Fantasies

I find myself fantasizing about the weirdest things.

Today, it was about going to the gym.  I was driving by my gym -- wait.  Let's get something clear.  I have been paying monthly for the YMCA for decades.  And if you prorated every time I went by how much I spent, each dip in the pool has cost me about the same as my fabulous two nights at the Langham awhile back.  So... before I get into my fantasy about going to the gym, just please understand that it'd be like someone fantasizing about getting a root canal.  It's about that rare and about that appealing idea to me under normal circumstances.

But we are redefining normal these days.  And as I drove by my gym (at least I remembered where it was located), I started thinking about one period of time when I actually went consistently enough to work up to running 40 minutes on the treadmill.  And I started thinking about how cool that was, that feeling of getting into a groove with the running until it didn't feel awful any more... it felt pretty good actually.

And I thought, man, someday I'll be able to do that again.  And I have these running shoes (good as new!) and maybe I could actually start running outdoors sometime, but no, then I'd wreck my knees and what I really don't want is for anything to interrupt my exercising regimen.  Because -- and now I started getting really into this fantasy-- I wouldn't stop at just running on the treadmill at the gym.  I would also ride my bike!

And I'd ride my bike on days that I didn't go to the gym, and I could alternate various kinds of cardio.  I would train until I could ride a century, but first I'd just take longer and longer rides in town and up and down the coast.  I'd do that and I'd boogie board, too.  I'd do that on the days I wasn't running or biking or swimming (swimming!  what a great feeling that is, right?!), and I'd drive home feeling sweaty good afterwards, all the car windows open, cooling down but inside pulsing with energy, all the blood flowing...

Seriously.  This was me, fantasizing about working out.

Last weekend it was all about food.  That was the weekend after chemo when I was supposed to be nauseated and feeling about as far away from wanting to eat as you could imagine.  And... when it came right down to it... I really couldn't eat all that much, but I started fantasizing about wanting to eat until I really worked up quite an appetite (at least in my head).  I thought about what I would eat if I could eat anything and everything.

I pulled out cookbooks and looked up fancy recipes.  I spent a long time looking at all the ways to barbeque ribs.  (This is also not typical behavior, as anyone who's known me for five minutes will attest.)  I did actually find a recipe for roasted vegetables that I put together for dinner (that I may post here someday, it was so good) and it was fabulous. But a rare instance of my fantasies finding tangible expression.

But then I started fantasizing about the oddest things.  Rice Krispies.  Rice Krispies are sooo... perfect sometimes.  But I'm trying to stay away from dairy, so I spent a good long while wondering if Rice Krispies would be remotely as good with some weird version of milk, like soy, or almond.

Of course, I indulge in some typical fantasies, such as pepperoni and mushroom pizza, dripping with fat -- and even ordered one the other night, but -- like fantasies of the other nature -- it was not nearly as satisfying as I'd imagined it would be. It tasted weird and I felt profoundly unfulfilled afterwards.  I think about hot fudge sundaes and half caf lattes, and basically the concept of any kind of food that I might eat without worrying about some part of it causing something bad to happen to me (sugar feeding cancer, caffeine feeding headaches, dairy feeding stagnation).  I want me to feed on my food, and my food to just sit there and not feed something else that is going to kill me.

Fantasies.

I've been dreaming, of course, about travel.  It started normally enough, as with all gateway fantasies, with Hawaii.  Someday, I'd muse in the beginning, when this is over, I'll go to Hawaii and bask by the pool for a week, with nothing on my mind except ... nothing.  But my rational brain would start noodling with the concept, poking holes in the thin gossamer fabric of my imagination:  how long is the flight to Hawaii?  Will it trigger lymphedema?  Will I have to wear my compression sleeve?  How unsightly would that be?  And what about sunburn?  Won't that bug my arm?  How much sunblock do I think I'll need?  Etc etc etc.  I've always been kind of lousy at fantasizing, to tell you the truth.

So I scaled back.  How about Singapore?  Singapore sounds good.  It has all the same niggling stupid thoughts associated with it -- plus being on the equator produces the worst sunburns ever -- but, hey, Singapore!  I could do Singapore!

