Stone Free - Medical Adventures, Part the Third

A very interesting day here in the people's Republic of Gumbolia.  It's not often one gets serenaded by Jimi Hendrix while urinating.

What's that, you say?  Some explanation is needed?  Of course, allow me.

So last week I chronicled my unfortunate encounter with a kidney stone.  I am happy to report that most of the week was relatively pain-free.  I say relatively because now my Pain-o-Meter has been recalibrated thanks to the aforementioned kidney stone.  I followed the doctor's instructions to drink lots (LOTS) of fluids, and stick to the medicine, and wait for things to...pass.  They advised me to monitor my 'output' even if that meant filtering said 'output' through a strainer to better catch anything (this becomes critical, later, you'll see).  They can be sent for testing, to better determine how to prevent recurrence. 

Well, the only strainer I have in the house is my trusty little tea strainer...and there is no way I was going to whiz through that, even if I sterilized it in boiling water.  Just couldn't do it.

I didn't have time to go strainer shopping, so I decide to take my chances and bide my time, trusting that the stone would be evicted by the natural flow of things, and that I would know when it did.  It's a jagged little stone, right, traveling through rather constricted spaces, right?  Some rather sensitive constricted spaces, I must add.

All the past week, I anxiously awaited results.  And every day since last Monday, nothing.  Nothing, that is, until Sunday morning.

Things...shifted.  I noticed a little disturbance going on in Brother John early, and hoped that this might be the end of it.  First trip to the loo...a little scratchy, but no stone.  Second trip, mid-morning: did the pee-pee dance, still scratchy.  Still, no stone.  Third trip, just past noon:  They told me that sometimes an 'escapee' can be heard hitting the, um...bowl of whatever miracle of modern sanitation one happens to be, um...using.  And so it was. Clink.

Amen and hallelujah, I thought, looking down, and there it was, big as day.  Well, it felt bigger than day but was really only about the size of a grain of rice.  Sitting there, all ready for retrieval...except there was a catch.  I wasn't using a strainer.  I wasn't even at home. 

I was at a urinal in the public restroom at a local park.  An automatic flush urinal, right next to the door.

I slowly zipped up, trying not to move too far.  Also, I didn't have any tissues or gloves with me, and I couldn't walk away to get some tissue or a towel for fear of setting off the auto flush and thereby washing away the "fruits of my labor", as it were.  So it was me, stock still, contemplating reaching into a public urinal(!) barehanded to pick up(!) a kidney stone.  And what if someone walked in just as I lifting the "prize" out of the urinal?  How to explain that?

Eventually, intellectual curiosity won out over revulsion...I took a deep breath, prayed that no one would come in, and make a lightning grab for the stone.  I was like a peregrine falcon on a pigeon, I was moving so fast.  Amazingly, I snagged the stone in one try.


I immediately hot-footed it over to the sink before any one else ventured in.  I hurriedly washed the thing off (and with a thorough washing of my hands!) and wrapped it in some tissue paper for safekeeping.  Hopefully, some good will come of this rather distasteful brush with the public sewer system.


The soundtrack to this farce?  "Stone Free" by Jimi Hendrix was playing in my head the whole time. 


"...Stone free do what I please
Stone free to ride the breeze
Stone free I can't stay
Got to got to got to get away..."

Lyrics from "Stone Free" by Jimi Hendrix.  This song may end up in a Flomax commercial...

Calm Down People! Change Is Good!

So here it is, dear readers, 2009! A whole new year laid out in front of us in all its glory! Breathe deep, suck in a lungful, smell that? Smells like hope, looks like a brand new fresh field of snow on a bright, sunny day with an impossibly beautiful blue sky overhead. I envision one of those photos often seen in National Geographic in articles about K2 or Mt. Everest: the ones showing a goggle-clad, grinning face in close up with the snow covered moutains beyond, and the rim of the world in the viewfinder. I know Braja might have some quibbles with my choice of the Himalayas (sorry about them chilly winds, my dear), but the image resonates with me.

The last 5 years have been one hell of a climb for me. My life has been filled with personal tragedy, deep identity and spiritual crises, near lethal stress levels and (lately) sudden unemployment. I am exhausted. I am so worn out I could pull my own Rip Van Winkle act without a qualm.

A steep climb, indeed. I think of it as having scaled my own personal Sagarmatha ("Head Of The Sky" in Nepali) maybe without even knowing it. I have arrived at the top tired, sunburned, dirty and amazingly enough, hopeful. It was hell to get here, but the view! One cannot help but be in awe at the magnificence spread out before you.

Things are different for me now. Hope was never my strong suit, even when things really weren't that bad. Quite frankly, I have more reasons now to just dive into the pool of despair. On the bad days, I am sorely tempted to do just that. So what is the difference now? I suppose it is perspective that I have now. Perspective won at tremendous cost, and that I am not going to give back; it means too much.

For now, I'll sit here on the top of the world and meditate on the horizon. I'll draw in some deep lungfuls of thin air that I imagine smells (at least faintly) of iron and stone, and clear my turbulent mind of everything, just for a little while. Somewhere, some wheels are turning, the cycle has begun anew. I'll fly my tattered prayer flag and start down the mountain, ready for anything, expecting of nothing, looking for my jewel in the lotus.

"OM MANI PADME HUM"

(Postscript: New year, new look. It WAS time for a change after all. I already knew it, hadn't decided yet, and Lady Braja nudged me into it. A heartfelt thanks to her for the advice!)