I am occasionally surprised at how long it takes me to catch on to something that seems fairly obvious once I get it.  Recently, I figured out something that had been troubling me for several years.  I don’t suppose I would have gotten it when I did, if not for the respiratory crisis that had so diminished my lung capacity.

For some time, at least several times a week, as I was drifting off to sleep,  I would experience a rapid tremor in my entire body.  The bed would vibrate with it, and I would hear a droning sound somewhere between a buzz and a hum.   Along with it, there was an odor like ozone, which I knew to be an olfactory hallucination because I could smell it even at times when I couldn’t smell anything else.   It stopped when I’d shift my position in bed, and then I’d fall asleep normally.

A few weeks ago, shortly before my condition worsened to the extent that I could not sleep lying down, I had just settled down to sleep when my whole body began to twitch and convulse.  I shifted, and it stopped.  My brain, even starving for oxygen as it was, associated the convulsive episode with the numerous episodes of milder tremors in the past.

I moved back into the position I’d been in when it occurred, the same position I habitually adopted when going to sleep, and a little while later, less than a minute, I started to convulse again.  I didn’t have to repeat the process after that, because I realized that my posture was causing the bony part of my shoulder to press against the side of my neck.  I had found a way to put myself in a sleeper hold.

I thought about that, and concluded that the “sleeper” aspect of that position might have been what had originally caused me to settle on it when I settled down in bed at night.  I tried to recall how long I had been going to sleep that way, but was unable to remember precisely when I had started.

The effort to remember took me way back to my childhood, when I always had to have my arms outside the covers to get to sleep.  Mama would tuck me in with the covers up to my chin, and when she had gone I would snake my arms out.

Beyond that, I don’t recall any particular sleep positions until I was about twenty.  During my pregnancy with my first son, in the latter months, I couldn’t get to sleep without something to elevate the leg that tended to press on my big belly.  Usually, that “something” was my husband’s hip, and we slept like spoons.

In my mid-twenties, when I spent several months in jail and then a little over a year in prison, I got into the habit of sleeping with one arm over my eyes to keep the light out of them.  That position turned out to aggravate my arthritis and fibromyalgia, and after I moved to Alaska a summer or two of the midnight sun got me over the need to have darkness for sleeping.

It must have been sometime after I began sleeping alone here, after Greyfox moved into his little cabin in town, that I adopted the problematic posture.  Around that time I had gotten a body hug pillow, my “buddy” pillow.  Later on, I got a second one for the other side of the bed so I could roll over and sleep on my other side without the effort of rousing sufficiently to take that long pillow with me.

In recent years, when settling down to sleep, I’d lie on my left side, with my left leg under the buddy pillow, knee slightly bent, and right leg on top of it.  From that position, I could turn out the reading lamp and place my glasses near it on that side of the bed.  That much of the nightly routine, I still follow.  I used to slip my left hand under the pillow and place my right hand between the pillow and my left cheek and jaw.  That brought the ball of my shoulder up into contact with my neck and as I relaxed toward sleep, gravity would cause it to press on the blood vessels there.  Occasionally, now, I catch myself settling into that position.  Then I just straighten the right elbow and put that hand down someplace near my knee.  There have been no more nighttime tremors or seizures.

—–

Since September, when the recent respiratory problems began, one of the more troublesome aspects of the illness has been the difficulty I have had adjusting to my diminished lung capacity.  When I sit still, doing nothing, I feel okay, no shortness of breath.  Even a few times in the hospital I would spring out of bed as if I was healthy and fit, only to discover after a step or two that it was not so. 

I did that this morning, too, but increasingly lately I remember before I spring up that it is imprudent to do so.  When I move slowly, and especially when I remember the doctor’s instructions to use the nebulizer and load up with bronchodilator before I get out of bed, I can get from room to room, tend the fire, raid the refrigerator, let the dog out, close the door after a cat comes in, or travel to the computer for an hour or two of blogging and/or solitaire before I freeze out or my legs lose all sensation.

Blogging will be easier now, and may be more frequent, since Doug downloaded a DOS word processor that works on the old laptop.  Presumably, I can save my work to a disk on the laptop and transfer it to the desktop, and then to Xanga.  I haven’t tried that yet.  If you’re reading this, you’ll know it worked.

PS:  Yeah, it worked, but since the program is designed for a printer and paper pages, I’m having to do a lot of formatting in Notepad.  On the laptop, I set the page length to 999 lines to eliminate page breaks and page numbers within my document, but it won’t let me fix line length.  Still, I’m having to spend much less time at this desk in this drafty part of the house now.

