HomeFebruary 27, 1997
"Last night I had the strangest dream I ever dreamed before. I dreamt the world had all agreed to put an end to war". No, wait, that wasn't it....
I dreamed I was reading The Paperwork. Diane Patterson had written a whole page on my writing. It seemed to be a critique of a piece I'd written on Roger Tory Peterson and James Fisher's Wild America(Houghton Mifflin, 1955) in which I parodied some of Fisher's writing. Diane objected mightily to my use of the phrase "windswept wastelands". She cited it several times as an example of my inability to write a plain sentence. The page had a white background. My name was several points larger than the rest of the text and the J in Janet was blue and even larger than the rest of the name. She consistently referred to me by my full name, always Janet Egan, never Janet. I woke up thinking "I have to change the part about the belted kingfishers."
Clearly this means I don't get out enough. The journal has become the world. Hmmm, I have been rather cooped up lately with the flu. Definitely need to do something besides journalling when I'm sick.
Wait a minute, I think the Diane in the dream had two n's! Dianne. So it was a dream Dianne and not the real one.
The mysterious knee thing has started to bother me again. I've been limping for 2 days. Make that 3 days. Part of the reason I dropped out of walking at Phillips Academy on Tuesday after just a couple of laps is that my knee felt swollen and unstable. By the time I got back to my car it hurt like hedoublehockeysticks. I am reluctant to have it looked at because I have no idea what happened to it. I used to have mysterious knee pains years ago, that were diagnosed as arthritis but they went away. I don't want to think this is arthritis. If it were, why only the left knee?
As I limped back and forth to the dumpster with a week and half's worth of trash this morning, I wondered how I would cope if I had to be laid up for awhile. How would the trash get to the dumpster? How would I buy groceries? And on and on... After being sick for over a week and now limping with the mysterious knee thing, I am starting to feel like an elderly person, an extremely elderly person. I also get this feeling that everybody else is higher functioning than I am. People with all sorts of disabilities are out there holding down full time jobs, grocery shopping, cleaning, taking trash to the dumpster, gardening, having hobbies and relationships and I'm hoarding trash and running out of kitty litter.
Back when I was still working at my last soulless corporate job, struggling to get up in time for the 7:00 AM conference calls to Japan or the 6:45 AM flight to Washington and coping with convoluted politics I used to hear a public service announcement on the radio every morning for a group called North Shore ARC - the Association for Retarded Citizens. It featured a retarded woman talking about her job experience: "My employer can count on me because I'm on time for work and get along with my coworkers. I've found that respect is a two-way street." I despaired of ever achieving the level of functioning this woman had!
On time for work and getting along with coworkers? I was so exhausted I developed a chronic case of jet lag - my body never knew what time zone it was, everything was out of synch. I was not getting along with a particular coworker who was giving me a really hard time (I promised not to write about this so I'll have to be vague.) I mean I was so terrified of setting this person off that I had to take Ativan before meetings with him. So I marveled at the North Shore retarded woman who got along with her coworkers. I marveled at her ability to be on time for work as I was speeding down country roads hoping not to get a ticket as I passed through North Reading.
Once I was speeding to catch a plane and a cop pulled me over in Middleton. He asked where I was going and I told him Logan Airport. He asked what time my flight was. I replied "6:45". He said: "you're going to miss your plane" and let me off with a warning. I was lucky. One time I really did miss a flight. There was a sudden thunderstorm and Route 1 flooded. I slogged on through the flood as fast as it was possible to go - about 5 mph - and made it to the airport just as my flight took off. I waved at it as it rose into the gray winter sky. Sigh.
Despite my problems with early morning flights and conference calls, I was reasonably successful at work. I don't mean to make it sound like my career was a disaster. It wasn't. It was a good run. Then I burned out.
There's more to say here, but I need to get some sleep. I'm starting to fade.