Tuesday, March 6, 2007

Soldiers

So it’s round 2 of Battle of the Blogs

I am here , and so too is Ms Melancholy.

That’s So Pants (who kindly nominated me in the first place) is here

and in the immortal words of Shakespeare’s King Henry V :

“Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;”

So I thought I’d kick off by talking about my thyroid problems - just to show I can get stuck in. I am imitating the action of the tiger, though modest stillness and humility would be more becoming. It is like this: I have an immune system that does not know its arse from its elbow. It is, as I speak, trying to demolish at least one organ that I could name and is responsible for my having to take daily doses of thyroxine so I don’t fall flat on my face. It pretends to be working for me by declaring all-out war on, say, a harmless bit of pollen in the air. Actually it declares all-out war on everything. This exhausts me. Immune system doesn’t care. It is delinquent as well as stupid and stability is something it doesn’t suffer gladly. Thyroxine is either too little or too much. So I am unbalanced, one way or the other. At the moment it is the other, which is why I am up at an ungodly hour.

It’s dark and blustering outside, but I’m here with my anglepoise lamp and the circle of light it makes on the desk. No candles, but I am all set up for the theme of light in darkness and how the flame within grows brighter when the darkness gets bigger. But I’m not going to do that. There are people who keep going with no apparent source of light at all, or some for whom the going is too hard, brave soldiers. I’m one of the lucky ones.

And the hour is late, or early, depending on how you look at it.

8 comments:

nmj said...

hey signs, you poor thing, this is just not fair - my sis-in-law had post-natal thyroid illness, but it is easily controlled with thyroxine, she is fine & needs levels occasionally adjusted, but what you have seems more complex...sorry i have no knowledge or advice to give...

Reading the Signs said...

hi nmj, yes, usually it's straightforward, but I probably sounded more sorry for myself than I am - being very used to it and all. There's something about posting in the small hours, isn't there?

nmj said...

oh, yes, there is definitely a gloom in the the wee small hours . . .

Ms Melancholy said...

Oh, total bummer. Thyroid stuff is so pernicious. I think us brits are taking a US style bashing in the blog thing aswell. Life can only get better.

Just checked, and it is in fact just me that is taking a whupping. This woman is just awesome.

Reading the Signs said...

I started posting up the thyroid thing as a sort of (ok, a bit black) joke, really - as the first battle-cry of round two. Not.

Talking of which, Ms M, it's all gone a bit pear-shaped. Is that the expression? I saw that my opponent doesn't actually want to be in the comp. So I have said that's ok, I'm fine with doing that too (which I really am, though I feel bad about the work Leesa has put in). But the voting seems to be going on. So we'll see this round out, I guess.

Life is sweet, life is sweet.
(Repeat)

Steff said...

Congrats on moving on! I would have voted for you before, but my loyalty lay with myself...but this time...it's all yours! LOL. Anyway, I think we can all use the reminder that no matter what we have going on there are people who are suffering through worse. It makes me thankful for all the blessings I have!

Thanks for stopping by my piece of blogland. Come back whenever you'd like!

Reading the Signs said...

Hey, Steff, good to see you here too. Actually, I'm not sure what's going on competition-wise at the mo (see comments on B of the B) - but it's been good to get to know some other blogs. Yours was a good place to spend time in.

Ms Melancholy said...

Hi Signs - stranger and stranger. But what a lovely comment from your 'opponent'. Speak soon x