Xanthia's MS Life

Years ago I got very sick and lost my voice. It was sublime. I couldn't even make a mousey squeak. At first it was upsetting, then I learned to accept it and then finally I actually began to enjoy it. For a solid two weeks I couldn't make a sound but even into the third week it was still a challenge to speak so I chose not to. I used a note pad to communicate or I just pointed at things I wanted. I would go to the grocery store and the clerk would ask how I was and I would nod and smile or do a thumbs up. "Paper or plastic?" and I would point. I began to listen differently. I spent many hours in coffee shops listening to conversations and it all began to sound trite. My perception of how we relate to one another shifted simply because I lost that mechanism which most of us share and which I took for granted. It was as if I was holding my breath in a swimming pool listening. Listening.

I was sad when my voice returned but I haven't forgotten the lesson of that experience. It was a serene Zen-like place that I miss. At least one day out of the month I think I'll make the world a swimming pool, hold my breath and listen.

I'm sorry this is a rather long post but these lyrics express perfectly how I've been feeling about life lately and since my own words seem to be failing me more often than not I'll borrow them from the poetry of Spearhead instead. The final line sums up everything "Love like your life depends on it because it does." ~X

You don't have to be so scared to share what's inside
'cause you're Daddy's little superstar
and you're Mama's little butterfly
fly high

A strange strange litany of verses and reverses
adlibs and rehearses
clouds burst and words cursed
an argument breaks out
it's one we've all heard before, it's boring
had us all snoring from the first line
one after another chimed in perfect time
tired rehashes of petty cashes and mismatches
you shoulda coulda's
and "why didn't 'tcha dida's"
crippling snippets aimed at the heart
to inflame and impart blame framed like Mumia
verbal diarrhea
creating chasms between the souls of two
or two billion
nations torn apart
station to station damnation
with much deliberation and very little consideration
to the return on the damage from the altercation
collateral condemnation
then denyin' like colorization of an old black and white
create a revision of the recent last night
the fight that started with two words, "I'm right"
(chorus)
You don't have to be so scared to share what's inside
'cause you're Daddy's little superstar
and you're Mama's little butterfly
fly high

But of course the fight ends with no resolution
merely a vow for retribution, substitution, execution, electrocution
ruthless, toothless and truthless
mumbling through page after page of excuses
abuses of the gift of the gab
Gabriel the trumpeter
bestowed upon us a voice with a choice
and a tongue kept moist by years of salivating
for oysters.. pearls and aphrodisiacs
locked in an ugly shell always too chewy and gooey
so they get swallowed whole
but a tongue is so much more than a vehicle for greed
a tongue is for washing fur
or for licking wounds
or for welcoming newcomers into a room
or cleansing those fresh from the womb
without a tongue there would be no croons
swoons, Junes under the moon
no bees pollinating no flowers in bloom
no recitation of words at the foot of a tomb
or wills read aloud of the family heirlooms
you probably couldn't even blow up a balloon
and that would be a shame
because to exhales the name of the game
exhale from the heart not from the lungs
speak from the heart not from the tongue
(chorus)

Listening is understanding and finding compassion
love is the action of soul satisfaction
a tongue can make wishes and also fine kisses
taste a sweet cake and also cast disses
but nothing compares to the voice from within
without it we might just be mannequins
up to no darn good shenanigans
learn to be skilful movers of the stones that block the heart
and turn humans to clones
learn to forgive, set free the bones
touch with your flesh, take off the rubber gloves
love like your life depends on it
because it does

Speak from the Tongue by Spearhead

Spring has finally arrived in Minnesota. I can't help but feel illogically optimistic. Sunshine and warm weather does that to me. My lawn is turning green, my tulips are coming up, the song birds have returned..it's enough to make any single girl's head fill with one thing...no not homicide...love, or in my circumstance the futility of trying to find it. As a single woman with an incurable and mysterious disease it has become increasingly obvious that I may as well have the scarlet letters MS pinned to my shirt. Men don't want to date "sick" women, not seriously anyway. If I were to reveal my illness on a date it would end it right there. Oh yes, it's happened to me more than once. And so I give up. I live my life vicariously through my friends and try to find happiness there. I hate spring.