Day 235

Sitting up again last night, I scribbled two pages that I planned to transcribe onto here this morning, but I’ve canned that. Where yesterday upbeatness came from, I don’t know. To add insult to injury yesterday evening, I was stung on my left wrist on on the right side of my forehead by some insect, and now my left arm is swollen and my forehead looks like I’m about to mutate into something not far off the Elephant Man. Let’s not talk about antihistamine tablets – I have some 180mg tabs in the house that I’m reluctant to waste (I have 10 left from last summer, and they’re prescription drugs), and I can’t take over the counter antihistamines because they do odd things to me. So I’m grinning (not so much) and bearing it (sort of). And my back is rigid.

There’s not much to say into this grey morning except to wonder why we all have crosses to bear. The novel I’m reading right now (about Colombia) is remorseless violence and hopelessness. Perhaps that puts my minor ailments (at least I hope they are) into context. As do the news bulletins this morning. And my annoyance last night at Liverpool losing has evaporated – it doesn’t really matter in the scheme of things, does it?

I made a note on Sunday night that when I ask questions on here, of myself or of those few misguided folk who read it, I’m not really looking for answers, because answers are there none, and life is an unending struggle against adversities large and small. That is bleak, I know, but that’s what it feels like to me. And past happinesses are just that – past. And the future – depends on how far into the future you want to look. Although, and this is perhaps the core of it, we can change individuals’ lives with acts of kindness, and individuals can change our lives with acts of unexpected kindness. And when M, who is worrying about me and my entire physical fabric right now, came into the office a few minutes ago and hugged me and ran her hands over all those parts of me that are hurting, that changed my life for that moment and made me feel treasured and safe. That’s what love is, then, the soothing of adversities.

AGGIE’S ART OF HAPPINESS – CHAPTER 188