My favorite time to write is when the sun goes down and the lights of the city come on. If there is a slight breeze, the lights will shimmer along the water, dispersing hues of blue, gold, and orange. The river becomes a large sheet of glass, displaying the dancing embers of the city lights.
The dogs have stopped barking. There is no repetitive pounding emanating from my neighbors house as he plays endless hours of video games. The city is quietly tucked away for the night and the geese are no longer honking the night hours away. Every few hours, I hear the train blow its horn, alerting me to the passing of yet another hour. Sprinkled throughout the night, are screaming sirens as they race across the town to provide aid to a hurting soul. These are the hours I relish.
No interruptions. No noise. No expectations. No responsibilities. Just the ability to steal a couple hours of blissful solitude for myself.
As my illness has progressed over these last few years, I find I need more and more quiet time. Gone are the days of spontaneity and loud, busyness. Although, I love hanging out with my friends, I am finding I enjoy one on one much more. Of course, multi-tasking has become a thing of the past. And to think there was a time that I could do ten things simultaneously and do them all well. Now I struggle to accomplish one thing completely and I settle for my best, whatever ‘my best’ may look like on that particular day.
The night hours afford me the opportunity to listen to the conversations whispering in my soul. It is here that I am able to process all that has happened and determine that there is purpose in it all. I may not be able to see that purpose in this moment, but when I least expect to discover it, it suddenly unfolds its truths before me.
I have learned that my worldview is shaped by how I choose to embrace the life I find myself living. I can choose to be angry, frustrated, and bitter, or I can choose to find as many nuggets of beauty, joy, and victories that I can find. There are many days that I am challenged to the max to see my ‘cup half-full’ instead of ‘half-empty’, but I find if I strive for a positive view every time, more oft than not, my life becomes a ‘half-full’ world view. At least that is my secret hope.
Hope is the one thing that this illness has not burned out of my soul. I have hope that one day things will be different. I believe there is a God who can heal me at any moment and I know that until that moment arrives, His grace is sufficient. I know that this illness cannot take away the greatness that He placed within me. And I know that the stories and the words that are burning within me, a gift He has given me, will one day be shared with thousands of people I have never met.
My hope may seem silly to you and that is okay. For me it is the very essence of who I am. It enables me to cope for one more day, and then one more, and one more, until I discover that I have now endured for twenty years. Hope is the balm that protects my soul from giving up. It urges my mind and heart to move forward, even if I must take one step at a time. Victory may come to me as it did to the turtle, but the point is… it will come.
Note: I have decided not to write on Sundays but to set that day aside as a “day of rest’, if you will. So…I will see you on Monday.
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Dominique,
I understand pain also. My doc at the VA just put me on morphine. It’s not usually prescribed for any ol ache or pain. It’s buffered and time released, so there is little “buzz”, just really good pain relief for 4-6 hours.
Pain has a way of changing one’s perspective. So much changes in one’s life when pain leads to an early retirement. Taking life for granted is gone. I feel i’m a much more thoughtful and maybe even more insightful because of my pain and the place in life it has left me.
I don’t so much hope as i try to find new ways to do things, or new things to do. I worked as a project engineer on road construction sites. It kept me physically active and when i retired due to the pain, depression was a constant companion. My inactivity was replaced by swimming 3-4 times a week at the local “Y” and it has done wonders for me physically and mentally.
Many friends ask me if i want to return to work. “No” is my answer because i don’t need to. My retirement funds were hurt by the “crash”, but i have a VA disability check and social security. I enjoyed my profession, but i see that as a finished project. In my spare time i discovered i enjoy painting (…not that i’m any good at it, yet it still gives me pleasure). I also have quality time to spend with my partner. I enjoy spending so much time with her.
For the first time in my life i feel satisfied and i am mostly happy. I say “mostly” because i still have moments of sadness brought on by my combat experiences. It isn’t hope so much as satisfaction that i have. Hope is something in the future, and satisfaction is in the present. In spite of the pain, i go to the pool and swim laps, and i feel so good when i finish because i am satisfied. I dabble with my pallet of colors as i look out at the cold rain thinking “i could be out in that mess working right now…..” It’s all good as long as you have breath.
.-= David W. Walters´s last blog ..Sell your coat and buy a sword? =-.
David – good to see you. I checked your blog out last week some time.
I can only imagine how bad the pain is if the VA has you on morphine. They don’t tend to give morphine as a daily treatment unless they deem it severe. Were you injured in the military? BTW, what branch were you in?
You are so right. Pain does have the ability to change one’s perspective. It sounds like you have found more positives then negatives in the changes you have chosen to embrace. That’s awesome!
I tried the swimming thing because I know it is really good but I almost drowned because I got overly exhausted and could no longer swim. So that was that for me!
