Picking Turnips with a Step Ladder

I looked up euphemisms for death on you-can-be-funny.com. The title of this post is a fave. "Baste the formaldehyde turkey" - also charming.

Pacifica with Candradasa,
two days ago

"Top Five Regrets of the Dying"* was written by an Australian nurse who spent several years working in palliative care, with patients in the last 12 weeks of their lives.

"Ware writes of the phenomenal clarity of vision that people gain at the end of their lives, and how we might learn from their wisdom. 'When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently,'  she says, 'common themes surfaced again and again.' "

To wit:

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.
3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.
4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

I don't have any of those regrets. I suppose I regret not staying in touch with some people I've met over the years, traveling, etc., but I don't think that'd be at the top of my list. Let's see...

1. I wish in the fairly distant past I had preferred love interests based on kindness and humor rather than height and looks. 
2. I wish I hadn't smoked cigarettes. (Probably unrelated to my current predicament, but still, seems totally horrible from here.)
3. More recently, I wish I hadn't complained as much as I apparently did when I was director of the Buddhist Center. (Seems to be most of what some people remember about the eight years I was director, which makes me sad.) 

That's all I can think of, though there are possibly myriad minor regrets. In any case, all of this was the best I could at the time, and besides that everyone makes mistakes, so why regret? But one does. I'll try to let it go before before I get in the horizontal phone booth. (I find these expressions very funny, I hope you do, too.)

Currently I don't have an appointment to talk to Dr. Nelson, so I don't know what was found on the CT scan, though I have my suspicions about it. When I called, there were no appointments available, or none available soon. I sent her an email this morning asking about the results of the scan, and one to Dr. Patel (radiation onc). Dr. Patel replied that unless there was shortness of breath or pain coming from a very specific location, it wasn't worth destroying lung tissue with radiation. So I guess I'll wait to hear from her (she would have only gotten the scan results today.)

I was thinking about Misha telling me I think last week that my 'upper burner' (basically, the heart) pulse was very weak. (This does not mean in western terms that my heart is weak. Not sure what it means actually, but obviously she noted some kind of serious vitality issue in my chest.) I have a consultation with Misha tomorrow.

Talking to any of my sisters is totally fucking sad, as are many other interactions. That's the way it is now and for the foreseeable future.

I came here (Cafe La Boheme) to write, but much of what I've done so far is look up physician-assisted suicide, euphemisms for death, and answer some emails. I feel confused, though writing this felt good.

*From
http://m.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying