From the Land of Maxalt

I woke up this morning full of good intentions.  Of course, we all know right where they lead....

My head started kicking early, but I ignored it. In the past two weeks, it's been like thunder rumbling in the background, a threat that never quite gets around to materializing.  Today, though, as I worked on scraping the top layer of the debris work-week neglect off my life and my house, it started up again, and I had a feeling this time the storm intended to break.

I emptied and reloaded the dishwasher, cleaned some genuinely toxic things out of my fridge, cleared away the MIG welder and all its accouterments to my office/workshop, washed a couple of loads of clothes, put my feather mattress outside to freshen and fluff in the bright sun.  Around noon, my mother called to see if I wanted to go eat dinner somewhere, and by that point my head was starting to get rather insistent.

We went to our local fish camp.  If you are from a place where you don't have those, you're missing it, buddy.  Everybody goes to the fish camp.  I talked to my great aunt and great uncle, my Granny's brother and sister, and one of my cousins.  It's like a miniature family/community reunion there at times.  Last time we were there, I apologized to our server for my parents disappearing on the way to our seats to talk to other people, and he just laughed, saying, "Oh, I lose people all the time before we get to the table."  Mom and I got a booth, and I sat watching the light on the brown river water flowing a short distance away from the restaurant.  Mom and I talked, and even before the entrees were brought, I took a pill.  Just the motion of the light on the river and the pale sand of the bank was making me nauseous.

After that, I have to say, I don't remember much of the meal, but I do remember the pain stopping.

I came home, staggered out with Mom's help, came in, fell down on my unmade, un-feather-mattressed bed, pulled a quilt and my comforter over me, felt Dillon perch on my hip, and became unconscious.

In about an hour, I have to pull the tattered pieces of myself together well enough to sit on an organ bench and be a musician.  Probably I can do that.  The world isn't in that frustratingly-indescribable state of hyper-reality and disconnection that either the headaches or the drug always brings on just now.  As long as the notes on the pages don't decide to pull a cartoon number and dance around on me, maybe nobody will notice I'm not at my best.

Oh, but I'm so very, very tired of this.