There’s absolutely no reason to read this unless we’re close.

As I write this, I’m lying on my couch after another night of vomiting.

As many of you know, I’ve had many episodes like this over the last several months. We’re ruled out food poisoning, an infection, etc. We’ve ultrasounded where my gall-bladder used to be to see if a stone got left behind. We’ve done a test to see if I have a blockage in my system. No and no.

The vomiting is happening in a certain context, however. I have bile in my stomach now that the gall-bladder is gone. Due to a hernia at the top of my stomach that prevents the stomach from ever closing all the way, bile and acid frequently reflux. My esophagus spasms (it’s weird until I remember that all of my muscles are prone to spasming). Ever since my gall-bladder surgery two years ago, I’ve woken up with digestive issues. (This is normal for a little while, but not for two years.) I have to take at least half an immodium a day to go to work.

This is all gross, which is why most of you don’t know about it.

My gastro-interologist has narrowed things down a bit. So here are the current theories–something called abdominal migraine (of course I would get that). Vomiting due to the bile reflux (though it should be more frequent in that case) or from a worn system from the stress it’s under (again, it should be happening more).

The gastro-doc is leaning toward the first problem; however, that’s something for my neurologist to deal with, and she’s incommunicado cause she’s on maternity leave.

We’re also going to take a picture of my brain. Just cause.

I’m gonna build up a little more strength this morning and then demand some attention from neurology.

Full days in Vancouver: 1
Pots of good tea: 3
Salmon servings: 1
Nando’s visits: 1
Friends caught up with: 2
Books read: 2*
Eardrums totally messed up from the plane: 1
Books acquired at MLA exhibit: 11
Total dollars paid for the above books: 25

At the Convention Center

*The books were Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal (amazing) and the third in the All Soul’s Trilogy (good fantasy fun).

I haven’t blogged much this year. This is partly because it’s been a crazy (busy) year, but it’s also partly because it’s been a pretty awful year in many ways. Some lowlights: replacing two cars (one replacement is a lemon that is in the shop as I write this); several trips to the ER; most of the year in physical therapy; between 2-7 medical appointments each and every week (expensive + time consuming!); Grandma dying; Vanessa moving away; taking in Mindy (not because Mindy is awful, but just because having to deal with another person in our too small place and having her disabled & thus needing to move in is awful); several medical procedures.
All of this happened in a year in which I taught 18 courses, served on several committees, edited the Atwood journal, edited Prized Writing, ran the upper division comp exam, edited a collection on Atwood for Cambridge, and hit quite a few conferences.
In short, I’m tired and fairly cranky from being tired and being in pain.
I’m really hoping that 2015 is a lot better. As a symbol of starting that, let’s talk about the good things that happened this year:
My classes were generally good. Some were very good. An independent study I did with an honors student was awesome. Teaching was a wonderful break from everything else.
I have become one of the favorite people of Artemis, the cutest baby in Davis, who gets to come over to my house at least once a week.
My boyfriend is awesome and our time together is consistently enjoyable, as we provide each other a refuge from the rest of the world.
My friends are amazing. They are supportive, generous, and thoughtful. I’m especially grateful to have been able to travel with Melissa and with Vanessa, to see Vanessa and Tiffany this holiday. Plus, friendship usually involves good wine.
I’ve been able to see some great plays and other live events, most notably in Ashland and here at Mondavi, where I caught Willie Nelson and Mike Birbiglia.
I’ve read some great books. Some I’ve mentioned here earlier in the year. A few more favorites: The Goldfinch–beautifully written. We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves–my favorite book of the year–set in Davis, thoughtful, compelling, gorgeous. The Kingkiller Chronicles–picked this up on a lark–so good, so well paced–could not put them down. The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared–dry Scandinavian wit resulting in a very fun read. The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic–this is sort of a cross between Outlander and The All Soul’s Trilogy.

