The Bitter and the Sweet (Fifty First Weeks)

The whole "Fifty First Weeks" idea was aimed at the potential to start over, channel amnesia, discard mistakes, make fresh starts. At the moment, the "fresh start" idea is beleaguered. Every day that I act a certain way, I'm scoring an ever-deeper groove in the mire, and the soil I displace pushes up on either side of that groove, creating walls that block any deviation.


Term's over, pressure's off, but things are not easy here. There has been some sweetness too, though, so let me start with that before I get to the bitter part.

The Sweet

Mother's Day brunch yesterday, and Leslie has chicks!

Lots of chicks. And they are adorable. Not tiny now,  and their personalities are starting to come out. Chickens are so much fun...It made me nostalgic for Hawaii.


Getting right into the spirit, both Leslie and Roxy have chicken outfits--super sweet (and silly)! 

And as for a sweet taste on the tongue, here's something I brought to the brunch.

These are black abada dates and barhi dates, each stuffed with a very quick raw vegan sugar free marzipan filling! 
Medjools are the only dates in the stores up here (except for the occasional pitted deglets, which are steamed, so I don't buy them--a shame, as I love deglets). I've mentioned before that I don't care for medjools--they're the modern-day-agricultural version of dates, super big, super sweet, less minerals, more sugar. So, when I saw that Shields Date Garden was having a sale on some of my favorite varieties of heritage dates, I went overboard and ordered up fifteen pounds of each! That should last a couple years...


Barhis were everyone's favorite in the raw food community in CA when I lived there, and were very hard to get because they always sold out so fast. What a treat to have an abundance of them. Abadas--I love how they're black and shiny--anything that color must be high in minerals. Abada is the name of a branch of my family, so I feel even more connected with them.


And how did I make that marzipan stuffing, you ask? Easy--
2 tablespoons raw almond butter, softened
1 tablespoon raw coconut butter, softened
1/2 tablespoon almond extract
1 tablespoon powdered xylitol


Stir all together and stuff into pitted dates!


Given my excitement to share these wonderful less-usual varieties of date, it took the wind out of my sails a bit when pretty much everyone at the party said they preferred medjools. I wish my moral judgment against medjools as agriculturally processed/demineralized/oversized/oversugared didn't interfere with my reception of other people's taste preferences--I try not to let it do so. Mostly, I was disappointed that everyone else wasn't as excited as I was about the other varieties of date! But medjools are the prototypical, generic date for most Americans, so I shouldn't have been surprised at the reaction of "Dates? Medjools!"


Whoa there, a little bitterness creeping into the sweet section!
I guess I'll call it a transition...

The Bitter

My Facebook status update on Friday:

Ela Harrison Gordon

Friday

Teaching-done. MFA coursework-done. RWW thesis editing-done. And now three different experts and my bloodwork say time to cash in. No way! Not NOW!!

Perhaps that sounds playful, as several people "liked" my status. But things are not easy here. The huge pressure of work of the last months has lifted, but I have a mountain to climb. I went into my naturopath appointment on Friday angry at all the drama and scaremongering people were doing about my health status. 

My naturopath, whom I love and trust, and was expecting to back me up that there was no need for the drama, had my bloodwork in his hand, and told me he was sorry, but he agreed with everyone else.

I feel like the elephant in the room.

So, now what? 

Remember my turmeric root I posted about?

Here's what it looks like today.

Since I've even written a poem comparing my shriveling to that of the turmeric root, this is poignant indeed. And sadly predictable.


I'm on my third day off caffeine, though, trucking through the headache and the unmasked fatigue. That's a good thing. 
We're "exploring options," but I'm facing having to miss out on a lot of things I'd rather be here for--in order that I may be here long term, they say. I still don't think the situation is that serious. They say that's part of why it is serious. Bitter, bitter.

Hanging out in Anchorage, Side Street Espresso, Workshop Aftermaths

A happy Wednesday! Our last day spending time with David and Heather et al until we don't know when - pouring rain here, a change of pace for Phil and me both, hanging out in the city, going to coffee shops, etc.

But it's so good to see Phil again!

Monday night we camped out, not too far from the road, in the brush - a compromise between Phil and me for sure - he'd have gladly gone for miles, I was so exhausted I could barely make it the few hundred yards we went. At least it was dry that night - and there were some amazing fungi, their fruiting bodies further harbingers of fall, on our route - check out this amanita!

Beautiful but deadly.

Last night we stayed with a friend. It is so good to catch up with people, but I'm finding it's way harder to keep on top of myself, blood sugar, etc, when we're in this hanging-loose kind of mode, than it was at the writing workshop, with a schedule and with the imperative to be on form to absorb everything. There's the cumulative effect from tiredness from that too, I guess, and it's interesting to note that when I'm not doing significant amounts of creative writing in a day, my energy seems lower. (Kind of like how Phil feels out of sorts if he doesn't get a ton of exercise in of a day. Right now, he's donned raingear and his new running shoes, and has gone off on a hike/jog to pick up some huge pieces of discarded iron he noticed somewhere and bring them back to the truck!)

My experience this second round of chelating is that it makes me feel pretty crappy, especially by the third or fourth day. Cranky, skin crawling, guts unhappy, achey (muscles and bones), blood sugar even more delicate. Hopefully those are all symptoms of mercury etc exiting my body, and hopefully things will feel much better when this is over!

We've spent the last three mornings at Side Street Espresso - our friends' favorite coffee shop in downtown Anchorage. The owners are super friendly and know everyone by name. And they have bengal spice tea, my favorite! There's lots of really interesting artwork all over the walls, and apparently the display changes every month. And every single day there's a special coffee drink, named for a real or fictional personality, who is represented in a cartoon drawn by George (one of the owners) himself!

Here's a slightly goofy shot of David and Heather, showing some of the decor too.

Back by the bathroom is a little gallery of several previous cartoons. 

Once a year, the artwork of the month in there is entirely composed of these cartoons, and people have the opportunity to buy them. Today, when we went in, the gentleman pictured in the cartoon du jour was sitting right there in the cafe!