September 2002 Archives

The last day of September is upon us. Less than three months until Christmas. I spent most of the weekend in bed trying to lay low…lower than my sinus infection, but to know real benefit. The headache continues and I can’t seem to get any relief from it. It is now becoming my big project in life…to get well. Watched “Shipping News” yesterday on DVD. What a great film! I absolutely loved it and now regret not having seen it when it was in the theatres. Kevin Spacey…unnerving. Judy Dench…amazing. I don’t know how they do it. Their performances are so natural, you never see these actors “acting”. Go rent it if you haven’t seen it yet.

Off to see the doctor again, and let me say that these visits are doing nothing to endear the entire field of medicine to me. I keep wondering when I will feel better, or when my doctor will actually understand what is wrong with me. "It's all in your head Mark. We will have to amputate it once and for all!"

Rob, I am sorry I didn’t give you a call on the weekend; I was just so under the weather that even talking was a monumental effort. I am hoping that eventually, whatever it is that I have, will be cured. Help!

So, the day begins…at tiredofthisfuckingsinusheadache.com.

Can’t seem to get warm again. Maybe my body is beginning to rot. I knew I should have gone through with the embalming. The sinus condition that my doctor was unable to successfully diagnose or treat is still in the exact same condition it was last week and the week before. I am frustrated. I suppose I will have to book yet another appointment with him, but it occurs to me that I might be better off looking for a new doctor, one that can make a diagnosis and then treat it successfully. Interesting idea…but I live in Canada and I am wondering now if that is possible here in this country. I rented a couple of movies on DVD yesterday out of sheer irritation. I let myself lie in bed for a good chunk of yesterday, hoping that the inactivity would make my headache leave, but this pain is unlike anything I’ve ever encountered; it just sits there in the middle of my face, at the bridge of my nose and under my eyes refusing to move or change. What gives?

Sorry about the delay this morning. We are short a few people at the office these past few days so it has become more difficult for me to juggle all the wonderful things on my to-do list. Eberhard and I had a rather enjoyable time this morning, putting a shipment of wheel weights into stock. I have a glamorous life, don’t you kid yourself. The symphony was wonderful last night, but of course we wound up rushing to everything. First I got stuck in traffic heading downtown, which means I was late meeting Stephen at his office. We had dinner at a nice restaurant around the corner from his work…can’t remember the name of it now, but I had a wonderful grilled chicken entrée, which miraculously did not make me run to the bathroom.

Is there such a thing as healthcare in Canada…because I have my doubts? I’m beginning to think that my dog is getting better healthcare than I am…which leads me to believe that perhaps I should fire my doctor and go to Willi’s vet. When Willi has tests done, his vet calls me to tell me the results. When I have an x-ray of my face, I have to call my doctor’s office to get the results. Turns out the x-ray came back normal. Once again I am bathed in relief since now I know it’s all in my head even though the pain is in my face. Maybe they need to amputate. No seriously…don’t get sick in Canada. We have universal healthcare…universally shitty for everyone.

Decaf is good. I love coffee, but the real thing makes me a bit…tense; and unable to sleep. And sleep is good. We need a good deal of good sleeping. So, no real coffee. Went to see my doctor again about the sinus thing. For whatever reason, he doesn’t seem to think that it’s an infection. “That antibiotic would have killed it. That thing kills anything in its path.” Great, will it kill the patient also? I just love doctors. So he says, “I need to have your get an x-ray of you face.” Great! This is bathing me in relief.

Decaf is good. I love coffee, but the real thing makes me a bit…tense; and unable to sleep. And sleep is good. We need a good deal of good sleeping. So, no real coffee. Went to see my doctor again about the sinus thing. For whatever reason, he doesn’t seem to think that it’s an infection. “That antibiotic would have killed it. That thing kills anything in its path.” Great, will it kill the patient also? I just love doctors. So he says, “I need to have your get an x-ray of you face.” Great! This is bathing me in relief.

Willi has been on vacation all week. We miss the dog. My mother tells me he’s scratching with his hide legs again. It must be an allergy. West Highland Terriers are prone to skin problems but we have been lucky up until now. I think the summer was just too hot and dusty for him. He’s not alone. Yesterday was hot. I mean HOT. It’s practically winter…what is going on here people? Is it Global warming? “I’m melting…melting!”

Cold hands this morning. The temperature in the house is 64 degrees. Why so cold? Turn on the heat. Ok. The outside temperature must have dropped overnight. God, can’t I make up my mind? One day I can hardly wait for the cold…the next I am complaining about it. Last night Stephen and I had dinner at Oliver’s, a rather nice restaurant in Oakville, to celebrate our 5th anniversary. Five years…how the heck does that happen? In a blink of an eye…that’s how. Life has a way of being over so quickly. It’s shrinking constantly. That’s just the way it is. As human beings we get to contemplate our time running out. Despite all this we had a nice time. The food was wonderful as always, yet both of us are amazed at the number. Five years…ha? What? That’s half a decade. What is that in gay years? No way of knowing or measuring.