Here’s to more of the good stuff. And now, just because, comet Lovejoy:

Despite everything, I have been able to get a bit of reading done. Below are some brief reviews:

We Can Fix It!: A Time Travel Memoir by Jess Fink. I didn’t finish this. A woman time travels back to see her younger self. She ends up having sex with her younger self. Repeat. Repeat. And it’s not even sexy. No time travel paradoxes are even mentioned. From the part I read, there was no real point. It seems more like a masturbatory fantasy in graphic novel form than anything else.

The Property by Rutu Modan. Another graphic novel–a good read about a family that travels back to the old country to attempt to reclaim a property that was lost when the family had to flee Europe during WWII. Well-drawn, solid story.

Gris Grimly’s Wicked Nursery Rhymes. This wants to be Gorey and Gaiman. It’s not.

Batman Incorporated by Grant Morrison. Batman begins to start franchising himself so more cities have his trademark protection. Fine idea and all, but I’m just not into it enough to keep going.

When David Lost His Voice by Judith Vanistendael. I couldn’t finish this one either. It’s described as a “tone poem”–those are tricky enough to get through sometimes when they aren’t in graphic novel form.

The Middleman and Other Stories by Bharati Mukherjee. I picked this up recently because I’d read and enjoyed “The Management of Grief,” about people who gather after their relatives’ plane has gone down near a foreign small town. I like the beginning of another story here, “A Wife’s Story,” which begins with an Indian woman watching Glengarry Glen Ross and having a bit of a fit about the characters’ casual racism. But then something happens common to most of the collection–richly described characters experience angst. They are just about to do something that will shift their lives, and then the story ends. We don’t get to see whether they’re lives get shifted, how it feels to have sex with that stranger, to quit the job, etc. I felt empty at the end of almost every tale.

The Surrogates by Robert Venditti and Brett Weldele. Another graphic novel–this time presupposing a world in which surrogate bodies have mostly replaced ours. We send our avatars (younger, fitter) out in to the world to have sex with our husbands, to catch criminals, etc. (Crime is actually down because hurting the avatar is only property damage.) Yet there’s rebellion from those who believe we should encounter the world in flesh. Will we be ready to if they win?

Blasphemy by Sherman Alexie. This is a collection of classic and new stories. I love Alexie and find his short fiction often superior to his novels. Perfection.

Gail Carriger’s series: The Parasol Protectorate and The Finishing School. I had unfortunately tried to read the second book in the Parasol series, not realizing I had book 2, some years ago. Reading both series in the right order has been wonderful. It’s steampunk fiction. Parasol is for adults–set in Victorian England–in which our smart heroine must deal with a world in which steam power reigns and in which vampires and werewolves live alongside the sometimes inhospitable humans. The writing is light and sexy (especially in the first book). Our heroine’s moments of panic are usually both because someone is trying to kill her and because fleeing might expose an ankle. The Finishing School series is for young adults and is set in a finishing school for female spies and assassins. It serves as a prequel to the Parasol series, as some of our young ladies have grown up for Parasol. So good.

On Friday, April 11th, Ian and I headed in with a full crowd to see Peter Sagal, host of Wait Wait, Don’t Tell Me. The Mondavi center promised a behind the scenes look at our favorite weekend show, but Sagal gave us a talk about a miniseries he did with PBS instead: Constitution USA. Sagal introduced us to several people, all of whom believe in the Constitution, all of whom have very different ideas about what it’s meant to do for them.

My three take-aways: 1. Sagal is funny in person too. 2. He pointed out that our constitution is the first and shortest, because our founders were smart enough to know it should be brief and vague enough to let us adapt it as we evolved. 3. The Constitution only works because we believe in it. Lots of other countries have one–many of them are repressive regimes. Their constitutions are sick jokes–more like PR for the international community than a document that makes rules and guarantees rights for their peoples. As Sagal said, our constitution is like Tinkerbell, and we gotta keep clapping.

I was disappointed that we didn’t really get to talk about Wait, Wait, disappointed in Davis for booing when he mentioned that we used to be Berkeley’s farm (we did–why shame him for bringing it up, even if he did find it funny?), disappointed that even with Q&A, we only got an hour and a half. On the other hand, it’s half an hour more than I usually get with him.

