"prescription"

On the Dr. Oz Show the other day, Dr. Oz was talking about coffee addiction. One of the points he made in passing was that it takes the body twenty-eight days to detoxify itself after you stop taking the addictive substance.

After two and a half years of use, I have been off the Temazepam that was prescribed by the sleep clinic doctor, for eleven days. Except for really sore places and severe muscle cramps that may or may not be related, I am doing well. My brain is coming back along with my memory and, I think, my creative ability.

Just to bring you up to speed in case you missed it, I went to my family doctor on October 17 to renew the prescription for my sleeping pills. The above mentioned Temazepam was prescribed in the spring of 2007 to help me sleep while wearing my CPAP mask for my sleep apnea. When he saw what I was taking, he became somewhat upset, and told me I couldn't take that because aside from the fact that it is quite addictive, it has a significant side effect for people over sixty 50 significantly decreasing mental ability and memory, in effect mimicking dementia.

I have to tell you that my wife and I had discussed the possibility that I was exhibiting symptoms of Alzheimer's, as I was having great difficulty remembering things, and becoming stymied by software programming problems that used to be easy for me, and most important, my duplicate bridge scores were going down precipitously.

I celebrate the release from this strange situation in "prescription", which you can see by clicking on the above title. It's not quite over, as I still have seventeen days ago, according to Dr. Oz.

easy

I wrote this poem after meeting my cousin, (let's call her Mary) whom many years ago, my sister and I babysat many times, back when we did not know she was our cousin, once removed. A little over twenty years ago, Mary found her biological mother, my first cousin, who acknowledged her but blocked Mary's contact with her children (Mary's half-sisters and half-brothers) and the rest of the family. Mary finally discovered where I live, but was afraid to contact me until she saw my picture in a magazine and decided to call. Mary lives about an hour and a half away. The story is more convoluted that this, but in deference to her mother's wishes I am blurring things. You may not sympathize with her mother's obstinacy, but it is rooted in the attitudes of the 1940s, when marriage out of wedlock was serious business that made Mary one of the "Butterbox Babies". That scandal has been the subject of at least one book.

Mary has children who know her story, as does my branch of the family, now. She is a witty, accomplished woman with sons and daughters, all of whom are married and have their own children. But she has this ache to know her mother's family. I am so pleased to be a chink in the wall to her family. Welcome home, Mary.

"The Colours of the Day"

I took this photo today after I finished raking. This is part of what I was talking about in the poem.