Home in The Wilderness

The children of Israel made mistakes that apparently cost them the promised land, something that is arguably never really arrived to them. Who knows what their state of mind was but somehow I hope they were comforted by the possibility that it would go to their children. I never expected to be a father. Kiana’s mother and I had decided not to have kids while she was on birth control… and a few weeks later would realize she was pregnant even as we made that decision.  I’ve never once called that child an accident. She was always a surprise. And the best surprise I’ve ever known and that the world can imagine.

Kiana’s mother is still at best infuriating. She has her second extended visit with her next week where because the daycare she’s been at “allowed me to visit” she put her in another where she “allowed me to visit” but not to pick her up, that her boyfriend could do that. If there’s anyone in the world that can explain that to me, please do so. I don’t know if it’s jealousy or some issues with control but who tries to keep their children away from the primary custodian? Who tries to keep them away from their parent anyway?

Ironically, the job thought me not qualified at a call center. It was through a marketing agency who thought I was qualified but the others didn’t… Overqualified, under-qualified, and no are the answers I’ve gotten about employment.  Even willing to take a paycut I can’t get a job right now… this is starting to get scary.

The doctors disagree with each other on a strange level as mentioned before but perhaps the strangest one is weighing and thinking that perhaps the wrong part of the brain was removed… This feels like the old play about whose on first…? Still, the comforting part is that they are all in agreement that wherever the hell we are, we are in a place where the monitoring this closely is no longer required and where it looks like we avoided a death sentence.

Even discouraged as I am these days, I remembered the end of the marathon I qualified for Boston. I was hurting around mile 20 and, per medical advice, the doctors had someone finish with me and when they joined me, they said, you know if you speed up, you can probably break 3 or at least come in under next year’s BQ time. I thought about it and I said, “There’s only one goal here.” And I got it. 

I am trying to focus on the one thing that matters, Kiana, a child who was the best surprise of my life. So realizing that I am not really that strong of a candidate for anything else these days, I took down the Livestrong poster in my house, the stuffed animal of the astrocytoma and even the bracelet. Perhaps in one of those silent nods, I put it in the Boston shot glass intending to put it on again I hope or is it to put hope on Again? I’ve taken down that infinity necklace that hung in my car… perhaps giving up on relationships. I’ve taken down now some other things that were symbols of hope. I let the ultimate crowd I’m not running tournaments anymore and also have let the marathon group I started coaching that I won’t be there. Some of me is breaking down, exhausted I supposed.

But the one thing I got that is there until I die and probably well afterwards is that tattoo, the lion and his cub. I’ve been listening to Aerosmith’s “Who says you can’t go home?” . It is a great song and it has some great lyrics, who says you can’t go home, I’ve been all around the world and as a matter of fact, there’s only one place left I want to go, who says you can’t go home. And I still water the trees daring to dream that hope, home are going to stay. 

I have no idea where the future lies because some of the things I so thoroughly believed about the present and the past turned out to be lies. I’m still working, open to possibilities. I work on lumosity.com, tweaking things, realizing that I am getting better for the first time ever in a year, up 15% in the last 4 weeks. My neuropsychologist, the one most concerned about how the brain functioned and now just about keeping me breathing out of the local team thought I went back to work too soon. I did that because I assumed that in the end I would be fading and wanted to provide income to my family as long as possible. He thought I should have taken more time off and worked on the neuropsychological training as I have been doing a lot now (use it or lose it). I spent some time practicing for the GRE today in case that route happens. I am not closed to possibilities but I just don’t know where to focus right now and I want to absolutely do it with that little girl. I’ll take my home in the wilderness if I have to to get her to the promised land.