Later today, I will finally get my xolair shot, only three full months after I was supposed to get the last one.

It took me being on the phone with several different people for hours. It took my shot nurse doing the same. It took my medical advocate doing the same. It took faxes and pdfs and tears.

Those of you who have been following the saga know that I used to pay $9/month for my xolair (thanks to Genentech’s xolair assistance). Blue Shield told me for over two months that I would pay $125/month + 40 for the nurse visit. Yet I couldn’t order the drug because BS was telling the pharmacy something else. Then BS told me that they had been wrong–all five people I’d talked to were just wrong–and that my copay was just under $1100/month (+40).

Here’s what we now know actually happened:

BS was wrong on their authorization form–they listed a pharmacy that was actually out of my network (“that was an error”); that cost me a week.

BS was wrong when many, many people told me to set up an account with the pharmacy and to order the drug. The letter they sent me, addressed to me, addressing me in second person (“your provider . . .”), was, they admit, “confusing” as it seemed to also tell me that I had to order the drug, when, in fact, the doctor’s office was supposed to do it.

BS was wrong when they tried to bill $1100–both because I was apparently not supposed to order the drug myself, but also because that copay would only apply to this drug if I had an out of network doctor. My plan is the UC Care plan, made especially for UC Davis Employees who use UC Doctors. My doctor works at the UC Davis Medical Center. When I get bills from there, I have to write checks to the Regents of UC Davis. When I got switched to this plan, I called BS to confirm that all of my doctors, including this one, were in my network. So how could I possibly expect them to get this right, even when the authorization lists this very doctor as being one of their providers? Silly me.

My copay is actually zero. I will have to pay $40/month to see the nurse, so under the new insurance plan, my cost goes up $31, which is, of course, fine. I just wish I were allowed to make this many mistakes as a patient/bill payer. I just wish my lungs hadn’t been hurting for a couple of months. I just wish I could get all those hours back.

And I wish they weren’t giving me more BS about a procedure I need on my neck, turning it down.

How am I supposed to trust them now?

(In other news: my students’ stand-up performance is here: http://webcast.ucdavis.edu/llnd/1bf40024 I’m the MC, so I do some stuff at the start and in-between. I was basically workshopping all new stuff, so it’s not polished.)

I haven’t been in the kind of contact that I want to be with most of you. Part of it is that I’m busy. Part of it is that I don’t necessarily want to talk about how I am.

I was really hoping that this year would be better than last. Last year was busy (no surprise), but also difficult due to my gall bladder, an amazing cervical spine headache that started in summer, and a car accident, which resulted in hours of physical therapy each week (it’s only ended last week).

This year hasn’t been easier so far. I’ve already written about my grandmother dying last month. What I haven’t said yet is that, while she was sick, this particular time of death didn’t have to be. What I haven’t said yet is that I’m angry about some of my mother’s decisions and angrier about her refusal to acknowledge them.

Next month, I will return home during Spring Break. My family is waiting to put the ashes in the ground until I get back. I need to try to have a calm conversation in which I explain to my mother that she can’t change my grandfather’s medicines, etc. without notifying the doctor. But she’s going to get defensive, and we’re going to have a fight, and I’m stressing about it.

The other thing I haven’t said is that it really sucks to be the only woman in the world with the middle name Jewreen. Before, there were two of us.

As for myself, three things are going on physically. Today I have a tube going from my stomach, out of my nose, and to a recorder. It’s testing the ph of my acid reflux and also checking to see if some of the reflux ix actually bile, now that we know I have some bile in my stomach. I am very uncomfortable, doubting I’ll be able to sleep tonight, and looking forward to getting it out after my classes tomorrow. Some of what we’ll learn will determine if the doctor thinks I need surgery for the hernia in my esophagus.

My inclination is not to have surgery; however, the drugs I’m on haven’t been controlling my reflux symptoms like they used to. And I’m on the highest dose of things.

