last week was either my fourth or fifth. While reaching down to grab something from my chair, I brushed the radio’s ‘on’ button. The NPR station began with the story, March 11th, 2020: The Day Everything Changed.
“A year into the coronavirus pandemic, the enormous changes in our lives have become unremarkable: The collection of fabric masks. Visits with friends or family only in small outdoor gatherings. Working or learning from home. Downtowns deserted at noon on a weekday.
While some changes happened gradually, there was one day [March 11th, 2020] that marked the beginning of the new normal.”
For a few minutes, I sat fixated as NPR host Marco Werman took the listeners through what changed. By all accounts, the World Health Organization formally declared COVID-19 a pandemic around March 11th, 2020. Since then, the magnitude of loss has been stunning. Today, nearly 120 million global COVID-19 cases and 2.6 million deaths later, I kept thinking of all that had changed. Sure, one could focus upon key political facts: Chinese officials actively blamed Americans for starting the virus while the Trump administration blamed China. Still, my focus narrowed. The question I asked myself was, “How has my life changed during the year of COVID?”