But, then, whatever.  I don't need to do Singapore to be happy.  How about the San Diego Zoo?  For one long hot afternoon (probably while the A/C was on the fritz), I thought about sitting in the aviary at the San Diego Zoo.  I dreamed about the cool misty humidity of the aviary and wondered about what rare and beautiful birds we'd be able to see.  Was it cheating to count new species of birds if you were at a zoo?  How lovely it would be to just sit on a bench inside the aviary for hours on end, and just be....

Crowded by possibilities, I immediately started fantasizing about the great cities -- the glittering jewel of San Francisco by the bay, the rich warm smells of Boston's North End, visiting my friend Gail in London, listening to jazz with a cold beer in a smoky upstairs club in Paris.  The other day was Walden Pond day... .could not get my head away from the lush tranquility of Walden Pond, and a cool summer swim to the other show.  Then there was Scotland day-- old friends, castles, theatre, whisky, walks in the countryside.  On that day, I spoke my fantasies aloud and Roger and we spent a dinner planning a trip to Scotland, Ireland, and Amsterdam next year.

Then a few days ago it was train travel.  What if we just took a train to... anywhere?!  We could go eat jambalaya and beignets in New Orleans, visit Roger's haunts in Kansas City, stop to hear some blues on Halstead Street in Chicago, then pull into Penn Station in NYC, coming up from the escalators into the humid human hustle bustle, sucked into the flow immediately.  (Roger and I locked that fantasy down into a train trip we are planning to Seattle, with a sleeper and everything, in a few months.)

I once even fantasized about shopping (see root canal, above.)  I hate shopping. But one of these days my body is going to be somewhat the right size and shape again.  I could go shopping!!!  How much fun would that be?!

And then sometimes it just gets really wierd.  I fantasize about getting a haircut.  Maybe I'll even start coloring my hair.  Maybe I'll become one of those women who spend actual time and effort on their hair.  I... could blow dry it, maybe.  I could make it look like ... you know...something.  I have this fabulous strawberry blond wig that a dear friend gave me... and it's all kinds of fun.  Maybe, with my own hair, someday I could actually look... good,maybe?  As in put together with forethought? With themes to my clothing, and attention to detail, and a hair stylist I see more than once every nine months.  I mean, I'll always be me, with a style sense that obviously originated in the '70's and hasn't really felt like budging since... but, maybe I could wear colors!  I sit around and think of colors that are outside my usual spectrum of denim, black, gray and white.  What about tourquoise?  Do I like tourquoise? Yes, I think I do.  But what about teal... yeah...mmmm... teal is great too.  Reds.  I like reds.  Could I actually ever purchase something with one of these colors?  What would that be like?  What would I purchase if I had the energy?  Maybe I could take some time with all of this stuff.

I ache for health.  Instead of fantasizing about sex (I do fantasize about fantasizing about it, which is a start), I fantasize about health.  What it would it feel like to eat, to breathe, to walk, to travel through the world without feeling toxic and broken?  What would it be like to have all my vitality back, at my fingertips, and not worry about what it's going to do, whether I'll overreach my precious stores of energy, whether it'll be OK for me to do or eat certain things.

I used to ache for time.  I still find time utterly precious and in all too limited supply.  But now I long for the health and energy to pour into that time.  My attitude towards work is vastly changed; means to an end, etc.  My attitude towards everything else is to gauge how much body/mind/soul value it contains -- and if it's not a high caloric value, then I move on to something else.

I woke up the other morning with the remnants of a dream all too vividly present.  In the dream, I was suddenly and inexplicably up to my neck in raw sewage.  And I woke up with the feeling that that's how I feel these days, inside and out.  I just want to feel clean, and non-polluted, and healthy. 

I am doing really well, all in all.  I am working, I am taking two walks a day, I am feeling pretty buoyant most of the time.  But obviously my mind is longing to break free, to escape the bounds of this physical body and fly away... somewhere, anywhere... to find that homeland called Being Healthy once again.  It may be found in a bowl of Rice Krispies, or it may be found on a beach somewhere around the world.  But someday I'll find my way back there.  And I'll make sure to send a postcard when I do.