Instantaneous

Earlier I mentioned a Cocoa Beach webcam, which I visit on a daily basis so that I know how to feel.  If it’s a gorgeous day with the waves gently caressing the beach, I quietly denounce Ginger and stare at the live little square for a few extra seconds.  If it’s seaweedy or cloudy–or, even better, if there are actual drops on the camera lens– I shut down the window and am mightily smug.

I am doubtless blessed to have many homes of heart– but when I’m at one, I miss the others.  Teleportation needs to happen NOW.

beaming up at:  mbe@drinktothelasses.com

The Steps

Well, and now we talk about the panic.

As you well know, there is OCD in these parts, and when the chemical equilibrium is upset, as it has been these past several weeks, it rather enjoys crashing the serotonin party.  Sometimes the anxiety is general; sometimes it’s focused on one particular area of life, and sometimes, when life is particularly awesome, it lazers in on one totally humiliating, terrifying thing which clings and reappears like mildew, not matter how often it’s shot with bleach and left to die.

This one is particularly bad; just as when I was a teenager, the OCD has attacked my faith, which effectively removes that source of comfort from the equation.  Many of you have read about how this works in “The Waltz” or The Book!, but just in case you’ve encountered neither, come along with me on a delightful gondola ride through baseless panic:

FIRST STOP

THE TRIGGER:  Hear an author mention the prophecies of St. Malachi on a news show

SECOND STOP

THE PANIC:  OH HOLY CRAP WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE

THIRD STOP

THE RATIONALIZATION:  Search frantically for a shot of online comfort

FOURTH STOP

RINSE AND REPEAT:  Bounce between #2 and #4 until alseep or drunk

In my many webtacular wanderings during Stop 3, I read many admonitions along the lines of “We won’t know the day or the hour” or “Well, just have faith and be prepared.”  Right, okay– so the good children of God will go to heaven.  But as the OCD sees it, the problem there is that if we’re facing the end times, it’s going to suck.  Christ said it was going to suck. It’s like my surgery– I knew I’d come through it, but I was still dreading the absolute suckation in between.

Not to mention the positively terrifying messages surrounding a reported Marion apparition in Akita, Japan– apparently we’ve won ourselves fire falling from the sky, and “the survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.”  Well, ain’t that a holiday weekend.  I am an English major.  I am in no way equipped to survive a tribulation.

As the Church teaches that public Divine Revelation is done, Catholics are not compelled to believe in apparitions; if they’ve been approved, we are permitted to believe them, but the content isn’t part of the deposit of faith– all of which is a supremely tortured way of saying that it’s times like this in which I develop extreme jealousy for Protestant husband and the raft of Protestant in-laws he brought with him, who never seem to worry about these things.

I don’t blame the Church for this; it’s like blaming a gunshot victim in a driveby shooting.  It was there, it was a live target, and the OCD aimed.

In the meantime… where is my Percoset?

as always at:  mbe@drinktothelasses.com

Workout

I’m 75% of the way through with my physical therapy, and today’s great reward was bouncing on a trampoline.  It was one of those little ones, useful for jockeys, perhaps, or Jello mixing.  Or balancing on a recently chopped-up leg while a physical therapist hurls playground balls in the general direction of the brainpan.  But every time I completed a set, I was permitted to bounce with abandon, which the therapist patiently allowed because she knew full well that I’d last a grand total of seven seconds before wailing aloud, taking a rest, attacking the next round, and then bouncing again because maybe this time, my left menisci wouldn’t feel as if they were under attack by bees.

Then again, it’s more exercise than I’ve had in a month.  Currently the only cardio I’m cleared for is water walking, which, when I first heard about it, forced an assumption that I was assigned a physical task which demanded not only two good knees, but, you know, divinity.  Then I looked it up online and now I cram my hair up in a Speedo cap and take to the community center pool, where I grimly stride from wall to wall like a destroyer of worlds.  At least no one’s hurling anything at me.

splash at:  mbe@drinktothelasses.com

In Honor of the Fourth

Behold, a bunch of Australians in the production of a British operetta:

(If you’re not familiar with The Pirates Of Penzance, at this point in the action, these pirates who suck as pirates are trying to sneak into a house, and while they’re doing so they’re singing very loudly about how awesome they are at being quiet.  It’s quite possibly the greatest dynamics-related joke in all of opera.)

Okay, there are a few things going on here, not the least of which are purple tights.  Then there’s the drum machine, the altered orchestrations, enough over-the-topness to generate an email from Richard Simmons announcing his outrage, the fact that the lyrics are practically indecipherable without the libretto, and a synthesizer with a Not Quite Gilbert and Sullivan setting.

But the reason you’ve heard me wailing for Percoset over the past week is that it’s gone far, far away, and I am left with an empty bottle and old, non-wondrous Percoset antidepressants that don’t quite cover the cutoff gap.  It’s been awfully fun around here.

So you take amusement when it arrives from Netflix, and sometimes that comes in the form of pirate kicklines.  Someone out there on some good non-prescription stuff second me on this.

you’re welcome at:  mbe@drinktothelasses.com

And Another One

…What kind of Parrothead cannot stand margaritas?

sad, really at:  mbe@drinktothelasses.com

Contradictions

You gotta lotta time to think with your knee jacked up over your heart, listening to the tendons heal.

How is it that a German Catholic from the West side of Cincinnati cannot abide beer?

Why does a person with a mathematical learning disability develop a lifelong obsession with the space program?

What’s going on when the child who actively prayed for her appendix to burst so that she may legally leave class becomes a teacher?

Why would a horribly pale woman who can’t stand bugs or humidity and who very nearly failed Spanish move to Florida for five years, and then mope in front of a Cocoa Beach webcam for minutes on end after moving out?

How come the same person who writes scathing essays about unrealistic female body image stands in front of the dressing room mirror with half a swimsuit on and bursts into tears?

Why did the the girl once voted “Most Likely Future Nun” graduate from the sister school of the flagship of Catholic higher education and then marry a person who currently has Martin Luther’s Bible Concordance bedside?

How can a person who was born on the coldest day in the history of Cincinnati dread winter so deeply that a cold window triggers a panic attack?

Why do babies, even paper babies in a magazine, make me cry, but the thought of producing one also triggers a panic attack?

WHERE IS MY PERCOSET?!

just asking at:  mbe@drinktothelasses.com