Different news

Oh, I so love my new herbalist.

I've been on his diet (no raw leafy greens, no dairy, plenty of plant proteins, no coffee (been doin' that one for 14 years, that was real easy), minimal sugar) for something like four months now. I just saw him yesterday. He said, based simply on his examination, "I can tell you've been following my diet to the letter. This is better, this is better, this is better..." and now that those issues are well on their way to having been cleared, we're able to address what may be one of the primary problems, and once we get that, we can start to see whether my over-enthusiastic immune system is specifically hacking at my myelin, or at something else.

And he gave me a new formula, told me that if things didn't get better in a week I should double the dosage, but call him either way.

And oh yeah, did I mention that his formulas have no side effects? NONE?

There was no promise of "cure," or "remission," or anything like that. Those terms were never mentioned, and I'm positive they never will be (certainly not "cure"). But, to hear news of improvement? And that there was at least a possibility of more improvement?

That don't come often, in the MS world.

It was a nice day.

Missing images

OK. I can't not at least mention this. I've been thinking about this for a while, might as well deal with it.

All of the photos on this blog are of things that I am barely able, or no longer able, to do. Last time I tried to get into the kyudo stance, I nearly fell over. My left foot, previously the better of the two organ-pedal-playing feet, is all but unusable on the instrument, and the right foot ain't doin' so good either, so I almost never play the organ any more. I suppose I could stand next to percussion equipment--briefly--but I don't think I could play in an orchestra standing, any more.

A few pictures have been taken of me, in the last year or so... Three or four at most. I think in all of them, I'm sitting at a restaurant, with my wife, smiling. The same restaurant, too, I think.

Which, you know, there's nothing really wrong with. And we really like the restaurant.

It's easy to amass pictures when you "do" things. When you're "active." Technically, I still do things (we're speaking this time in the non-Buddhist sense), but they're just not photogenic--photo-generative. They tend to involve sitting. Alone. Sometimes in front of a class, talking. Or watching them work. Nothing that really attracts photographers, or that demands photography.

Oh well. So what. Of all the things I've lost due to MS... I mean, really, I don't attract photographers any more?

All of our problems should be so easy. And silly.

Missing connections

Gentle readers, those of you who follow me are probably not surprised when I talk about the non-standard therapies I pursue.

I visited a new qi gong person yesterday. She had a very gentle spirit, a very gentle touch; she's just starting her practice, and she's going to be very, very good at it.

I told her my main complaints about the MS experience. The walking, the issues with (let's call it) the plumbing, the vision, the control of my legs... these are inconveniences. My main complaint is the energy loss--specifically, the creative energy loss.

So she was working on that, and while I was lying on the table during the treatment (not much for you to do besides lie there, during qi gong, and check out the sensations of the energy moving around) I started to have some really good ideas, pertinent to a presentation I'm going to give later this month.

And I mean really, really, good ideas. Powerful ideas. Interesting ideas.

This is the kind of world I want to live in. Trouble walking, I can work around, but powerful ideas... those, I crave living with.

A day later, I still sort of have the connection to that place of creativity, it's still sort of flowing, but it's not gushing like it did yesterday.

Ebbs and flows are completely usual for creativity... but what I fear is that, when this ebbs, it won't flow back. That has been the MS pattern: the energy leaves, but it never returns. And so I fear that yet again, I will have been restored, only to watch everything seep away. Again.

Nothing recharges me. Nothing.

Except... the energy of autumn. The Metal energy of autumn. There's a special spark in the air during autumn; when that cool bracing breeze blows, and I feel it in my very soul, and I breathe that crisp air, and... I hear a Wagnerian horn call ringing through every fiber of my being. God, it is wonderful.

It's best in New England. It's wonderful in the high Sierras. I can feel it in the Nevada desert. I could even feel it in Hawaii.

It's pretty much completely missing in Los Angeles. There's no "metal" in the air. No crispness. No energy; no freshness, no power. And (again, looking at it from a five-element perspective) without the gifts of Metal that bring you clarity and the ability to release the no-longer necessary, you have nowhere through which the Water can flow, and renew your very substance, so that new growth can occur in the spring.

What little Metal LA has, I can feel--barely--in the air today. The "zing" of the New England autumn, that I absolutely lived for when I was in Connecticut--that, we ain't got. And dammit, that's what I really, really want.

As soon as I finish the scut work I'm trying to clear, I'm going to make myself a nice cup of tea, and go outside, and try to tune my spirit to the "Metal" energetic wavelength; breathe the air, become invigorated by the wind, and maybe, just maybe, the same way you can pick up Los Angeles AM radio in Nebraska by the way the radio waves bounce of whatever they bounce off of, I can find the Metal in Connecticut and soak it up.

And finally, recharge. Maybe for more than just a few hours, this time.