I was finally able to see someone at the pain clinic for this cervical spine headache in December. We are looking at doing a nerve burn in my neck–pain medication isn’t doing anything, nor are the non-invasive things like massage, etc. Friday, I had a nerve block, a sort of test to see if the nerve burn would work. The very temporary block had wonderful effects, although I’m sore and swollen from the procedure. My insurance company wants me to have another test block done before they approve the burn, which would be longer lasting.

Lastly, one of the drugs I need, xolair, is expensive and weird. When my insurance changed at the start of the year, I had to try to get reauthorized for it. It’s now almost the end of Feb–I’ve been off my drug for almost two months. Both my nurse and I have spent hours on the phone with insurance and hours on the phone with the specialty pharmacy. It looks like I might finally be able to get back on the drug next week, though my copay will be lots higher. And then the insurance company wants to reevaluate in June. Every dose they can prevent me from having saves them thousands of dollars.

The other big news is that my aunt Mindy is not doing well. She is now basically too disabled to work. She has been living with my cousin for the past few months. My cousin’s husband, however, is getting transferred to Guam. My aunt has been unsuccessful so far in getting insurance, etc. (The Southern States have not expanded medicaid to poor adults.)

The short version of this is that Mindy will be coming to live with me at the end of Spring. It will be a bit tight–I don’t have the money right now to move us to a three bedroom. But I at least should be able to get her the care she so desperately needs.

Work is fine. The students are understanding about papers coming back two days late the week Gma died. They are understanding and sympathetic about the awkwardness of a tube coming out of my face today. My stand-up class is a joy.

I gave a smart and amazingly attended presentation at a Writing Teacher’s Conference in January. Had a good MLA. I’ve applied to be the coordinator for the Upper Division Comp exam. I’ve got a paper coming out on (a)sexuality in Sherlock. The Prized Writing Ceremony went swimmingly–the Chancellor was there for the first time, and she enjoyed it so much that we’ve already scheduled next year’s so she can be there. I’ll present at pca/aca in April (no more conferences for the year, though–too broke). The Margaret Atwood journal is going online. I’ve been contracted by Cambridge for an Atwood collection. The authors are writing now. Denise and I are putting together a Simpsons collection. Melissa and I are putting together a collection of best comp paper assignments. There are and will be plays and movies and, in April, Willie Nelson. Book group still gathers here for food, wine, and cats. When HBO or BBC is doing something good, there are weekly movie nights too. The boyfriend cooks for me and distracts me and pleases me. Alexander is generally in good spirits. He doesn’t love all of his classes. (His classes are part of me being broke.) But we get along well.

Just today, he reminded me that I wasn’t allowed to use the microwave (due to the weird machine I’m wearing). Then, when I thoughtlessly went to the microwave half an hour later, I got the same tone from him that the cats do when they jump on the counter.

My friends are lovely. I miss you and love you all.

