3 am

I've woken at 3 am. it's a Paul Simon and Garfunckel Record cliche. Kirk sent me a picture of Dan Donahue playing guitar in Winnipeg. I was wafted back too many decades to Viscount Alexander and Vincent Massey High School. Facebook has that way about it. Lifting one out of the present and casting them up on distant shores. Memories jarred. Bits of flotsam and debris. Post tsunami and Sandy's. Someone poked the middle east again to give Obama a head start. 300 missiles and 3 dead. 300 million dollars and these are 'poor people'. Our dead here in Canada die for lack of a hospital bed. They go for a thousand dollars a day in some places. My patient that jumped in front of a bus was sent home. No doubt I'll see the bus driver for PTSD and how many passengers. I saw the man on the street an hour later. St. Paul's Hospital was always chilly since the nuns no longer were in charge but that was even more chilling than normal. And they speak of global warming. Maybe God wants us to have the heat to soften our heart. It wasn't nightmares that woke me from my sleep. I've been graciously saved from apparitions. None of the ghosts of faces that died in my hands have haunted me some time. I'm no longer screaming and waking lovers. It's best to sleep alone. I still thrash at time, waking tangled in sheets. I'm thinking of going through the ice on the frozen river on the tundra in the ski foo that mercy mission, the terror of submersion, walking miles and hours in frozen clothes, polar bears. Funny how that memory should come back. It's not particularly fighting. I wasn't alone. Not like the storms at sea or the charging wounded animals intent on murder and self defence. I've made myself a coffee. Coffee is good in the wee hours. It's from Starbucks. Fine ground for the Italian stove top expresso. Lying in bed thinking of boats and motors I remembered Dad and his boat and his motor. Fishing. Was it an Evinrude or Johnson he had? 5 hp or something more. There was the canoe in later years. Orphans. Gilbert jumped up on the bed feeling my restlessness. He's an intuitive little guy. Big hearted and comforting. Licked my ears of course. Lay close, pushing his little body next to mine. Made me think of "Jesus in Disquise" the song I've been enjoying of late on the Message, Sirious Satellite Radio 63. Hard to believe Third Day's album is out at week and I've not got a copy. There last one I had first day off the stands. Maybe today I'll drop into a Christian store and buy a copy. House of James is always a great place to buy music. But they're way out in Abbotsford. I thought of writing a steaming sex scene for a detective novel that's long in coming. A chapter a season it seems, these last few years. The mind playing peek a boo in the bed till I got up and made some coffee. She undid the button on her blouse, half unconsciously at first, but sure he would notice in time. He was standing in the squad room by the copy machine, dressed in black slacks and blue unbuttoned jacket, reading the file of their latest death. Together, that morning, they'd seen the body. Again the same mo. This one a knife, like the other, but there'd been a shooting as well. She didn't like men looking at her in general. In particular she'd appreciate the attention she so often got unwanted. He looked up from the file and glanced her way. A long drink of a man, her grandmother would say. A tired half smile. He returned to reading. She wondered if he was waiting for her. Sitting at her desk, she felt her thighs touching as he looked her way. On the phone she was still waiting for a human to answer. A stream of robotic messages inviting her to punch one number or another but none yet announcing how to connect to a human. She couldn't very well expect a machine to remember when it last saw a young girl. No matter how beautiful. There I've added another bit to the ongoing novel. And they've kept their clothes on. I've got several bodies stacked in the wings in other bits. I especially like the one in the dumpster. I don't think my unconscious woke me at 3 am to write steamy detective bits. Better than nothing though. I thought of Hep C too, the patient I saw tired with the disease. In passing I thought of writing a medical review of the disease. So many at the methadone clinic have hepatitis though few have cirrhosis. The disease of alcoholism among other things. Now there's treatment but a couple of my patients have had to go back for a second round while most respond immediately. What I don't understand is why some are selected for treatment and not others. There's a criteria based on viral load and liver enzymes that's new to me. It's a staging system that's become prevalent the last year. Before the concern was overall health but now there's a new specificity with experience. I remember watching colon cancer and cervical cancer advance till they could predict who and what would give the best results when. Amazing to meet the fellow with HIV for the last 26 years, looking young and robust and healthy. Amazing what modern medicine has done. I hear luddites daily and yet can't get over the miracles I've been blessed to see this last quarter of a century. How quickly the government forgets. More screw the doctor news out of the east with governments voting themselves more and more money. Administration always thinks its all about them. Step 4 and resentments. Time for 'institutions' again. There's always the old 'anti authority' adolescent shit creeping into one's thoughts. Forgiveness. That's what's needed and amends. Prayer for sure. Meditation. Did that yesterday. Sitting alone, quiet time, listening for God, giving God a space to reboot the soul. Meditation - giving God space to reboot the soul. It's been a while since I've wanted to talk to aliens. This planet must be feeling safer this week. I don't walk about naked with a blanket as much. Not waiting for an improbability drive this day. Getting tired. Eyes drooping. Little guy went back to sleep. He has his own schedule. Likes to go to bed at 10 and get up at 6 or 7. If I wake before he licks me I sometimes see him sitting and watching me, waiting for me to wake up. If I try to sleep in that's when I get the tongue in the eye or ear. I'm fading. Back to bed. Maybe I'll get a few more hours sleep. Waking in the night isn't the terror it was when I was a gp and had no idea when I'd sleep again and a hundred people to see. This is Saturday. Disrupted sleep a luxury with a Saturday morning. Bed calls though. Gratefully. Thank you God for sleep and wakefulness.