I ran yesterday morning. Not for long, but I ran. Everything is painful. Everything is heavy. Oh the life of a depressive. Kill yourself. Why bother, life will do it for you if you just hang in there long enough.

This morning as I awoke I noticed, as I do each morning that it has definitely become more difficult for me to see the digits on the digital clock on the VCR at the foot of the bed. I generally have good vision, but after sleeping for a while my eyes are out of focus. To focus them is a challenge at first. They seem to need a warm up period, say three minutes or so and then they are almost as good as new...almost.

I wear reading glasses now and I have noticed that reading without them has become more challenging. I must have been dyslexic my entire life and I didn't even know it until my eye sight decided that it was finally time to deteriorate. Hey, I can see distances well...still.

Life begins at forty, or at least a new version of life seems to. We get more serious about things. This, if you haven't notice yet, is not a rehearsal. This is it, or rather that was a lot of it already, and did ya happen to notice how fast that went by? Ya. Well, fasten your seat belts, because if you think that was fast...here comes sixty five.

The other day I was surfing the television with the remote and paused on one of those wild animal documentaries. Whatever happened to Walt Disney's happy version of nature? Now it's all brutal...see the lion...see the lion run...see the lion kill helpless doelike creature that never had a chance. See how brutal? Now flip the channel because this is too brutal. See little helpless mammal...see crocodile approaching...see crocodile grab cute, helpless mammal in its jaws and chomp until almost dead. Now for the thirty second piranha fish finale where cute, bloody, helpless creature is devoured to the bone. Nature is so wholesome.

You shouldn't eat that, it's not natural. You want nature? In nature you could definitely be a fast-food dinner for a school of piranha fish, thank you so much! If it's absolutely imperative that I should be in a jungle, please let it be a manmade one...say New York City.

And Speaking of New York City, I am having lunch with my mother at the Hothouse. This is the first time I have had a chance to talk to my mother about our recent trip to New York City. I am forever trying to convince my her that New York is the only place on earth that really matters. She doesn't understand my enthusiasm for the place. Still I am rather relentless in trying to convince her. She lived there with my father for two years, 1956-1958, but both were ready to leave after two years. Up until now, nothing strange...just me loving New York out loud, but then nature can never leave well enough alone can it? From the restaurant sound system comes the following words out of Frank Sinatra's mouth:

Start spreading the news
I'm leaving today
I'm gonna make a brand new start of it
In old New York
I wanna wake in the city that doesn't sleep...

"Do you hear that Mother?", I say pointing to speaker on the ceiling above us. This happens to me all the time. Synchronicities. My mother looks at me like, ya, what's the big deal? Am I the only one who gets it? Frank is singing "New York, New York" and I've just been talking about it for ten minutes. It's the universe sending me a signal. Doesn't anyone else get it?

So, a new day begins...

Oh sweet Jesus, when will this sinus headache of mine take a flying leap. Three days of antibiotics and still my face and head ache. Now my nose feels congested as well. How is a person supposed to be able to function optimistically with chronic pain? I am depressed. No doubt about it. I will just have to try to keep my aching head up.

As I sit in my front bedroom office, I am surrounded by computers and audio equipment. This is a small space containing immensely powerful tools for creativity. The one tool that is missing is time. When my father passed away from bladder cancer almost two years ago, my brother and I stepped into the family business to keep things moving along as usual. Both of us interrupted our career paths in midstream to step in and make sure that his life’s work continued on. It has not always been an easy thing to do. At the same time we lost our father we inherited his life.

Yesterday was difficult. I spent a good part of the day watching the one year anniversary of 9/11 on television. I found the reading of the victims names at Ground Zero deeply moving and entirely disturbing. It took more than two hours to read the 2801 names of the people who had lost their lives at the World Trade Center one year ago. Each name represented a human life lost and countless family members and friends that were devastated. There were of course services in Washington and Pennsylvania but it was the sight of the families of the victims at Ground Zero walking down the long ramp into the pit that I found to be especially moving. Having been to the pit in person in August, and now to watch on television as thousands of people descended into it, laying flowers in remembrance of their loved ones at the very site of the catastrophe, was almost too much to bear. Late in the day President Bush and his wife came to Ground Zero and spent time shaking hands and meeting the survivors at the footprint of the North Tower. Again I could not help but tear up at the sight of this. The care with which President Bush greeted and spoke with, and sometimes even hugged and kissed each person in the crowd, astounded me. Even the CNN commentators were moved and could not contain their feelings, as their voices noticeably soften as they spoke about what they were witnessing.

