Fixed Stars

Actually, the title of this post is from a Sylvia Plath poem which contains the line "Fixed stars/govern a life."  I certainly don't believe that, but it was what came to mind.

Last night I woke around 4, which is common these days.  Chemotherapy apparently causes sleep problems (or perhaps the brush with mortality whilst undergoing chemo does that).  I sat up in bed, combed out my hair (I do this with a certain fascination now, combing and then cleaning up the hair, and combing again--it's so thin now, thinner than it has ever been in my life).  I know people lose their hair every day from chemo, so I feel some solidarity, yet watching hairfall from chemo is not easy.  CG gently suggested that, however much I am opposed to it, I have professional situations still even though I am not working, and that a wig would be a better option for those times than a head wrap which pretty much advertises that I am on chemo.  I really hate wigs (I have worn them for dance upon occasion) but there are some made for chemo patients that seem a bit better (lighter and cooler than the usual ones).  Of course some of the styles I've researched are hilarious (think the cover of "Some Girls" by the Rolling Stones), but some are really rather nice.  At least CG has the means to help me get the more expensive ones (the human hair ones can cost a couple thousand, seriously, but they look much more real and I can get them in colors somewhat closer to my natural shade).  Of course, I could bust out in some wild purple-streaked Tina Turner wig, but I don't think that would flatter me terribly.  But who knows?  My neighbor in Lompico had alopecia and she had a number of wigs in different colors and styles.

Anyway, I combed out yet another handful of hair and stargazed.  My white hair coming out in the comb is the color of stars.  I have nausea 24 hours a day now, also, as the Imuran builds up in my system (I don't really know why it does that) and damps down the immune system more and more.  The nausea feels exactly like when I was in early pregnancy, but without the little reward growing inside.  I am learning to power through the nausea because I really have no choice.  I can't take prescribed antinausea medications because they interact with another medication I take.  "Green" meds are fine, but I have to not remind myself ever to take them and then watch "The Birds".
Bad choice.  Seagulls will never be the same.

At any rate, this is a day I get to shape in any way I want.  I am going to put on my Italian-lady-in-the-marketplace headscarf, take a walk, get some yoga in, perhaps, and then sit down to the Demeter book, and then go to my singing group.  Bellydance is next week, and I hope I can at least sit in and watch Haitian dance; I know Shawn my teacher will be glad to see me.

In these ways, I weave myself more strongly into the tapestry of this life.