Chronic Instability

Is it really true that the night is darkest just before the dawn? Or is that just a metaphor about emotional processes? It's definitely pretty dark out there, though there's a riot of birds chirping; clearly, they know light is going to return soon.

I've been awake for the past four hours, alternately tossing and turning, getting work done, panicking about how little sleep I've had, and fretting about the inconsistency of my own body's responses to medication.

Last week, I got a cold.  Sometimes, I get a cold, I keep biking and running and going to the gym all through it, and it goes away.  Other times, it takes hold of my chest and ties a rope around it and makes it difficult to get breath in, get breath out.

At which point, I get a prescription for predisone, a kind of steroid that doesn't give you big muscles or superhuman sports ability.  It's just supposed to make me breathe.  But the effects of the prednisone aren't consistent, either.  It usually makes me pretty high, but if it's working well, I get a lot done during the day and I don't get quite enough sleep and I recover and move on.

This time, though, it's knocking my sleeping schedule to hell.  I think maybe I got five hours once night this week.  Tonight (last night? do I admit to it being over, or do I still think I'm going to try again to court Morpheus?) I've had three.  I don't function well on less than six or seven even when I'm not sick, and trying to let my body rest and recover when I feel like I've had a few gallons of coffee is impossible.  I'm trying hard not to get cranky with my family and colleagues; getting weepy in the car is fine, but not getting sleepy.

The pharmaceutical model is that if a medication worked well in enough of a test population to get approved, then it's assumed that it will work that way, consistently, in all of the bodies for which it's subsequently prescribed.  That's what the marketing will tell you.  The reality is, medications work differently in different bodies, and sometimes they work differently in the same body at different times.

Inspire: to influence, motivate, animate.  Expire: to die.  Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out.

I've been re-reading Simi Linton's Claiming Disability, and I don't want to disagree with any of the important points made by the volume, in particular the key point that people with disabilities must control the discourse.  But somehow the book does not speak to my own embodiment of dis-ease.

It might be because, while Linton is very careful to avoid identifying disability in general with any one physical or mental condition, she does discuss the visibility of disability as a crucial component in its construction, though she acknowledges, in a discussion of "passing" as non-disabled, that disability is not always visible.

My dis-ease is invisible.  I "pass" unless I make a distinct effort to inform the world that my body works differently.  Those around me would be aware that I'm having difficulty breathing only if I tell them: there's no visible marker.  For me, "claiming disability" requires making an assertion about something that no one else can see.  It's subject, then, to belief -- or to disbelief.  "My smoking won't hurt you." "It's all in your head."  "Just take the stairs."  It's not a matter of passing as disabled, it's a matter of having to assert a disabled status when everyone else can "see" a person without markers of physical difference and therefore a person who must not be disabled.  Plus, no one likes a whiner.

And here's the dawn.  The taxicabs and the buses and the trains over the Williamsburg Bridge will soon drown out the chatter of birdsong.  And  I'll give up on ontology for another day, and perhaps try again to sleep.

What Professors Do: Write Assignments

Writing assignments for papers and projects we want our students to complete is another one of the things that professors do each semester. This isn't simply a mechanical task, but rather an intellectual challenge that ties the goals for the course and for the program with what students can be expected to produce at a given point in their academic careers.

I have to come up with an idea of what it is I want to the students to do, whether it's a short exercise in reading texts carefully with a dictionary to find the nuances of word meanings, or a longer research project in which students will come up with original ideas based on previously published scholarship.

I have to make sure that the materials covered in the course up to that point support the project I want the students to complete, in terms of information about the field, knowledge of research tools, and analytical skills. I also think about how writing the paper or doing the research assignment will help the students learn what I want them to get from the course.  (I'm generally interested in getting students thinking carefully and critically and asking good questions, rather than transmitting a bunch of facts.)

As I write the syllabus for the course, I'm already thinking about what kinds of research and writing assignments I'll be giving.  Sometimes I write out the assignment details when I write the syllabus, while I'm thinking through the issues of what I want students to learn and how I will help them learn it.

Conveying the instructions for a project in a one- or two-page description of the assignment is a challenge.  I want to be reasonably concise, so as to avoid overloading students with information, yet detailed enough to give a clear idea of what process they need to go through to get to the end result.

Each time I teach a course, I change the assignments, sometimes a little bit, sometimes a lot.  I need to make sure students can't recycle their classmates' papers from previous semesters, and I also tinker with descriptions and instructions each semester to try to make sure everything is as clear as possible.

Ten of Tens, March Update

Take-out happened this week -- twice -- but for the first time since the beginning of the year.  Virus also happened this week, and night-time asthma and vomiting, and an out-patient surgical procedure... so it was a more than usually stressful week.

I've been getting better about cooking on the weekends so as to have ample leftovers available for lunches, and for dinners on short notice, during the week.  And I'm ready to re-commit to avoiding take-out and all its trash.

This is all part of the ten of tens, in which I make the effort to change one thing each month that will make a positive environmental impact.  In January, I tried to eat more local food, but failed pretty thoroughly; I also stopped eating take-out, which wasn't the official plan for the month, but had been on my radar.

