Yesterday I awoke with concerns about my breast health.  With some strange symptoms (that I won’t spell out here unless someone is super curious and asks), I immediately made an appointment with my primary care doctor who immediately referred me to the breast care center at the local hospital.  They performed an ultrasound and digital mammograms, finding little due to fibrous breast tissue, but finding enough to have some concerns.  Two dark spots on the films are suspicious and since I have a family history of breast cancer, they are taking no chances.  I am having a consult with a breast specialist on Friday to prepare me for a possible biopsy or perhaps an MRI as recommended over the phone by some doctors in my family.

After a day of panic and confusion, I had a night of ten hours rest.  Today I have a whole new outlook.  I am armed with information that makes the next steps not so scary.  I hope that I am prepared for anything.  Information is key – at least at this stage.

So, why am I telling you this besides the fact that blogging is good for getting things off your chest? (no pun intended – no, REALLY, I didn’t catch the pun until after I wrote the sentence.)  My father had breast cancer. Yes, indeed, men can get it.  My grandmother had it too.  It is so important to be vigilant. Don’t take symptoms lightly, even if you are under 40 or a man.  Do not allow the system to push you around.  Ask questions during appointments, then call back and ask more if you have more.

Today I heard a report on NPR about how much of the medical system is quantity versus quantity these days.  So how does one tell when a doctor is ordering tests to boost their incomes, to try to avoid malpractice, or to honestly help you as is necessary?  It seems like a complicated game to play as an uninformed patient.  That’s where being perspicacious comes in I suppose.

So add this to my list of things to deal with during my mid-life crisis.  Luckily, after almost 40 years of experience, I think I can handle this one emotionally.  Maybe that’s the best thing about hitting mid-life.

It seems that my husband was right, sort of. I am indeed a tad early for my midlife crisis.  Around the world, mid-life crisis has been determined to settle in at 44 years.  It is believed that mid-life crises are accompanied by enhanced depression.  Men reach a peak in depression at age 50, women reach it at 40.  (http://www.medindia.net/news/44-Years-You-may-Be-Vulnerable-to-Depression-32394-1.htm)  Considering that I’m 38, I had better work harder to curb the anxiety I feel about middle age.  Otherwise, I am going to fall into a pit from which I may never recover.

The University of Warwick and Dartmouth College study on depression, cited in Mental Health News, explains that no one knows why middle age is a “vulnerable time.”  The article states, “One possibility is that individuals learn to adapt to their strengths and weaknesses, and in mid-life quell their infeasible aspirations.  This seems reasonable.  Here are some other reasons:
- The amount of time I have ahead of me is about the same as the amount of time behind me. Sobering for any individual.
- I am now among the oldest of my friends when once upon a time I was the youngest (that would make anyone feel old and what has happened to all my older friends anyway?)
- My career always seemed like something I was trying out…now it seems like something I’m stuck with even though I’ve discovered things that would be a lot more interesting|  Ditto where I live
- I’ve realized that I can’t do everything.  Some things I must leave behind.  Some things I will never get the chance to try
-  I’m getting thicker around the middle even though I’m not gaining weight.  My body is starting to ache even though I keep myself in shape
- The world is not getting any better.  Things are getting more complicated.  It seems like there are more and more crazy extremists right on my doorstep.
- I miss the time when I thought everything will be better when I grow up – not because things were better then, but because I thought that they would get better.

A strong proponent of naturopathic medicine and a user of many natural methods to counter depression, I found this web page useful.  It provides some advice I’ve never heard.  I especially look forward to a nightly foot rub.  http://www.kitchentablemedicine.com/ten-ways-to-better-cope-with-depression/
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A few months ago, a friend was expressing concern about where money was being given for stimulus.  She ran through a long list that concerned her before citing museums.  I interuppted and said that she finally reached a subject which I could intelligently address since I worked in the cultural heritage field.  I explained that when we took money away from these institutions, it would be hard to bring back what we lose.  If you don’t fund the preservation and maintenance of artifacts, if you turn off the climate control and dismantle the collections, they are not coming back.  It took us centuries to collect, provide access to, and preserve the materials that represent our culture.  Our artifacts, archives, and books are the foundation upon which an erudite civilization lies.  They are the foundation of a free thinking society.  If we get rid of our culture, what do we have left?

I love the computer and I love to write.  I have a lot to say.  I also have a lot to do and sometimes it becomes difficult to balance it all.  I feel as if civilization is on a precipice.  This technology stuff can be really cool, but if not managed carefully it can eat into our lives.  It can take away face time from those we cherish.  It can become burdensome.  Is it possible for me to really forget what is important while my daughter is across the room eating breakfast and I’m checking e-mail?

I am not advocating for or against wrapping computer technology tightly into our lives.  I’m just looking for a balance myself and working out the kinks.

Time to go find a present for my fifteenth anniversary, pick my daughter up from school, and get myself outside.  I”m glad that I found time to shower today.

“Once in a House on Fire” is one of these books.  A memoir of growing up in an abusive household, the book is written with sensitivity and hope.  It reminds me how lucky I am and reminds me how I have the power to initiate change.  I first read this story when I was childless in my twenties and identified with the main character, a teenage girl.  Today, I am re-reading this as a mother.  I am older than the main character’s mother. I find myself torn between the character with whom I first identified ten years ago, and the older woman.  The girl is on the cusp of breaking free and starting her “real” life.  The latter is on the verge of losing what is left of herself, giving up, and declaring that she is beyond the age when she has the power to steer her own life in a new direction.

