Friday, October 14, 2011

Substance

Fabulous day here on edge, pristine blue/gold autumn with a touch of sting in the air. What to do with it? Or, more specifically, how to use the time available before energy meter times out? (Esp as this is in part borrowed from cup of coffee). I could: go for a walk on the beautiful forest; do last night's washing up; write another three A4 sides of novel, which has clocked up a surprising number of words considering I have not been able to give it much of me; write a poem; pre-prepare the evening meal; or I could sit here and do a blog post. You catch me, so to speak, in medius res, doing just that - PWME in action. Of a kind.

There is no right way with this. You make your choice and feel bad about the other things you have opted not to do. Or you make your choice and decide not to feel bad about anything because you are doing your best. I no longer understand how everyone else (without M.E.) lives. This is strange, because when I was in Monaco looking at all the super-rich peeps on their yachts I could quite easily begin to imagine how it might be if one had unimagineable amounts of money so that you could, for example, spend a quarter of a million just on getting the right kind of fridge/freezer for your floating monstrosity. Monstrous perhaps, but I could imagine it. Money is just another kind of energy. So why can't I get my head around the idea of an ordinary day in the life of someone who does not have to negotiate with the bastard disease? How do you work, shop, clean, go to the gym, see a film/play, get on a train, do admin, cook a meal, talk on the phone - all in one day? How do you even do two of those things and feel ok? Energy aside, I do not know how anyone can process everything without becoming overwhelmed. I belong to the one-a-day club, whose members can really only do one thing a day. Even so, I break club-membership rules. I push myself, do more, pay for it - can't do the pacing thing, stupid me, but on the other hand, the moments, each splinter and fragment - I want them so much.

Cat of Signs is now taking a daily pill (cunningly hid in sliver of tuna fish) for her hyperthyroid condition. We discovered also that her increasingly wretched state was due to fleas, picked up from the cattery in August. Dealt with. But she won't leave the kitchen and basically lives in an empty Abel and Cole vegetable box. The vet says that this is because she associates the rest of the house with fleas. Also, that we need to vacuum the house every day paying particular attention to corners and edges (yeah, right) so as to avoid a nasty infestation situation once central heating is switched on. And that we should be spraying something (toxic) around the skirting boards - just to make sure. Strategies.

If I say fuck off enough times, will the fleas get the message?

If I bring C of S's daily saucer of cat milk up to the living room will she leave her Cinderella abode and come back to us?

Because otherwise, I don't know what.

**

13 comments:

Anna MR said...

Tell the fair CoS I'm bringing the dreaded v-word back into blog-parlance for her sake - fleas absolutely detest it you know. So here goes, for you, CoS:

vitun kirput, häipykää

Man, I speak a powerful language I do. But don't tell anyone I swore so uncouthly here.

As for the doings and the energy levels: I don't know how you do it - doing so much, having so much go in you, with ME weighing your levels down. I do not have ME and seem to manage, well, nothing. Yesterday's dishes? No way. And don't even mention things such as novels or poems. It's been years, Rumplesignskins, years.

You are a star, you know? A Star.

Mwah

x

Reading the Signs said...

- and a Mwah back atcha, Mister lovely Anna. I have just said vitun kirput, häipykää out loud and can feel its vibration in the atmosphere. There is a potence that the fleas, I feel absolutely sure, cannot ignore. I will try to ensure that Mr. S does not hear it as he has enough already what with the uncouthness that flows, I know not how, from my lips. 'Struth, what a scholar and a gentleman has to put up with these days! I blame the mater who was always most liberal with the F word.

I go now to have a bath - before getting toxic spray from the vet. Don't ask why I need to have a bath first. Ok, I'll tell you anyway. It's so I don't need to have one tomorrow - doing a course at The University - thinking ahead, you see. Effing superstar, what?

(Rumplesignskins is good, yes :))

Cusp said...

Do you know, I sometimes think that actually, in reality, other people (i.e. non''club' members) dot do all that much and that EVERYONE has to decide to do x.y or z at the expense of a,b or c and then feels guilty about not doing whatever they didnt do, even if what they did do was feed all the hungry in the world, acheive world peace and hoover under all the beds

Anna MR said...

Cuspchen, I believe you're onto something very seriously central about The Human Condition: guilt rules. No, hear me out, it totally does: for what would we do without it, with all the emotional energy to be spent on something worthwhile for once? Dunno about you guys, but I seriously wouldn't know how to go about it all. (Hoover under all the beds? In the world, Cusp? That is very good.)

Rumple of Signskins - A University Course? Professor, you are a supernovic star of stellar qualities and no mistake.

x x one each

Fire Bird said...

fleas are bad yes, but don't usually make cats so wretched - more just their itchy humans. we used the little drops you put on cat's neck. but i do remember the hoovering and spraying routine. not nice.

WV oshist

indeed

Reading the Signs said...

Dear Friends,

I have just spent a long time writing exquisitely phrased replies to each of you. And then everything disappeared because I pressed a key by mistake. Gutted? I am saying the F and V words and C of S and Mr. S have both scarpered. I mean, what the f -

Fat-ee-gay now - not to mention mooda.

Pray for us chemically sensitive types who are obliged to spray the house with chemical anti-flea stuff. Any scary things, I put fingers in ears and say la la la.

Mwahs! xxx

Zhoen said...

I wonder how high energy and athletic people do so much, and seem to feel so little pain. I have a big day, and I want to spend the next day lazing. I run too much, or lift too many fluid bags, and I'm in pain the next day. Why people run marathons or get into mountainous bike races is a complete mystery.

Poor cat. Poor you, when you have to do a number on the fleas.

Reading the Signs said...

Zhoen, I'll be vacating the house for a few days - to minimise any after effects. Dear cat, at any rate, is so much happier after flea treatment, even if she hated the after-taste of it. Just biting the bullet, really.

'tis me said...

Um I just need to make a totally unnecessarily me-like contribution here to tell you the word ver is mative.

Whatever that means.

x

Reading the Signs said...

I don't know what it means either - or the one that Fire Bird gave. Getting a bit rusty in Wordver, whereas I used to feel quite fluent in it. But, you know - girls like me - bit of an airhead really - just wanna have - er -fun.

Good to know you're keeping a finger on the pulse x

Mad Englishwoman said...

I can only do one thing a day too.

And we have an unused bottle of toxic anti-flea stuff that we were supposed to spray round house and never did and we didn't hoover either and both cat and dog and we have survived (relatively) flea-less.

Reading the Signs said...

'Tis done, Belinda - or at any rate, begun. i have absented myself from Signs Cottage for a few days to lessen the possibility of reacting to substance. Doing a bit at a time.

Good commenters all, ye know - I think we all mean different things by 'one thing.' There are PWME for whom the one thing might actually be to sit up in bed for a while. And just to complicate things, my criteria can change, depending on how I am.

let's hear it for old beardface said...

Um yes. Having bemoaned about my lack of energies and so on…as compared to the people who have a days' work sitting up in bed for fifteen minutes… I do now feel quite clearly guilty of that famed thing, white whine.

Shame, quite clearly, on me. But I do admire your drive and desire to create, my dear Signskins, and I don't compare favourably in that department, that I do know.

x