Coping with change

Sherlock did not get nervous Tuesday morning when I went into chills with the flu, the broadband went down, again, and the furnace broke. He did not mind lying in bed with me under two comforters with the heated mattress pad turned way up; this is how he figures you're supposed to spend the day. He did not get nervous about the workman with blue shower caps on his shoes who could not come to fix the furnace until the next day.

Being pretty much incapable of abstraction, Sherlock did not understand my complaint about how the nurse cheerily told me my temperature was normal at 98.6, and paid no attention when I explained that it wasn't my normal. My normal is 97.6. Her "normal" is a fever in me, slight but worrisome. At this point the headache felt like I had a medieval torture device for a hat, so I wouldn't dream of arguing. Why bother? Medical people almost never believe me if I tell them something that doesn't fit their idea, such as "I'm very sensitive to cortisone, and I don't want that shot." Sure, sure, they think, figuring, I guess, that I'm just a woman. If I were Sherlock, it would take three people to give me that shot. I admire that in a cat.

Sherlock was surviving nicely the things that were making me feel picked on by the universe. What got to him yesterday was when the luggage came out. Then Nigel came and carried large pieces of Tom's electronic recording gear out to the van, which is somewhat like rearranging the furniture, and we know how cats feel about that. Then Tom started packing.

What did Sherlock know? Being totally enlightened and unencumbered by reason, he knows only what he has experienced. When the luggage comes out, we go away. Here, the disadvantage of not having a large vocabulary became apparent; I couldn't explain to him that I would be staying home, no longer able to go on retreat, even if I didn't have the flu.

Change, change. Sickness, aging, vulnerability. How does Sherlock cope, he who cannot read nice Buddhist articles about equanimity or self-help books about positive thinking? I went looking for him a while ago. He was on the screened porch, but not on the bright rag rug, his favorite spot, and not in a patch of sunlight either. No, he was under the glider, as near as he could get to the comfort of a cave.

The economy is crashing so badly that talk about nationalizing the banks doesn't seem to raise an eyebrow. As for me personally, since I have an infection, I am once again on hold on the transplant list, meaning I won't get called if that magic kidney comes in for which I am a perfect match. While I was being afflicted by the feelings natural to someone in this position, I tried to distract myself by checking the email that has piled up in outer space these past two days. What do you know, a Zen friend is offering a workshop that would tell me how not to have these feelings.

Sorry, I don't fit under the glider.