Wednesday, September 25, 2019

King of Pain, King of Life





Been on a Police kick lately. In my world, that stuff is all still fresh and new. What's forty years across the human musical timescape? Blink of an eye. Maybe you have to be olden to take this perspective, but maybe being olden brings a lot of rich reward. Copeland sure has some interesting interviews up on the interwebs as well.



As I've mentioned before there were aspects of my 2019 summer existence which really sucked. One of the major ones was physical pain. To recap that, I managed to grow a benign tumor deep in my pelvis. It had been growing for some while and eventually began pushing my lumbar spine out of line and smooshing some of the lumbar nerve roots, causing lots of pain.

Sting was writing about a different kind of pain, but his words can be useful for anyone facing pain. Well, in my opinion anyway. This summer I had the pain of loss and the pain of pain. Today, as I write this on September 25, 2019, I find the composition, melody, and lyric quite uplifting. There is no life without pain. But life isn't only pain, and pain has a wonderful way of framing the rest of experiential living. What quality of pleasure and enjoyment can one experience with nothing to scale it against, with nothing to provide scale, context, perspective? How can such visceral, beautiful music arise except from the ashes of suffering?



Don't get me wrong (if I'm looking kind of dazzled -- old people rock, even if like me they're mostly a bunch of dickheads!), pain sucks and isn't enjoyable. But it can be formative and forging, and since none of us can avoid it, my thought is that we're all well advised to make the best use of it. The only other choice is to let it destroy us.

Yesterday a bunch of super people wielded the magical power of modern medicine in my behalf. They injected steroids into the tissue surrounding my smooshed lumbar nerve roots. My pain departed immediately, and as of this morning it's still gone. There's no way to tell the future so I have no idea if this is a one-shot, long term fix. Maybe yes, maybe no. There's some reason for optimism given the way my body's efforts to heal itself were trending, but only time will tell.

At the moment I'm pain free. I can walk without pain, and I've discovered that I've been altering my gait to compensate for the hurting, so now I've got to get my gait back to normal. A mere trifle.

So that's my deal for the day. Here's hoping that all of you kind readers are well and finding ways to revel in and enjoy your mortal existence.


12 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Feels so good when the ouch is gone!

      I'm hangin' in. Thanks for stopping by Sarge.

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  2. Well, that's a relief in more than one way. Glad you've at least taken steps to mitigate the issue. I'm deaf anymore, so I don't even bother trying to listen to music, as about all I hear is the bass line... Get better, and take care of yourself!

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    1. I'm very fortunate indeed, to have access to first world medicine and be able through knowledge and experience to actively help rather than harm myself.

      I'm much more deafer than the young people, many of whom look at me and shake their heads when they notice me listening to over-blasted old music. They'll find out someday!

      Thanks for stopping by!

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  3. By gum, I thought I was stopping by every day; but I missed yesterday's post. Bird watching is something I have taken more interest in as I have gotten older. Large birds are especially fun to watch.

    I hope that the pain thing has been brought under control; life is no fun at all when one is in constant pain. Not to mention how it impacts one's daily tasks, especially those you have.

    Thanks for the post.
    Paul L. Quandt

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    Replies
    1. I think the birdwatching is a very human thing. Especially in England.

      Pain's no fun, but it can be an opportunity for growth too. Also, feels so good when it's gone!

      Thanks for stopping by Paul.

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  4. On the topic of things that fly, the USAF wants to upgrade the 115th Fighter Wing, based at Truax Field, in Madison, from F-16s, to F-35s. If course, Madison being Madison, there are groups in Madison that want the money spent of F-35s to be spent on Global Warming, and the ANG keep flying F-16s built in the 1980s.
    I say, let the Air National Guard have their F-35s.

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    1. Local school children and teachers and government workers should be sending in their pennies to fund the new (ahem) "fighters."

      They might also check out some of the great deals down at Famous Davis' in Tucson. I understand they have some very clean, low mileage F-86D's for a very good price and with nice in-house financing. Eighty-six is bigger and better than thirty-five, right?

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  5. I hope the steroids make your relief permanent!

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    Replies
    1. Me too. So far so good!

      Thanks for stopping by Scott.

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  6. I hope that you can keep the pain at or below the level of irritant. If it doesn't keep you from doing those things that you want to do and doesn't make you wish that you didn't have to do those things that you have to do, you are in good shape. Welcome to the aging process. Just keep getting older and you will be fine. Mark

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    Replies
    1. Lots of wisdom in those words. Thanks for stopping by Mark.

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