10.25.2009

To Quote Rage Against the Machine...

Channeling my two-year-old here for a second, my life is "mine." And I will lead it as I see fit [dammit].

So this is the occasional check-in where I let you know how I am doing--really doing, really feeling--in all of this.

I feel pretty fucking great. For the most part, anyhow. Yesterday I got a wild hair1 and went for a run for the first time in I don't know how long. The last time I remember strapping on the running shoes2 my guts were coming out of my stomach, so it's been at least a year and change.

The motivation to get out and get moving came from the same place as when I was living in Norfolk, VA3 and was starting to feel beat down by the constant summer (and spring and fall) heat4.

It was something like 85° at 6pm for the third week in a row and I had just had it, so I strapped on my shoes and went out for a light run, just to show the weather that I was the one that made the decisions around here. Me.

So yesterday I went out for a two mile jog at an embarrassingly5 slow pace and came back all kinds of achy and chafed and today I feel like I'd been run down by a steam roller but it was a beautiful day and I was out--and occasionally sprinting6--in it.

Today I continued to vent my backed-up spleen7 by doing a bit of raking in the back yard but mostly tearing out all these bushy/viney weeds that I have mentally marked for demolition since last fall. Seeing the fruits of your grudge-fueled labor sitting curbside, waiting for removal is very, very satisfying8.

So that's pretty much the report from the home front these days. I am refusing to live in the past and am working on moving forward, with renewed emphasis on "moving." I am trying to be a better and more productive me.

But best of all, I continue to feel more and more like me with every passing week. The me that got ground down by the punishing reality and horrible possibilities of cancer. The me that got hollowed out both figuratively and literally by treatment. The me that seemed to get erased by The Troubles, never to return.

I'm back. And to finish what I started in the title of this post: "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me."

Hallelujah.



1WTF does that mean, anyhow?
2
Damn I love those Sauconys.
3
Home to the world's biggest naval base, don'tcha know.
4
The transformer across the street blew at 3am on more than one occasion on account of it being overtaxed from the power demands of air conditioners.
5For the fuck of shit I can never spell that word correctly.
6"N.W.O." by Ministry gets me all fired up.
7Purely metaphorical.
8That and the beer reward that followed.