Valentine’s Day tends to be celebrated in a sexist way. That is, rather than being a celebration of two people’s love, it is a holiday in which men are expected to spend money and plan surprises. I’ve always thought that both women and men should give gifts (if gift giving is part of the holiday for the couple), that both should plan, etc.
One year, with an ex, I decided I wanted a roomba. We went in on it together. Best Valentine’s gift ever–it has spared my back a lot of agony.
Part of the reason that the holiday has morphed into this one-sided money orgy, however, is that, for many women, this is one of the two times a year that romance is possible. Today and on their anniversary, they are told they are loved. They receive physical proof of his love.
And that’s part of why I don’t like the day. If Valentine’s Day is the almost only day you have romance in your life, then what is going on in your relationship?
(It’s also why I don’t like the idea of what many men refer to as “Steak and Blowjob” day. Why would you only want that once a year?)
In the relationships wherein I’ve been happiest, romance has happened all year long.
Don’t get me wrong–I’m not getting flowers all the time or serenades or chocolate.
The key, you see, is having two things:
–a thoughtful partner
–a better understanding of what romance is
To illustrate, let me share a story of my favorite couple, my grandparents. My grandmother, a great lover of romance novels, had a more traditional understanding of romance–flowers and candy and whatnot.
My grandfather’s children would sometimes find things my grandmother would like for Valentine’s Day and prompt him to buy them. One such weird object was a rose that had been dipped in gold. He bought it for her. She loved it. I’m not sure he would have ever thought to buy it himself. I’m not sure he should have thought of it.
My grandfather demonstrated romance every day. Whatever little thing might bother my grandmother was something he attempted to fix. Her back hurts? Here’s a hot tub. The phone cord keeps getting tangled? Here’s one guaranteed not to do that.
When she got older and had trouble going outside, he would go out every morning, pick a rose from their garden, and present it to her.
Women often complain that men don’t just *know* what they want. Even when they drop hints.
Women: what hints are you dropping?
For example, if you mentioned that you were having trouble having a healthy lunch and he started packed them for you, then perhaps it’s time to forgive him for not just *knowing* that you want a cliche heart necklace today.
Of course, I’m presupposing that your partner does love you, does listen to you. Not every partner is giving. Not every partner is loving. Not every partner is attentive. In those cases, him giving you chocolate on the one day that all of society tells him to isn’t romantic, either. Obligation doesn’t equal love.
I’m also framing this critique with men giving to women. Women can be just as guilty of not being romantic, loving, giving, attentive. Ladies, do you know what he really wants as a gift? Do you present him with surprises throughout the year? Love should go both ways.
It should also be noted that romance doesn’t always equal love in the way we think it does. One of my most chivalrous lovers was also the one who left me when I was almost nine months pregnant with his child. I’ve had a man hitchhike across Canada and then sneak across the border to be with me. I’ve had men write songs about me. I’ve had flowers and candy and people climbing trees to woo me on my balcony. I’m not with those people now, for various reasons.
Tonight I will have cocktails, wine, fancy appetizers, dinner, and dessert. It’s a gift my guy and I are giving to each other.
The bottom line?
Ladies, if you want something *special* this year, then tell him what you want. And don’t tell me it will take away the surprise. The fact that you and society believe he HAS to do something special today and only today means there’s no real surprise anyway.
If you do want actual surprises, then V Day is a silly time to want them.
And think about surprises. What if, on a Tuesday in June, he did something really thoughtful for you? Would that surprise you? If so, that’s sad, because wouldn’t you like him to be thoughtful all year?
And shouldn’t you be thoughtful back?
Maybe the best way to be thoughtful, by the way, is to take some of the more extreme expectations off of this day.
Your question shouldn’t be: What will he do for Valentine’s Day?
Here are the questions:
Does he love me?
Does he show it (whether or not showing it means money for you)?
Does he accept me for who I am?
Does he make me want to love him, to show it, to accept him?
Gee, would he like some flowers and candy?

Here’s one of my favorite pictures of my grandparents, from two years ago when they renewed their vows.

Courses taught: 5

Papers graded: 870, not counting homework

Book contracts for an edited collection on Margaret Atwood given by Cambridge: 1

Car accidents: 1

Hours of physical therapy per week for over two months: 3-6

Nieces and nephews born: 2

Books read for work: about 20

Books read for pleasure: None, I think, even over break.

Upper GIs: 1

Cancers found by Upper GI: 0 (yay!)

Conference panels chaired: 2

Book chapters written and sent to editors: 2

Margaret Atwood Journal issues out: 1

Minor foot surgeries: 1 (a redo, since the Jan doc did it so badly)

Campus Book Project talks given: 1

Campus Book Project talks chaired: 3

Campus Book Project books chosen: 1

Plays attended: 3

Awesome Halloween costumes: 1

Mix CDs produced: 3

Kittens fixed: 2

Kittens taught to stay off the desk and counters: 0

New Recipes Tried: probably 15-20

New mentees for the Guardian Scholars Program: 1

Trips to take the boy’s car to the shop: 2

Letters of recommendation written: 6

Types of bitters homemade by me, Vanessa, Rae, Marina, and Melissa: 5

Trips to wine country: 2

Here’s to a better year (all the good stuff, but less of the silly medical stuff)!