In Sickness and In Health

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Earlier this week I went out into our near-deserted city for a doctor's appointment. Like many things in my life and part of my disposition, I have held to the same healing services for many years now. There are functional advantages to such stability; disruptions are exciting, they can be liberating, but they can also be dangerous. In most cases one wants the path of stability; on occasion, the path of disruption can be is necessary. One may suggest that here in Australia we've given up the relative stability of our social behavior to "disrupt" COVID-19, with the desired effect. I have, in many ways, been neglectful of seeking the art of the healers, and it is something that I am determined to be more attentive to in the future. There was a sublime beauty to the city that day, an emotional clash in the weather of coolness and warmth, all generating a perfect day, one that could even make the heart sing.

The song may end, but there's a malady that lingers on. Yesterday, I received the blood test results and for what is the first time in my life they are not good. Certainly, I have short-term illnesses in the past, minor infections and the like, but I have been blessed throughout my life with not just good, but even excellent health. But not now, and this is a systemic problem; I am outside the acceptable range for both liver enzymes and low-density lipoproteins, the latter which can lead to cardiovascular disease. How aesthetically appropriate that an evergreen romantic such as myself would be at risk of a disease of the heart! Nothing that a change in diet, exercise, and even alcohol consumption (as moderate as it is) cannot change, and indeed, must change. A necessary disruption to some deeply ingrained stability in my life.

But it never rains, instead, it pours. I have had cause for much elation and stimulation in my life this year, and when I look over my achievements and activities I can really have a sense of a quiet pride (a deeper love). But even a quiet pride comes before a fall, and no good deed goes unpunished. An old black dog has come to visit, one whom I have not seen for a multitude of years, and it does not bark, but rather howls its keening like a banshee. If there is any advantage to the visitation of this canine apparition, it is not an indiscriminate guard which howls at all and sundry, but rather a trained pointer which emanates its growls at very specific sources of deep dissatisfaction. I get the sense that it doesn't have any plans to leave me soon, and I know what that means: "In his autumn before the winter comes man's last mad surge of youth."

Comments

[motg]

Good luck! I cannot advise about the Black Dog, but I understand it visits without warning and outstays its welcome. I do not know if offering i metaphysical dog biscuits and throwing sticks for it is an option... but it might be worth a try.

(btw a close friend has been telling me for years his theory that I do suffer from the Black Dog. I think he's wrong. I'm just weary. He said that fatigue and overwork also look like depression.)

[ecosopher]

Sorry to hear about both the dog and the blood results. Glad the latter can be controlled, and hopefully the former too! It's a difficult time to be feeling unwell.

[fred_mouse]

:( Sympathies on the old black dog. I have an infestation of brain weasels, and it is making everything So. Hard.