Tuesday, August 30
I was also limp yesterday, but less so. Today, limpness is profound. Zombie naps seem to accompany limpness, and true to form after a much-needed post lunch nap (needed because sleep suffered a long and seemingly unnecessary interruption last night) I could barely move for a half hour, and barely walk for an hour. I’ve done some imagination exercises, but even those are zombified. Everything becomes a chore, reading and understanding is an almost insuperable effort. I should probably cancel all activity on days like this, but I so look forward to walks with Roman and Tuesday evenings at Blue Bar with Erika, that I push ahead. By the time we returned home, I was feeling quite symptomatic, then within a few minutes the PD symptoms largely disappeared and left me with recovery symptoms, and merely exhausted.
Wednesday, August 31
Limp. Very, very limp. And hungry.
Thursday, September 1
A little less limp, today. I continue to be hungry. Had an appointment with an empath this evening, we worked on opening up heart energy, and the state of surrender. That was quite effective. It energized me in ways that allowed me only four hours of rather restless sleep, but barriers came down just the same.
Friday, September 2
Due to my lack of sleep, I took an early morning half hour nap so that I could be alert for the Alexander lesson at ten. It zombified me. The session was good, but after lunch I took another short nap that left me so stunned that even after another half hour wait, I had a hard time moving. And wake and shake is still an active phenomenon. I really hate both zombie naps and the wake and shakes that follow, and can find nothing to describe or explain them.
As the day grew, so did the positive after effects of the work on heart energy and surrender. It’ll be interesting to see where this goes.
Saturday, September 3
Surrender feels good; open and more relaxed. Heart energy lends spontaneity. Last night I went to bed at midnight and the next thing I noticed was dawn. Limpness backed off during the day, but put in a re-appearance in the evening. Nice day. Feeling present and internally balanced and strong. Movement is different, perhaps better.
Sunday, September 4
Last night after an hour’s sleep, I woke up urgently needing to do something, but by the time I was on my feet I had forgotten what it was. I did note, however, that I was not at all sleepy, so to pass the time I took up my phone and searched a boyhood friend, David John Pace. I had searched him many times, since the dawn of the Web, but there was never enough biographical information for me to distinguish him from the dozens of David Pace’s that populated the results. Last night there was plenty of info – in his obituary. He died of cancer in October 2020.
He had started out as a musician and transformed into a much loved and highly regarded photographer. For some reason, I thought I’d heard that he took over his father’s wholesale business. Far from it. For ten years he documented daily life in a tiny African village, living there three months out of the year. That I had missed re-connecting with him made me profoundly sad. Our last experience together was dropping acid in Santa Cruz in 1972.
The Guardian published his first photos taken with a Hawkeye camera he received as a gift for his eighth birthday. The banner photo was of a group of kids in Halloween costumes, “in his family living room”. His family living room was all white, so I knew the location was not correct. I looked more closely. It was in my family’s living room, not his. Our friendship survives. Our lives were separately experienced after the age of twenty-two, but still intertwined.
News of David’s death kept me awake most of the night, and put me in a funk all afternoon. But Irina swooped in with daughter Anya, took me to the cat park, walked me into four laps on the sagrato, then we spent a wonderful half hour playing catch in Piazza del Duomo, me in my wheelchair.
Monday, September 5
Surrender, aka, gratefully working with what you’ve got. Heart energy, being open to the natural state of things. With those perspectives I am suddenly aware of subtle changes in how I feel that are difficult to describe, but very encouraging.