What is the Matter with Me? As If I Really Want to Know

Self examination is a critical feature of living a stoic life. And I find Stoicism to be a workable philosophy. I do believe that I have no power to alter the world around me, only the power to control and change myself. I find it works fine as a teacher. A teacher with self control can lead most of the students in the classroom down the happy path. That leaves only a few weirdos that you have to knock on the brain with a rubber hammer (figuratively, of course.)

But tonight my blood pressure is 176 over 90 (go-to-the-ER level numbers.) My blood sugar is 153. I made the fatal mistake of eating spaghetti and meatballs from the microwave. I get tired of a strict diabetic diet. But I can’t afford insulin either. Sometimes I feel more like not examining myself in that particularly painful way and just risking eating what I like without worrying about sudden death that I can’t avoid anyway.

There are some things I feel like I have to write yet. But I find it is harder and harder to do it with glaucoma eyes and arthritically-challenged fingers to use for battling an overly sensitive and somewhat vengeful keyboard and word processor. I have a story in my head about an autistic boy who wants to live alone in the forest and hears music in his head that no one else can hear. I have a story about teenagers battling suicidal depression by sitting in a circle naked down by the river, eating marijuana brownies and talking to ghosts. I have another story about teenagers learning about love during a journey to the center of the Earth where a monster has imprisoned one of their girlfriends. I have a really weird Aeroquest Sci-Fi story with flower people as bad guys and space goons eating a space station out from under the heroes. It’s already done. I just need to proofread and publish.

And I probably won’t get any of it done. Writing The Haunted Toy Store is going molasses-in-January slowly.

But we have to have hope to continue. And I do have hope. She lives inside my head and thinks she’s the Leopard Goddess of the Wastelands most of the time. But she’s still there. Still real.

Yeah, still good.