Clear & freaked out (in a good way)

 So I've spent the past week as you know, recovering slowly from the bout of colitis. It is a long, 10-mg-steroid-tapered process, but it is working. 

I've thought A. LOT. even for me. And I know that once I get back on the clinical trial, I have a 50/50 chance of having another colitis flare-up, in which case I am off of the clinical trial, and looking for another treatment. It scares me of course, but something is happening over here: my general outlook on things is evolving. It's freaking me out a little, if I'm being honest.

Clarity: I can't go to that 50% place of darkness, not now. I have to go day by day, listen to my body. If it becomes inflamed again, well, this is not the drug for me, even if it does keep the cancer in check. If it doesn't become inflamed again (because it turns out there's also a 50% chance it won't), on we go, into the great blue investigational-agent yonder. 

More clarity: all this time dealing close-up with my own mortality has really helped me focus and edit. There are 2 things in my life (besides friends and family, people, duh) that give me pleasure and purpose: one is writing: I think this is what I have to offer the world, my small gift, something that could be of use to others. The other is baking -- it's not quite as important or noble in its quest as the writing, but the process of it is calming for me, and the results often make other people very happy. Right, so these tare my focuses/foci. If it's not about writing or baking, I'm not bothering with it or about it. 

One thing I did while recovering was get a new Kitchenaid mixer. The one I have now is about 25 years old and I've never cared for it all that much -- it was a present from an ex, who deliberately bought it for me in the color HE wanted (red), instead of the color I asked for (buttermilk yellow).  (He was 23 at the time). But it has worked this whole time and so I've used it. My birthday falls at the end of the month, and so I let my beautiful spouse buy me a new one (birthday/xmas/hanukkah combo gift) because,  life is short get the mixer you want right? 

My first project with the new mixer will be to bake a retirement cake for Mrs T., a lovely friend of my sister's, and a fellow labor & delivery nurse at the hospital. She started working there as a candy striper when she was 12 years old, went to nursing school, etc., and now is retiring at 70. She has been such a good friend to Lisa, and so kind to me and to the rest of my family over the years,  and it really feels like an honor to be able to bake for her. To give something back.

And that's where the clarity gets like, super clear: It's time to give back. Right now, today, I am not sick. I feel good, I am good, and I mean to focus my creative energies on pulling together my poetry manuscript, and on baking for other people. That's it. That's the message. 

By default, my mind would like to explore every dark rabbit hole of the reason why I might be so clear-headed, and of what might happen if I become sick again and oh shit, not now, not when I've got the new mixer and about 100 poems to whittle into shape. But I am not exploring. And I am able to hold myself from doing it, mostly. I guess my mind is also getting stronger these days. I don't know.

Reader person, do you know me? You know this is not me. It has almost never been my M.O. And the sense of calm that comes with it? FREAKY. But here I am.