It would be so easy for me to skip my writing task this morning. I really just want to remember 9/11 and watch the television, and listen to what is going on in New York City this morning. My head and heart ache. So much suffering in the world. If anyone is looking for me, I will be at home glued to the tube until the ceremonies are over. So, the day beings…again.

The 9/11 television retrospectives and documentaries are coming fast and furious. All the images of the towers toppling are all coming back…are all around us and in us. Time has done nothing to soften the blows. It is all still so close to the surface. A year has done little to heal this outrage. In some ways the images are even more distressing and unreal after not having seen them in a while. I was in New York in August and I stood at the site, and I still cannot comprehend it. It does not sink in. In my minds eye, those buildings are still standing there. Let us all go easy on ourselves during this week. This is a difficult time. Even if we think we are past it, we cannot help but be traumatized by it again. We are simply not past it yet. The human soul is injured, and the sights and sounds of the season will bring it all back. Be aware. More than we realize, this is a haunted time of year now. Be aware…think twice, think three times. The terror is still there, and it has an influence on all of us. Don’t be fooled, anniversaries are real and significant.

I have nothing else to say, except that…

The day beings…

My hands are always cold in the mornings. I’ve been thinking about wearing gloves but then how would I type. Poor circulation at my age? Hmmm. What gives?

Had to take the weekend off writing. There was work to do in the studio, and then Sunday I decided that I would take off entirely just like millions of other people do. On Saturday I wrestled with computer technology in my studio…music software hell. This stuff has such an allure. It promises the world, but first you must jump through a series of endless loops and hoops to get things to work, and then it’s possible that it never works perfectly. You would think that the software companies would have gotten all the glitches out of all this stuff by now…but nope. All a person has to do is read the newsgroups pertaining to certain types of software to witness all the confusion and struggle going on with music and video software. It’s bad.

Has anyone noticed that Toronto rush hour has gotten to be a ridiculous exercise in futility? Who wants to drive in this city anymore? It hurts. The Gardner Expressway…well what is so express about it? Not a damn darn thing. At rush hour it resembles a parking lot. So when does it become an expressway? When no one is driving on it? Hmmm. Sinus headache continues…only now I’ve medicated it with painkillers…didn’t Elizabeth Taylor use pain killers? How many times was she married? Enough times…Hello!

Be serious.

Still have this goddamned sinus headache. Perhaps it’s time to get my silly ass into see my doctor. Maybe some antibiotics then…Which one of me is the masochist? Lost another pound over night! The weight is just falling from my bones. But is it fat or muscle? Is it real or is it Memorex? How does one know these things? I haven’t really done a workout since coming back from New York on the 6th of August; I’ve been writing instead. My inner buff guy is going to start having a fit, if I don’t start letting him workout.

Do we all have multiple sub-personalities or am I the only one? I have all these different people in me wanting my time. For instance, my inner singer wants to sing, my inner buff guy wants to workout all the time, my inner writer wants to write all day…and so it goes. Each one of them wants to have what he or she wants. Some of these personalities are stronger than others and at different times. My inner singer…if he doesn’t get a chance to work on his voice…well, he gets very pissy with me. He’s fine if I let him sing a couple of times a week, but any less than that…boom! And this singer guy has a bunch of friends as well: The songwriter, the record producer, the arranger…they all hang out together in my head and try to get me to do what they want to do…namely make music. Believe it or not they are still interested in making music, where as I am not so entirely convinced that they know what the heck they are doing. Plus my inner writer, the one that enjoys this writing thing, has become more influential with me.

Julia Cameron talks about inner personalities as well. Her favourite is of course the inner critic, and God knows I have that one in spades. Who doesn’t?

But then there are the sub-personalities which are unique to each individual. For example, I have a very strong willed sub-personality named Doris. Carol Forte, one of my favorite voice teachers from the 80's, had a very similar sub-personality she named Doris Domestic. Doris is a German housefrau who can scrub and clean like nobody’s business. If something needs to be cleaned that has a lot of grime and dirt clinging to it…guess who cleans it? Doris Domestic! Thanks Carol for giving this person her name.

Doris loves to clean like a maniac, god bless her little dish-panned hands! And once I set her in motion…Forgetaboutit, there is just no stopping her. Doris is the one who pulls appliances away from the wall to take a good hard look at what’s behind them. You know what’s behind them and so does she. Dust and dirt! Doris thrives on this stuff and she can hardly wait to pull the whole thing out and vacuum and scrub behind it. Somebody call the police, there’s a mad woman loose in my kitchen! Of course this is all fine and dandy unless you are trying to get ready for a nice dinner out, but don't get into a fight with Doris; she will clean your clock everytime.

I don’t know why I am telling you this stuff.

I want to know which one of my sub-personalities has the sinus headache that just won’t quit, and why he or she is not taking us to the doctor. Hello!