You know, there is something therapeutic about painting. I don’t know what it is but I enjoy painting as well. I haven’t done it in a while, but I have been thinking of, perhaps, taking a painting class this summer (my best time of the year).
I am sorry to hear about the impact our recession has had on your retirement income but I am glad that you have your disability and social security. I live off my pension and social security. I am in the process, however, of down-sizing so I will be living on my pension only. Too much happening in Washington and it is making me wary. So I will do with less and if an upswing in the economy happens I will be in great shape. If it turns the other way, I will be ready and comfortable.
Hope. That is the word isn’t it. I guess my hope isn’t so much in the future as it is in a person. I know that I know that Christ has good plans for me. I have seen him perform miracles in my life, like healing me of seizures, and using me despite the limitations I must now endure. I think it makes my story, and those like me, more powerful because we are still striving, reaching, overcoming and accomplishing despite what has been thrown at us. For me that is a great essay on the possibilities of hope.
You are welcome to come back and chat anytime you would like! God bless.
I am the youngest son of an old soldier, i was born at Ft.Bragg N.C. Dad served in WW2, Korea, and Vietnam. I was a teen during the Vietnam era so i didn’t serve at that time. In fact i vowed never to serve in the army. Never say never, i have heard. While in college my girlfriend somehow got pregnant, i joined so her and the baby would have health care on the government.
I became a paratrooper like my dad. I was always so proud of him, so that was the reason i decided to jump out of airplanes with a crappy parachute.
Yeah, i know it sounds corny, but it did make a “man” out of me. Really, a person learns just how far his body and mind can take them when they have to. But the training is too good, and by that i mean that they condition a person to shrug off pain to continue the mission.
It was my birthday, 26 September, 1983. It was a night time training mission and i dropped in with my company as a radio operator. It was a typical exercise, seize an “enemy” airfield and hold it until we can land our transports with the big guns and attack helicopters. The moon was bright and my chute opened fine. All of a sudden, i was hit by another trooper whose chute did not catch air (….a “streamer”), and we plummeted until finally his chute caught air and my suspension lines snagged on him and we hit the drop zone together. The other guy broke his back and had to be airlifted. I claimed i was ok, in fact i felt fine, happy to be alive with a huge amount of adrenaline in my blood. I was also buckin’ for sergeant and you can’t make it by missing a training exercise like this one.
In fact i had compression fractures and a crack in my sacrum. Yeah, i felt sore, but i shrugged it off. A month later i was deployed to Grenada for my one and only combat mission. I was our platoon’s radio man. We had too many sergeants, so i didn’t lead a squad. Besides, the Lt. wanted a trained individual on the PRC-77. We came under fire from this building, so i called for air support. A navy jet delivered 2-500 lb. bombs on the building. We got those bastards. I was jubilant, as were all my buds in the platoon, when the bombs hit their target. We went to check out our handiwork. I saw this crusty ball laying on the ground as we approached. This was no ball, since it had a mouth. Along with the bad guys, we killed a dozen or more civilians. I have searched the news accounts of this “conflict” and no mention of this air strike was ever reported. I got an Army Achievement Medal for it.
In addition to my medal, i made E-5 after we returned to Bragg. And that’s when my pain started talkin’ to me. Infantry airborne soldiers drop in with up to 100 lb. ruck sacks strapped to their bodies. They land, pick up their rucks and their weapon an take off at a fast pace. 12 miles in 2-1/2hrs. is the norm. I went to Ranger School but dropped out. The pain was too much. My dad suggested i go to sick call. I did and they realized i was working through the pain of those compression fractures and the sacrum crack. I retrained as an intelligence analyst, and was medically retired in 1987.
And my dad died in the meantime. His advice would have helped, since he too suffered from PTSD. I didn’t understand why i was so angry, and neither did my wife. She left me and the anger got worse. The pain in my body continued and the pain in my soul got worse. Finally, i went into a catatonic state one day and my 2nd wife had commitment papers taken out. When the cops came, i turned my back on them. Three of them jumped on me and all hell broke loose. I remember very little of it, but i ended up waking up in the VA hospital. Two of the cops ended up in the ER as well. I had 3 felony warrants for assault against a law enforcement officer. After i was released from the hospital, i spent 56 days in Wake County’s lock up. The attending physician at the VA’s ER took pictures of the beating i took from those cops. The Wake Co. DA only asked i not file a lawsuit if charges were dropped. After 56 days in lock up i was ready to get out, so i signed. It was while in jail that i read the bible…..twice, since it was my only reading material. Since then, i have become an atheist.
I lost my 2nd wife, my house, my car. Lived on the street for a few months. Too ashamed to face friends or family. Finally my son took me in. I filed my SS claim, and asked the VA to up my disability from 20%.
