Quiet time

Hi neighbors! I am glad to be home! When in Des Moines I always hit a couple of bookstores. I found "Don't Sweat The Small Stuff..." by Richard Carlson and have been enjoying reading that again. One chapter was about taking time to just sit quietly for a few minutes. Here's a journal entry about how that turned out!

"The house was empty except for myself and two cats. I had just read in "Don't Sweat the Small Stuff" that it was good to practice just sitting quietly. I determined I would do so. I was on the couch and found the reclined position more conducive to being quiet. When my head fell back into the top of the couch, I discovered one of the cats was already sleeping there. Sensing my head conveniently widening his sleeping berth, the cat stretched until he was half on the couch and half on my head.

I considered this punishment for having gotten into such a comfortable position to be still and quiet. Then I realized it could be a blessing as counting the cat's breaths could lead to meditating! It was half an hour or so later that I remembered that counting a cat's breaths was too similar to counting sheep. I probably wouldn't have awoken then, but the cat woke me up when he jumped from my head and into my lap. I brushed him off and got up to get some coffee. Thinking about my meditation, I realized I had not succeeded in receiving any enlightenment. I had, however, succeeded in remaining still and quiet for half an hour! A new record for me." I don't know if falling asleep counts, but I'll take it.

Have any of you ever had a colonoscopy? I'm due for one this week and am now (Wednesday) working my way through the first day of preparation. Today I can have oatmeal, Jell-O with topping, ice cream, milk, some soups, puddings and coffee!

I dread tomorrow though as my diet shrinks to coffee, water, tea, 7Up or Sprite, juice and plain Jell-O. Also tomorrow, starting at noon, I have to take 17 Gms. of a laxative every 10 minutes until I've consumed 255 Gms. of it. That's 15 glasses of water!

Tomorrow I will be drinking and doing other things all day long! No time to lament not eating a banana or an apple or my Cheerios! Oh, well. My doctor told me it was a test needed only every 10 years. This is my first and I sincerely hope I will have forgotten all about it within 10 years!

It would be nice if a person could enter the hospital one day a year (or 10) and take all the needed tests in one day. The hospital would be full, one day off of work (or three days off every 10 years) and it would all be done and over with.

There is probably a reason this doesn't happen. As someone who is not a doctor, or hospital administrator, or insurance officer, I can't figure it out.

For someone like me that one day a year would loom so large in my mind I'd run from it and never show up.

Everyone I've talked to about having a colonoscopy has said it's not a traumatic thing. Most of them, or their family, talk more about the "drunken" aftermath while waiting for the medicine to wear off. A medication is given IV that I think, takes six hours to get out of your system. My doctor explained that it would be like a severe drunken episode. I've never been drunk, and haven't been around people who are drunk so I have no idea what to expect.

My son and daughter-in-law have promised to stay with me until the medication is out of my system. (I won't be allowed to drive home.) I hope I don't embarrass myself while in my "drunken" state!

Until the next time folks, remember that life is a series of tests, only tests! A week from now I will have forgotten all about it and have gone back to my primary goal -- weight loss.

Come to think of it, drinking the equivalent of two weeks worth of daily laxative in one day should help me lose some weight!