A confusion of thoughts

No, a confusion of feelings. Thought-feelings.  Important events.  Yesterday I decided to go on retreat with Tom.  This led quickly to the lists of things to be sure to pack, (don't forget the emergency meds) and things to do before we go (get money).  They traveled around in my mind at night while I lay restlessly half-sleeping.  I am doing this in part because I'm just too anxious already, and because it is a chance to receive three meals a day.  (But pack your Butterfinger bar.)

Too soon I will have that chance again, though - three meals a day in the hospital.  They are about to schedule our transplant.  It looks like Oct. 12, which coincides with our wedding anniversary.  It might be sooner, except that I'll be gone on retreat and can't do the final cross-match that is required exactly 7 days before the surgery.

How exciting is this?  I talked to an artist-friend after church on Sunday.  We decided that there may be no difference between scared and excited.  I thought of going on a roller coaster, which I have done several times in my youth, really scared.  It was so much fun.  You abandon yourself to the stream.

Right now I am skipping from one planfull thought to another, many stones going across the water.  I hope that on the retreat these thoughts will get tired of themselves - at least the thoughts about remembering my worldly necessities (don't forget the Phoslo!), those will be gone, I think.

I don't like the fact of having to have some human contact during the week.  My experience is that I go deeper and quieter if I don't.  But on the weekend the sits will be held in the Oratory, about a quarter-mile away, and it's back and forth several times a day.  I used to love walking that gravel road.  But right now that's a lot of exercise for me.  I'll get enough walking going to and from the dining hall.  But while we're in the Oratory, I will mostly have to ride with Tom. And every second night he has to wrap my arm in the tight compression bandages.  Another medical necessity.  We don't have to talk, however, and Tom is not a chatterer.

Along those lines, this whole thing is a great challenge to me to take care of myself, to rest when I need to, not to rush at all.  Well, I don't "strain after enlightenment" anymore, what teacher used that word?  That's the key - wanting nothing, just being where you are, who you are. Watching the cows in the adjoining field walk slowly home in the twilight.

We will have a full moon our last night there.  Very auspicious. I think about picking a bouquet of wildflowers - there are many more than you think in September, once you look for them. Maybe I will feel I can walk out to the pond.  Here's a haiku I wrote one year, standing there.

blue dragonfly, come back!
this time I will not brush you off.