Luck took pity on me. Both claims were accepted. I live fine now. Anger management classes don’t help much, but swimming and painting does wonders. My new girlfriend has several acres of woodlands here in the sand hills of North Carolina. Sometimes i sit in a deer stand and just wait for something to drink from the stream that runs thru the lot. I don’t shoot, just watch. I hate cops. I hate war. I love life. Life is good. I make the most of it. I have a red SYM HD200 scooter i like to ride. You’ll see me zippin’ along the back roads of Moore Co. on it. Kate, my girlfriend is great. She diffuses my anger. She plays bluegrass music. Sings, plays her Martin and a fiddle as well. I’m trying to learn the harmonica, since i have a good set of lungs. I love to sing as well at music sessions.
“But be that as it may, those of us who did make it have an obligation to build again. To teach to others what we know, and to try with what’s left of our lives to find a goodness and a meaning to this life.”
-last lines spoke by Chris Taylor (played by Charlie Sheen) from “Platoon”
I never went through the day after day grind of nam, but i know enough that war ain’t no game. Perhaps that’s what pisses me off so much. Many of my fellow Americans regard war and conflict as inevitable or as just another game. It ain’t. It is avoidable, and when it isn’t avoided, it has consequences far beyond what most generally think of. Oliver Stone knows.
.-= David W. Walters´s last blog ..Sell your coat and buy a sword? =-.
Wow! You should think about writing a book, David. My gosh! You have achieved so much in your life. I love military stories and I would think your life story would be very interesting.
You are right that most people don’t get war at all and understand that the consequences are very high. I never served in war but my whole family is full of Msgts, CMSgts on the American and French side. [I got out just before Desert Storm].
I am glad that life has come to a place where you are content and at peace. That is a good place to be.
Thanks for sharing. [P.S. I think this is a much easier discussion than the gun one on Larry's blog, huh!
]
Take care and don’t be a stranger!
Larry & i got together on “Stumble upon” and i enjoy discussing politics with him and his cohorts. It’s informative to have these discussions. Larry’s a good guy, he tries to be fair and his beliefs run deep.
Sure, i’m kinda liberal, yet for whatever reason, i’m registered as a republican here in North Carolina. Why? The republican primaries are more fun than their democrat counterparts.
This is a great nation, yet it has always been flawed to some degree. Sure, we wrote freedoms into our constitution, but we allowed slavery. Big mistake in my view, yet at the time it was perhaps unavoidable since so much wealth was tied up in it. Yet from my reading and studying of the old south, i have come to understand that the plantation system practiced throughout the south was an example of a successful sustainable economic system. The forests of a plantation were harvested in a way to ensure that there were always a majority of mature trees. Try telling that to a liberal discussion!
Left and right tend to coalesce into their own groups. This is the problem as i see it in politics. It takes two to tango they say and most people forget the success of Richard Nixon’s trip to China. A liberal could never have pulled that off, and his conservative convictions lent weight to his overtures to the People’s Republic. (….Only it became too successful for our economy, huh?) And don’t forget it was Nixon who engineered the Environmental Protection Agency.
So i look foreward to our dialogue!
.-= David W. Walters´s last blog ..War sucks =-.
Yes, Larry is a great guy. Not many like him anymore!
Hi, Dominique –
I read your About You section and could relate to so much – all of our stories have these similar strings running through them, don’t they? I, too, loved being active before CFS and being physically strong was a big part of my self-image. I think that’s the craziest and most frustrating part of this illness, the exercise intolerance. Like you, going to the grocery store can knock me out for days.
Also like you, I hold onto hope and find that it sustains me through the worst times.
Sue
.-= Sue Jackson´s last blog ..Great Program on Time Management =-.
Sue – It is interesting to me how our illnesses can vary wildly, yet , at the core we share the same struggle. To be honest, I wasn’t sure how many could relate to my story as I have both illnesses together but I have been quite surprised to find that the similarities run deep. Grocery shopping…sigh…I should write a whole post on that alone. I think my next trip is on the 31st so maybe I will make that my post for February 1st
Yes, hope…as I said it is the balm that sustains me.
See you soon!
Thank you for sharing your heart, Dominique. Though a debilitating illness is not my experience, I have seen God slow me down in ways I have learned to accept. For me, it was self employment following 11 years of working in business aviation.
I cannot say I am “there” yet, sometimes struggling to find my place and also make a living. But by working alone I can set my hours, which means taking time here and there to spend with my family.
.-= Matt Keegan´s last blog ..Lending to the Lord =-.
It is the weirdest thing, Matt, but every time you leave a post, you end up in spam. I have to tell wordpress you not spam and then re-approve you. Any ideas why? Anyway..
I can most definitely relate to the finding my place. Change is never easy, is it!
Thanks for coming by. I will read your article, Lending to the Lord, tomorrow. Spent today on the Massachusetts Race. Psyched!