Insidious Adaptation

It’s 11AM, the day after moving. The day after I broke routine, ate various protein bars, drank way too much caffeine, consumed no vegetables, no fish, and I fear, not enough water. After all, it was a long day from 3:30AM, for I like to write, until 10PM, most of which was spent very active. At the end, to celebrate the end of moving festivities, pizza! That’s right, carb-rich, greasy, fat-laden, thyroid stimulating, za. A favorite fast food in this household, for it is fast and it is technically food, a perfect cap to an imperfect day. A way to resign the mind into a binge of sorts and into a relaxation as I convince myself, “I deserve this.” The pizza, the energy drinks, the lack of this or that, or the too much of something led to a 16-hour fast to help the system get a break from the strain of poor choices. This was hour 15. I was starving. I came around the corner of the kitchen, catching a glance of the oven timer. It was behind a few minutes, not a huge deal, however whe...

Pain is a necessary component to life, demanding attention, altering our wills, found in various forms, grabbing each one of us where we needed it the most. Physical pain may have been enough to get us to stop one behavior, yet, others need mental anguish to grasp theirs, forcing a deeper look into self. Other's live in pain like a badge of some sort, a low sense of self, unworthy of peace.  What I am proposing here is not merely another avoidance of pain, but an acceptance of it. Accepting that pain, in this life, is natural, and should be expected. Pain is not the opposite of pleasure, but another “offshoot” of the human condition. A contingency to our, “best laid plans," and more fascinating than pleasure. Pleasure is too obvious, too abrasive and brash, supposedly “enhancing” our situation and distracting our wills. Feeling good is as temporary as feeling bad, though we minimize both outside of the moment. In a moment of pain we feel there is no worse, in the moment o...

I recall the death as tragic. A swift prompt from my green and black screen.   “We lost Sally!” Dang it. As the mechanical piano played a tune.   Emotions running wild at this point. Why did we not see this coming? How could we have allowed this sickness to spread as though it was a mere cold? Why are we on this trail if only to lose everybody in the process?  The Organ Trail game was a classic. Despite various versions, there seemed to be one common feature for us all, dysentery. OK, that, and what do we do when we get to the river? I always forged it. I never even knew what dysentery was, or that it could be significant enough to kill a person if left unmanaged. I knew it was related to digestion, however, living in the modern times of a video game depicting this disease, it was nothing more to me than some diarrhea. Goggle reports the disease is “rare” and less than 200,000 cases per year in the US. Uncomfortable and embarrassing sure, but deathly and com...