Journal - Aug. 14, 2012

I was dreaming of a big barge of an old chevy. There was a 50's girl there, decked out in wide brimmed hat, half veil, long white gloves and a form fitting three quarter length skirt. I was wearing a white suit and fedora, classic detective clothing from the 30's. I remember her saying he was 'hunting for something'. Then I awoke.

Rolling over, I encountered a little dog head attached to a little dog body that came alive licking my face when he realized I was awake. Then he was jumping from the bed to bring me a toy. I up stumbling across the floor jumping one leg at a time into sweats while slipping into sandals I fastened on the stairs. He was flying out the door and down the dock a head of me. He still had his chewy in his mouth. Happy dog.

What a glorious day in the city! Sunny blue sky. Early morning sounds. 7 am. I was taking the dog for a walk. He was happy. My body was 'slouching towards Bethlehem". I said the Lord's Prayer to myself. Seagulls flew overhead. Already the man with the shop was working on the rear end of his GT. He's up early. No one else was a bout. None of the usual traffic. Nice walk in an industrial neighbourhood. Dog doesn't care. I'd like trees and grass. He poops on the one stretch of grass we encounter.

There's not much happening here. Not much happening inside. I'm thankful for the sunshine. August. Summer almost gone. No July to speak of. No June. Now the glorious days of August. I fear the winter. Can't think ahead to the cold rain and misery of despair. The suicidal springs and the loss of all hope. It's an annual tsunnami of grief. I wonder if I'll be up to facing it again this year. Want to somehow offer more.

Find myself missing San Francisco. Lots more mornings like this. Memory anyway. Then the endless summers of Winnipeg come back, open skies and dry heat.

I'm content here. My mind jumps about like a fish on a line. I'll be fishing this weekend. I have the capability. One step ahead of the Hound of Heaven.

Thinking of Dad. A good visit. Wanting to return to see him again. A rock in a changing world. Sitting in the sun with him talking nonsense really. Words just music to the shared time in sunshine. Connections.

Gilbert lying at my feet, happy for the walk. I'd done that religiously before I went away and now am re establishing good habits. He's curled up in a little ball. My buddy. My friend. A companion happy just to be along. No criticism, no expectation, glad to share the time and food. He does like eating my food.

We've been enjoying the toaster oven recently. Lots of cheese sandwiches. Summer grazing food. Loved the elk Roast we had at Laura's. Loved Art's elk jerky in Orlando. Already looking forward to bow hunting in a few weeks. This weekend sailing to Salt Spring Island.

I've thought about the meaning of life. I've also thought about the disparity. The economic crisis looms large with the last couple of years one after another person talking non stop about the financial difficulties. I complain about the high taxes here and two kinds of welfare, those snakes that suck the life from the top looking only to siphon off resources from government plans to line their pockets uncaring of the projects only interested in sounding like they're doing something, mostly interested in spending money and the blue collar welfare folk, those who could work but won't. Both groups free loaders and parasites on the real thing, making a supposedly lean machine swollen with lethargy and sloth. I feel like I carry the weight of the world. Struggling and supporting working more than 3 or 4 men and women and tired of the years of long hours, sacrifice and service.

The welfare system takes money from taxes to pay the fat beaurocratic wages and all the CEO's while the church donations do the major work of service. I'm doing way too much for free and pro bono and am called a 'mark' for my 'generosity'. I curse generosity. The lending of money over the years in the range of tens of thousands and every time I'm burnt like now by psychopaths whose mothers didn't raise them not bite the nipple or bite the hand that feeds.

The mind seeks a place of self pity. Self aggrandisment and self pity are always waiting to pounce on thought and steer the ideas into their direction. Self centered and selfish. Poor me, poor me, pour me another drink.

It's a glorious day. I'm drinking a cup of coffee. I've just had a great walk. I've a day of work that's bound to please the bank. I can hope a motorcycle sells today and some of the stress of finance is lifted. Maybe someone who owes me money will pay. Maybe the outstanding collectibles will come in. I'll work longer hours and more days and in the end I'll have the same Canada pension as those who didn't work. I served the government all my life but there's no pension and older I see the future and today go without to have more money should I live in a town where I can't afford to live wondering why I'm here save for relationships.

I look up and I'm confused. I keep my nose to the grindstone and life is good. Where am I supposed to be. Here I guess. What am I supposed to be doing, this I guess. It's a "living". as they say. But I look about and it seems that the scoundrels I knew who killed and maimed for profit, the liars and the cheats are now flying about the world visitting other countries and letting them see what Canada is like. I am Canadian. This is a grand country.

Self pity and self aggrandisement, twin vultures on thought. Jealousy, envy all lying beneath the surface. Run behind all the journalistic reports I read.

I'm praising God and seeking closer relationship. Should be meditating. Singing praise. It's a good day. I'm about to shower in hot water, put on clean clothing and drive a marvellous little sports car into a fine office to sit all day and serve in work. It's a priviledge and an honour. I'm blessed in so many ways. Thankful. God is great. God is almighty. I am a child of God and my role and purpose is to know God more. This is a sojourn. I'm a tourist here, an eternal being just passing through. This is a kindergarden. I'm in God's sandbox. Love is what counts. I am to be a lover not a fighter. Healing is good. Celebration of life is good. Life is good.

Thank you Jesus. This is the day the Lord has made and I am thankful for that. Hallelujah!


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