In February, I redoubled my efforts to eat more local food, but have largely failed again.  Recently, I recalled research on "food deserts," defined as urban areas more than one mile away from a supermarket.  In short, this research acknowledges that if food is more than a mile away in a place where people don't typically have cars, or more than ten miles in rural areas where it's assumed that they do, then it's difficult to deal with grocery shopping.

The nearest farmer's market, at Tompkins Square, is 1.3 miles away and operates only on Sunday; the bigger one at Union Square that's open four days a week is 2.3 miles.  On a warm spring or fall day, or even a steamy summer one, I'm quite happy to hop on my bike, load it up with produce, and ride back home.  But in the cold of winter ... particularly if there's precipitation ... the time required to put on all those layers and the energy required to face the temperatures has been defeating me.

However, I'll keep trying.  Aided by the fact that spring is on its way.  And for March, I'll work on limiting water use: shorter showers, less running water while washing dishes.  A nice easy goal, because I already know March is going to be a bear, with three of four weekends committed to travels of varying length.

Meanwhile, not eating takeout has become a good habit.  And with a few additions to freezer and pantry, it will be that much more solid.

Starting Small

In recent weeks and months, I've come to realize that decisions I made 20 and even 30 years ago to move far from the town where I grew up are now limiting how much I can be with my parents as they get older.

A little over a year ago, I was rear-ended (in my car) by a runaway truck, and escaped (miraculously?) nearly unharmed, except for a shoulder injury.  The physical therapists told me to stop doing yoga because I needed to rest the shoulder, and over the next several months as they worked on it and gave me exercises to strengthen it I learned just how complicated a joint the shoulder is.

I still fear being hit from behind, mostly when I'm driving or riding my bike, but I also feel a fairly constant sense of vigilance about what's around me.

Between the lingering fears,and current worries about various illnesses and infirmities among people I care about, I find myself drifting in a fog of anxiety.

Three days ago, I decided that even though the shoulder still aches, it's time to return to yoga.  I made a very, very small commitment to myself: one sun-salutation sequence each day.

Once I get going, I tend to continue, whether for ten minutes or thirty.  But the fact that I made such a tiny commitment makes it easy to start, no matter how badly I want simply to fall into bed at the end of the day. I'm not going to beat myself up about how little I practice, and if I should miss a day, I'm not going to beat myself up about that, either. 

But as I resume daily practice, I'm reminded of how much I need stillness, balance, simple awareness of breath. I'm finding hope that I will be able to move through fear, through worry, through regret about decisions that can't be unmade, and find equilibrium.

If I can get anywhere, it will be by starting small.

Fighting an Epidemic

It's clear we have a problem with gun violence: the numbers of people who die from guns, whether shot by others or as suicides, are far higher in the US than in comparable developed nations.

We can argue about the causes: is it violent movies, television shows, video games?  Is it laws that allow people to buy guns without licensing or background checks?

The gun makers, it turns out, are willing to spend money on the bet that playing violent games will encourage people to buy guns: they work with the developers of the games to make sure their guns get prominent placement.  Meanwhile, they donate lots of money to the National Rifle Association, whose leaders say the problem is violent video games, not gun ownership.  And other people say the problem is neither guns nor violent cultural artifacts, but untreated mental illness.

In short, we have an epidemic problem.  The more time we spend arguing about it, the longer it will take to arrive at a solution.

If the epidemic involved disease, and there were multiple possible transmission vectors, we'd be addressing them all, rather than arguing about which was the most important factor.

In this case, we have multiple factors that may be contributing to the problem.  Rather than arguing about which is most important, we need to address them all.

We need legislation that requires background checks and licensing, nationwide.  We need research and education about the effects of watching violent video and playing violent games.  And we need better recognition and treatment of mental illness, and a reduction in stigmatization of mental illnesses that leads people to refuse treatment.

Just Imagine It For A Minute

What if cars were the exception, not the norm, mostly invisible in the course of our normal comings and goings? What if people weren't allowed to park their cars on town or city streets?  What if pedestrian zones were the norm?

A pedestrian zone in Turkey

Walking would be a different experience if your view of streets and buildings weren't obstructed by parked and moving vehicles of various sizes.  Biking would be transformed if you didn't have to assume you were invisible to drivers of cars and trucks.

Bicycle parking in Cambridge

Our towns and cities would look and feel and sound and smell totally different.

Just imagine it for a minute.

Drug Testing and Guns

You might have to submit to a drug test if you ...

Start a new job
Apply for welfare
Play professional sports
Need financial aid to pay for college

But if you want to buy a gun, no drug test, if you're in a state with no background checks.  Also...

Convicted of violent crime? no problem.
Convicted of rape? no problem.
Convicted of selling heroin to minors? no problem
Have an order of protection against you? no problem

Gun laws won't keep guns out of the hands of law-abiding people.  Kind of like car laws don't keep people from driving.

But car laws do help limit speeding, drunk driving, and other dangers associated with car ownership.  Nationwide gun laws will not keep hunters and other recreational gun users from their pursuits.  But they will help to reduce dangers associated with guns.