Supertramp - The Long Way Home

As I continue to enjoy my Satellite radio in the (still new in my heart even though it is officially a year old) car I was contemplating Supertramp lyrics the other day.

The part that got me thinking was the verse towards the end:


Does it feel that you life's become a catastrophe?
Oh, it has to be for you to grow, boy.
When you look through the years and see what you could
have been oh, what might have been,
if you'd had more time.

But, today, as I look up the lyrics, I see the dreaminess of the song:

So you think you're a Romeo
playing a part in a picture-show

Cos you're the joke of the neighborhood
Why should you care if you're feeling good

You never see what you want to see
Forever playing to the gallery

After each of those - the chorus "take the long way home".


I want to take the long way home.  I want to dream big dreams and not care what others think.
Is it too late to start?  I have dreams, but I set them aside and take the direct route home because there are things to do there - dinners to cook and dishes to wash and laundry, etc.

We can't all live carefree lives, following our dreams - we need the worker bees.
Yet, it would seem, we all have dreams.
So why are some people blessed with abilities and situations to follow them and others are not?
I suppose that is the same question as why are some people blessed with good health and others not.

More Reading

A few weeks ago I posted about a book I was reading called "Dying to be Me" by Anita Moorjani.  The main point of her story about a Near Death Experience (some would say she crossed over and came back) while she was battling cancer was that, in her opinion, FEAR was the cause of her cancer.

Hmmm, that is certainly food for thought considering that I've said several times on this blog that cancer is the thing I fear most in the world.

The author's viewpoint is that she grew up "fearing failing, being disliked, letting people down, and not being good enough" (p. 132) and all that fear caused her cancer.  OK, so I'm ahead of the game a little bit.  I don't doubt myself.  I learned early on how to be completely happy with who I am.  A birth defect will do that for you.  A cleft palate at birth left my lip deformed by a scar.  Children frequently made fun of me growing up so I adopted the attitude that if they didn't want to get to know me just because I had a scar on my lip then they weren't someone I wanted to know anyway.

So I know I'm not too hard on myself, but I do pledge to be less afraid of death by cancer.  I will try to refocus my thoughts about July 12, 2017 as a day of opportunity and new beginning.

Prognosis

I heard an interesting discussion on the radio - a medical talk channel I've recently tuned in on XM radio.  A caller said that when her father was diagnosed with Alzheimers she was able to find a special type of therapist who told them about the seven levels of the disease and what to expect in each one and they provided an assessment of what stage her father was currently in.  She found it very helpful and wanted to let others know it was a possibility.

The two doctors felt that most people would not want to know.  One indicated that it was also available for Dementia patients too.  I wish I had known!  When my mom was suffering from Dementia it seemed like it all happened so fast, especially the end.  I think I would have appreciated knowing how close we were.  I might have been more prepared or had a different focus and made different choices.

The doctors also said that years ago it was common practice to give a prognosis of the likely amount of time left for a terminal patient but now there has been a shift and doctors are told not to take hope away from the patient.  I've heard this philosophy along the lines of the power of positive thinking.  I definitely believe in positive thinking but I think it is unwise to stick our heads in the sand.  

I'd rather be told I have six months and make a personal resolution to beat it and prove them wrong and look at every day past that as a gift.  On the other hand I do like the commercial for The Cancer Treatment Center of America that says, "none of us comes with an expiration date."

Maybe It's Better I Don't Get Old

Here's something about me I don't admit very often - I don't really like old people.

Give me a room full of high school students any day over a single older person.

I know I'm not alone in feeling creeped out going into a nursing home - a lot of people feel that way.

Not my daughter - when she was younger and the Girl Scouts or Youth Group would go to a nursing home, she thought they were all so cute.  She never seemed to notice that I was staying on the perimeter and counting the minutes until it was over.

Even when my own mother was in the last stages of her life - I had NO patience with her.

I could not stand to have the same conversation time after time on the rare times I visited.

Not my son - he had a standing Wednesday night visit with her and enjoyed her stories.

And when she was in the hospital and completely non-sensical, he'd redirect her to her socks.

In my head I was screaming, "Just take your pills old woman and we wouldn't be in this hospital."

She was wanting to go look for her own mother (dead already more than a decade) and my son would say, "I like your socks" and she'd pause and look at them and say, "They're yellow" - for the fifth time in half an hour yet it was as if she had just discovered them.

While I am proud of my children and their endless patience with their Grandma, I am certainly not proud of my own impatience.  I often think maybe it is a good think if 7/12/17 is my end date and I don't have to grow old because if there is any credence to the concept of Karma, I'm due for a miserable old age.  

I know we all have our strengths.  To be the Body of Christ on Earth not everyone can be a hand, some have to be a foot.  I'm a very logical person, that's how God made me for His purpose.  But Logical and Senile just don't pair well together.  I'm okay with that.  I'm not beating my self up about my weakness, just continuing to keep my screaming thoughts inside me head whenever the need arises and knowing that I am NOT meant to serve God in the old folks home.