Bed!

When I get home from the hospital, I get into bed.  It doesn't matter what time it is, or what the weather is.  Sometimes I even say to myself, "Gina, go sit on the deck! It's beautiful outside!" Nope. Nothing can keep me from my bed.

Now, to be fair, I am a napper, so getting into bed in the middle of the day is not completely out of the ordinary.  The difference is that this has nothing to do with napping.  I simply need to be under my covers.

What I love about this -- what, habit? practice? reflex? --  is that I can do it!. I don't need to struggle against it, feel bad about it, or - worse - wish that I could do it but can't.  I can and I do.   But I do find myself wondering why - not in a tortured way.  Just in that way that you wonder about questions for the sake of the wondering, without having anything at stake.  I may find an answer, and I may not.

Going to the hospital means that I have metastatic breast cancer and, as optimistic as I am and as great as I feel, the chances are strong that I will die from this - and probably sooner than I would like to.

Going to the hospital means having stuff done to me.  Needles inserted.  Blood taken.  Chemicals injected.  Sit here.  Lie here.  Follow me.  I smile at strangers who will measure and scan my body because I am so desperate to humanize the situation.

Yesterday, as a man put a needle in my arm, he said, "If only the Palestinians weren't so full of hate!"  Later my spouse asked me what I said in response.  (Side note: Once I went to a new periodontist.  We were chatting before he got started.  He lived in Lexington - as I did at the time - but he sent his kids to Dana Hall.  "Great school!" I said.  "Yeah," he replied.  "The only problem with Dana Hall is that there are so many lesbians."  So there I am, lying back and with a fucking bib on.  Hmmmm. Who has the power in this situation?  But I still managed to say after a hefty pause, "You know, as a lesbian. I'm having trouble with the idea of you treating me."  Sat up.  Took of the bib.  Walked out.  And called my dentist and told him that he had made a horrible referral and that he may want to refer his patients to someone else in the future.)  So back to the hater of "hate-filled" Palestinians.  What did I say? Nothing.  I was tired, hungry from fasting for the past 15 hours, and just waiting for him to shut up and give me my radioactive contrast.

So I guess that's why I get into bed.  Just to undo, restart, regain my everyday-ness.  And sometimes to take a nap.