It appears that I have blathered on in all directions quite long enough. My inner web master is saying that it’s time to post this to the website before "we" run out of time.

Got to get moving here people! Wrap it up!

So, the day beings well, if not without a bunch of screaming lunatics in my head!

P.S. Thinking of renaming the website to www.thosemarks.com.

A beautiful early September day in the making: From my window...not a single cloud in the sky. I spent the afternoon cleaning up my studio. I desperately needed shelves for my CD's and books. Thing had been stacking themselves up on the floor. Although I was happy about finally having a window to look out of, the studio was simply not finished without some bookcases. I am a person that needs to be organized. Not to insult myself, but I am really not intelligent enough to be able to function in a mess. I simply don't have the memory to remember what layer something is under. I need things out where I can see them, and in their right place.

Although the studio is compact, there really is not much room for more than a couple of people and the occasional West Highland Terrier. Still I don't mind the compactness of the space. I like having things contained. In a world of endless possibilities, I am finally coming to understand the importance of setting up limitations. I'm not talking about confinements, but rather helpful limits: It is this not that, it is green not brown. Whenever we choose an end result we are limiting ourselves to that one thing to the exclusion of every other possibility. So, what we create has to do as much with what we put in as does what we leave out and what falls away.

Yvette, If you can get to a web browser and check the site...I hope you have a good couple of days off. Enjoy the beautiful weather. I'll be holding down the Fort.

I just want to take a moment and thank you for reading thatmark.com. It has been a while since I have felt excited about the web, but I get "it" again. I understand the importance of this. We all have voices, and we need to find our voices and let them be heard. The web gives us all an opportunity to share our thoughts and ideas with the world in a way that simply wasn't possible just eight years ago.

So a new day begins.

Open the blinds on that all important window. What do we have? Let me see. Oh ya, blaach. Nice. Of course it may just be too early to tell. 6:27am isn’t what it used to be just a few weeks ago…lets face it.

Willi was scratching himself again this morning. Seems he has finally developed that dreaded skin allergy that a lot of West Highland Terriers supposedly are susceptible to. I will make an appointment with the vet today and hopefully get him in right away. Poor puppy! It’s one of the most difficult things about having a pet. Sometimes it takes a few days to figure out what exactly is wrong with them when they are not themselves. Of course this could be a reaction to the dust in the office. I noticed that he was getting quite dusty after his office days last week, so I gave him a nice bath on the weekend, and that spoofed him up a bit, but now I have to watch him life a hawk, because this could get bad very quickly if it goes untreated. Oy.

Despite the chores on the weekend, I did go for a swim in the pool, something I just haven’t felt like doing these past few weeks. It seems that by the end of the summer the whole swimming in the pool thing has lost its appeal. Robert came over on Sunday and we had a nice time just sitting around by the pool and chatting. Stephen kept us from becoming "starving artist types" by manning the BBQ and preparing wonderful tasty things for us to eat. Thanks Tooly…I know I seem under appreciative some times but I am so happy that you like to cook and are so damn darn good at it.. A blessing and a curse for you, I know.

While Rob and I chattered on, Stephen watched the entire third season of the Sopranos on DVD and progressively developed a strong Italian South Jersey accent that made itself known between episodes,“Fuck you man…This is such fucking bullshit.” Thanks for sharing.

What more do you want from a long weekend?

I was able to cut the front lawn and water it in an effort to bring it back from the dessert. I swear I could make hay from the grass on the front lawn: Parched and dormant within an inch of its life. I could feed the cows out there. Anyway, I made a concerted effort to revive and take care of our front garden, but it all seemed so way past the point. I also was able to sweep up under the carport where a lot of leaves and debris had accumulated. Wonderful. The next day the winds picked up again and blew the same amount of leaves and crap back in place. You couldn’t tell I had done a thing. Futility squared.

And what about making some music? Forgetaboutit!

And there was of course the laundry…very exciting. I did small loads, thereby fooling myself into the impression that I was hardly doing anything. But we do have clean underwear to go to work in…which after all is what it’s all about. Right?

Work...right?

Well, I think I have done enough damage for one day. And all this and more before 7:11am in the morning! Weeeeeee…

So an new day begins…doesn’t it?

P.S. Next time I will ask more questions…like, "what the fuck?" I love that question, now if only I could get a straight answer.

More labour on the long weekend. Spent the day working on cleaning up the website and checking all the links. I have template pages...weeeeeee!

I hope your weekend was more wonderful than mine, but I should stop complaining really.

My hands are cold...very cold. Air conditioned to death. I can hardly wait for the winter...at last I will be getting some heat around here.

And so the day is almost over...

You will find me in the yard cutting the lawn today. Labour Day weekend is all about labouring around the house...getting things fixed up that I don't usually have time to do.

No rest for the wicked!

So a new day begins!