I read and re-read character driven stories, lost in the mind of others seeking to find themselves.  True stories of growth — challenges overcome, mistakes made and learned from — allow my mind to redefine itself and figure out where it fits in the world.  My shelves are lined with memoirs from the lighter easy to read Beverly Cleary’s “A Girl from Yamhill” to stories of despair turned to hope such as Frank McCourt’s “Angela’s Ashes.”  A sense of place different from my own, including stories such as “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” lift me from my chair to faraway places and lifestyles with which I can’t really identify, but appreciate.  Other stories such as “Educating Esme,” the story of a teacher’s first year in an inner city school, hit closer to home by mimicing my aspirations and sympathies.  One of the best memoirs I’ve recently read is Barack Obama’s “Dreams from My Father,” providing a clear view of the process of growing up and the shaping of beliefs.

Every life has a good story.  I give gratitude to those who help shape my life by putting their own lives on paper and make it worthy in my mind of a re-read.

One of my biggest is people who think that they own the road.  There are the people who tailgate me when I’m doing ten miles above the speed limit.  I find that people in those big Ford Explorers are often the biggest offenders in this category.  Who drives those massive things anyone?  The windows are often tinted or so high above where I sit in my little car that I can’t see the driver’s face.  Why do they need a car so big?  It comes down the road at me like Darth Vader – black and shiny and foreboding.

Then there are the people who race me for a parking spot.  These are the same people, I think, who come flying into a spot next to me as my five-year-old tries to open her door in the back of the car to get out.  I fear for our lives in parking lots.

People walking down the street can have this “own the road” attitude too.  Every morning, women walk three across in my neighborhood, chatting up a storm and not bothering to move over when a car comes by.  They may look up to smile and wave at everyone who passes – known or unknown.  It all feels so fake and Stepford wifeish.  Rather than smilling and waving at me, perhaps they can show their kindness by moving over when a car comes.

And then there are the dog walkers who let the leash so loose that their dogs run in front of my car.  Some of them don’t even bother to have a leash, thinking that the dog has the common sense to get of my car on his own.  The words dog and common sense don’t go together.  I’m a cat person.

This phenomenon of walking abreast in the street is beyond me.  I’m from New York.  In New York, if you ever venture off the sidewalk or curb, you soon find yourself scrambling back off the street in fear of your life.

In the suburban-country (for lack of a better term), where I live now, my neighbors are very into great big green lawns.  They hire help to maintain their lawns that way.  Up and down the street are parked pickup trucks pulling lawn mowing equipment.  Starting in April, I need to slalom my car down the street through the cars parked on both sides.  Why can’t they pull into driveways?  I can’t see what is coming from the other side of the street when I need to pull around them.  I am tempted to write into the newspaper to encourage them to give traffic tickets for this practice.  I don’t know if this is a ticketing offense, but it should be.

My biggest pet peeve is the driver who doesn’t bother to stop to turn right on red.  It doesn’t matter if there is oncoming traffic or not.  This is the same driver who will pull off the road to get around me when I am stopped on red and going straight.  I am tempted to leave nails off the side of the road at the light near my house to try to stop these people.

All of this mean ranting goes against my normal understanding personality.  Why does driving bring out the worst in all of us?  Impatience, rage, and uncaring are not the best of human qualities.

I did a little quick research to figure out the reasoning behind the practice of bleeping the seven dirty words. (Okay, really I looked it up on Google.)  It seems that people are trying to protect my child’s morality. However, I would be much more upset if I heard a child yell “bitch” at my daughter on the playground than if they shouted out the four-letter s word.  Why is a word that denigrates women fine to use, but the adult word for poop is not? How did we come to raise certain words on a platform and others that may be more offensive to some are left alone?

When I was a child, I cursed in front of my mother just once.  She asked me if I knew what the word meant.  When I replied that I did not, she sat me down with a dictionary and made me look up all the words that I thought were “bad” to see what they meant.  I learned from her lesson that a curse is just a word.  We can choose the words we speak carefully. We can adjust our vocabulary to suit a situation or to make an impression on the world.  Our words reflect who we are and how we want people to see us. Foul language can punctuate feelings and help us make a point.

“Blazing Saddles” has a story to tell.  My laughter is interrupted by bleeps.

How do we know what we know?  As an archivist, I find it disheartening to watch people take the first thing they find on the Internet and accept it as fact.  The same goes for books.  Just because information is in a published book — even in a history book — doesn’t make it true.  Everything we hear on the news is suspect.  I’ve had news reporters run into my archives and say “what do you have on such-a-such subject?”  Then they run out just as quickly with one bit of information in hand, even when I stand at the door yelling, “Wait!  I have more!”  They don’t care what is real, what has been made up or what is just someone’s perception of a particular event.  Never mind all the other perceptions that are documented, available, and waiting for discovery and interpretation.

It would be nice to just be able to trust someone else’s documentation or point of view.  But in reality, we need to gather information from multiple sources — original sources if possible — and come to our own conclusions.