Sunday, June 29, 2008

I've seen fire and I've seen rain

Rain! Love it! An inch fell tonight with the promise of more tomorrow. All day the air was heavy and humid. When I played with the quartet for the first wedding of the day, at 1:30 p.m., the sky was too bright, the air somewhat stifling. By the end of the wedding it was hot and I was hotter, not having managed the ever present temperature adjustments my body refuses to make quickly. The doctor’s latest advice on this “temperature adjustment difficulty” is that it will pass in about five years. Five years! Do you have any idea how hot, or cold, a person can get if their thermostat won’t regulate for five years? Talk about global warming! All baby boomers with hot flashes should just rebel right now and get Congress to pass a bill regulating OUR temperature. Forget the polar ice caps. Get me a Sonic Route 44 right NOW!

There was another not so tiny problem today that could have been related to aging. My joints hurt. I don’t mean they ached. I mean they fell like they were on fire most of the day. I woke up that way and even took plenty of ibuprofen, did stretching and exercises in the floor just after getting out of bed this morning. That’s another thing the doctor says needs attention—the joints. We’re talking about flesh and bone here, not the illegal variety. The doc wants further follow up on the latest comprehensive lab results. When I had the lab tests it was only two days before Daddy had pneumonia, and I thought nothing about it, because for years and years, all my labs return with perfect results—right down the middle of the charts. Not so this year. The results showed a slight increase in the cholesterol and an enormous jump indicating inflammation. Flames! Fire! I prefer the fire of the Holy Spirit, thankyouverymuch. Anyway, the thumbs were flaming after playing for the first wedding, so I took more OTC anti-inflammatory drugs, rested while Muffin rubbed the arms with Blue Emu goo, and drove myself to wedding number two for the day. Our quartet played with another quartet, along with a trumpeter, a pianist, an organist, and guitarist, along with three vocalists. When I sat down with the other first violinist who is about thirty eleven years younger than I am, he said, “I don’t know why, but my hands have hurt all day and now it’s really bad.” I really tried not to feel gratified. Really, really tried. Anyway, it began raining while we were playing and both of us began to feel better.

I simply refuse to accept that I have growing pains. Not when the twenty-somethings are complaining too. This lovely rain that is falling goes a long way to regulate temperatures and quell fiery pains. Thank you, Lord for Your rain. Amen.

No comments: