Thoughts on a Marshutka (1)

Monday 20^th February 2012

It was one of those times when you wish you had a camera but at the same time knowing that a camera would never capture the essence of what your eyes were seeing.  We were on the 8:30 marshukta from Kaspi to Tblisi to go to mass for the first time in over 2 months.  The sun was that delicate pale yellow, not a home-made custard kind of pale yellow but a mouth-watering citric acid kind of pale yellow. Enveloped in pale grey snow clouds illuminated by the morning sun, the sky was a beauty to behold.  The mountains were like giant black and white speckles.  Sitting in that marshutka, looking out on such wonders, I felt truly alive and connected to the universe with an intensity that I experienced as a physical tugging of every sinew in my body being pulled into the distant landscape.

I have been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis and I am scared.  I have never really been ill before and did not expect it to happen to me.  We all know people who are ill and while we care deeply about those who are close to us and are sympathetic to those who we are not close to, what really gets your attention is when it is personal and you are the one who is suffering.  I have been in pain most of the time since Christmas and my hands and feet don’t work the way they are meant to.  At times I can’t pull the duvet over me in the middle of the night and have to wake Martin and ask him to do it.  Sometimes I need help putting my coat on as I don’t have the strength to hold my coat. Sometimes I feel like I am taking advantage of Martin “Can you get me ..?”  “Will you make tea?”  “Do this, do that.” and then feel irritated and then ungrateful when he doesn’t do things exactly as I want them done.  I just feel twenty years older and I hate it.  I am scared that my life as I envisage it will just stop right now.  And then what?  What if this is long-term?  I try not to think about it as in reality I do not have a clue what it would be like to be in that situation. 

While I know that whatever cards I am dealt with, I will find a way to deal with, it’s just that until I know how bad it is going to be I just can’t work out what to do about it. So I remain in a kind of limbo, just getting on with it.  Life is just not predictable.

So sitting on the marshutka absorbed in the early morning sun and just thinking thoughts.  Today is a good day, my meds have kicked in and for the time being I am pain-free.  I am going to enjoy feeling alive while I can.