creaky ol' bones

okay. so we're unsaturated. we're whey proteined plus. we're non-smokers. heck, we're barely breathing!!! so what's going on exactly?

everyone around us looks great. youthful complexions, lean and fit; we all stay out of the sun, eat our leafy greens, get eight hours of sleep (when we actually can sleep!). we're not at the office until midnight. we have nice family lives, nice vacations, good friends.

and yet, so many people are in the throws of life-altering surgeries, treatments, processes. the upside is that everyone seems to be making it through this mid-life crises, a little psychologically scarred, but well and kickin'. so is it just that, in addition to diet, exercise, and mental balance, we're also seeing doctors more frequently, getting full body scans, and listening to every creak and ache as if it's our last? and guess what? they're finding stuff!

so, despite all that we do, we have the anniversary of chernobyl behind us. we have good old fashioned american stress! we have over programming, and no safety nets. we have semi-nuclear, non-extended families. and al gore and ed begley junior scolding us for treating the environment so poorly (they're right - and maybe that's the root of all evils!).

i myself will have the opportunity to ponder all of this tomorrow when i go for my regularly scheduled stress test. geez, i hope they don't kick my tires and look under the hood. i kind of feel like they're going to give me one of those stickers that they put on the windshield - good until 65,000 miles, then come back for a tune up! everyone, and i mean everyone, we know has a story. and it's not just about aging parents and the like. it's US ... the forty and fifty year olds. we're not worried about covering our gray hairs ... we've got more pressing issues!

let's keep going, keep rooting for each other! we've all come this far - broken hearts (literally), cancer here there and everywhere, kidney stones, and mystery ailments ... hang in there, we're all still standing, and, with a little help from our friends, we'll be doing so for quite some time!

can disease save your life?

i often have strange thoughts roaming around my brain.

today on the drive home from the city, i hear the song 'ironic', which amongst other topics, notes the craziness of taking a flight for the first time and having the plane crash down. simple enough reasoning in a song with this title. and then fear of flying sticks with me, and while i bake a heart shaped puff pastry tarte, i reflect on the lyrics. at this hour, we are to be sweeping across the pacific on a hong kong bound jetliner. we've canceled our tickets to make way for jane's timely treatments and speedy recovery (tomorrow morning is chemo 3 of 4 - almost there!).

and i think - can illness really grab you from the clutches, of, well, 'unfortunate circumstances'?

i'm not a big believer in fate - more like right place, right time, or pure bad luck, etc.. and then ... imagine for a moment (and not that this would be wished upon ANYONE, because it is truly awful), that our adventure to the far east has been annulled ... for the sole reason that jane has been on the road to wellness as a result of her diagnosis ... and that we find out that our flight is ill-fated - well, just doesn't quite make it, and we just happen to not be on board.

and then, one would think "thank g-d jane has contracted this disease - it has saved our lives!".

oh, i know, it's rather sick and dark, and trust me, i don't go around wondering about this all of the time, but it does make one ponder. are there people out there believing that they are blessed, because the results of something that has invaded their bodies (seemingly ominous) has in fact turned out to be their (and their family's) savior?

wishing everyone well, and that all flights make it safely to their destinations!

isn't it ironic? a little too ironic?