Chuck Berry: It’s got a back beat you can’t lose it.

Churck Berry had the beat: it's got a backbeat, you c an't lose

Sharon’s blog: DayBooks

 

Have a heart.  Well, with luck.  I’m typing this post from Valparaiso, with a sweeping view down a cat-encrusted hill down to the harbor.  Life seems good.  Just a month ago I was iffy — hanging by a portable defibrillator.  Thinking our summer travel to South America (what we retired for) might be out of reach.  Even though I gave the device a name, it was hardly a pet.  It dragged me down.

As I felt better and better (after my winter hospitalization for pneumonia) it seemed unfair to lug around this reminder of illness — everywhere, all day (except for the daily breaks for shower and handstands).  I felt internally whiney.  I felt outwardly cranky.  And the ongoing tests did not improve my mood.  I had always been so well!  Even in sickness.

One more test: in the nuclear medicine department.  Injection with something radioactive.  Then I have to lie completely still for half an hour or so under some sort of scanner.  I am good at this.  I do yoga after all.  Meditation has never been my strongest limb, but I’ve been working on it of late.  I completely wow the technician.  He’s never known someone to do this so well: lie still.  I take it as a sign.

And yes, I ace the test (almost).  My ejection fraction has risen to almost normal range.  I can kick Henry to the curb.  Few things have given me more pleasure than packing him up and taking him to the UPS store.

And here I am in Valparaiso, doing my yoga practice while I look at freighters in the harbor.  To my two great life thrills of 2014: getting out of the hospital and getting rid of the defibrillator I can add a third: being in South America yet again, understanding and speaking Spanish better every day.  And Argentina is in the World Cup final!!!!!!

I know soon enough I’ll feel annoyance at something. I’ll be bored for a bit.  I’ll have an ache and/or a pain.  But for now I’m breathing freely, even with pleasure.

My electrophysiologist (heart electrician) said I should stick to drawing feet — and leave the hearts to her.

 

 

 

Spread Your Fingers Evenly on the Floor