 Spare
change?

I’m leaving the begging hat (my PayPal link) up for now.  My hope is that you charitable Xangans will help us meet the first two or three months’ payments to the hospital, EMT, and ambulance service, until Greyfox’s earning season gets underway and/or I can find some way to earn some money and keep them from turning our debts over to collectors.   To those who have already contributed, many thanks.  I sleep better, knowing I’m not in this alone.  If we can keep Greyfox from caving in to the stress and losing his serenity and/or sobriety, the family will survive this crisis.  If you’d prefer to mail a contribution, he has posted the mailing address at ArmsMerchant. 

UPDATED
 BELOW

Things around our households (Greyfox’s and mine, the dual bases of our family, at opposite ends of this big valley) are getting back to what we laughingly refer to as “normal” for us.  Laughter is part of that return to normal.  For the first time since my hospitalization, in last night’s phone conversation Greyfox laughed, joked, and let himself be distracted and amused by his cats’ behavior as we were talking.

Before I went into the hospital, as my condition worsened, he referred several times to his observation that I was “taking” the situation “better” than he was.  I did not understand what he meant by that, because he was not overtly overly concerned with my worsening condition.  His expressed concerns were as self-involved as usual — usual for his “recovering” self, not as intensely and exclusively self-involved as when his NPD was in full expression.  In retrospect, I think he considered my illness terminal, expected me to die, and thought that I did, too.  That might explain his perception that I was “taking” it exceptionally well, when what I was actually doing was trying to stay focused on survival and self-healing.

He visited me once in the hospital and while there said several times how “stunned” he was at my decision to call the EMTs and go to the ER.  I know that I have never once said that I would rather die than go to the hospital, but I think that was what he thought.   I am sure that at that time he was focused on the expense of my trip to the hospital, and I guess it triggered his economic insecurity.  Everything he said to me during that visit, his body language and the feelings he was projecting, expressed disappointment that I had chosen to call 911 and live rather than dying at home with my son looking on helplessly.

As he was leaving, I pointed out that it was infra dig to be so obvious about his disappointment that his spouse had survived a crisis.  We both know that money is the most important thing in life to him, and has been for at least all his adult life.  Only recently have spiritual matters gained any importance for him, and human relations remain problematic as can be expected for a pathological narcissist.

His attitude was somewhat troubling to me, mostly because it indicated that he had slipped back from his spiritual focus into fear and NPD mode.  It didn’t hurt my feelings.  If my feelings were prone to be hurt by such things, I’d have been in dire trouble in this relationship from the start.  At the time, I had other things on my mind, predominately the adverse reaction I was experiencing to some of the medication I’d been given, and the necessity for zeroing in on which drug had caused it.  I could spare him enough of my consciousness, as his therapist, to mildly confront his narcissism.  My main concern was my own survival and recovery.

After the doc told me what accommodations I would need at home — since it’s too close in here for a wheelchair or walker, it involves strategically placed seats so I can rest and catch my breath as I move about — I phoned home and asked Doug to set things up.  I had thought it through, and was able to give him concrete instructions about where and how to place seats and what to use.  At that time, it was uncertain if I’d be released that day or the next.  His growled response was that if I was to come home that day (this call was made in early morning), it, “wouldn’t get done,” because he was going back to sleep.

I had to come to terms with the knowledge that through my illness I had become a pain in the ass to my son and a burdensome expense to my husband.  Then, of course, I had to tell them that I recognized and understood their feelings.  Doug was feeling guilty for having feelings he didn’t think he “should” have, so after I came home we had several conversations about feelings being what they are and “should” being a null concept.  Nobody knows just what Greyfox was feeling about his feelings, least of all himself.  His mind doesn’t bend to such contortions as examining his feelings in that way, he says.

Now that I can get out of bed and move around without being desperately short of breath, I can start trying to be less of a burden to Doug.  I have been trying to think of ways to become less of a financial burden to Greyfox, as well.  I can do psychic readings, but since Xanga’s revised terms of use eliminated Coyote Medicine’s Klinic as a commercial venture, I’m without a venue in which to work.  Greyfox says he’s not too proud to beg, and thereby implies that I am.  I am not.  We have received a couple of contributions from Xangans already, and any others will be gratefully accepted.

Spare change?

UPDATE:
It was pointed out to me that it does no good to ask for help and not tell people where to send it.  While I know that this is not strictly true, since I have already received some responses nevertheless, I will point out here, as Greyfox did in a comment to this entry, that he has published his mailing address at ArmsMerchant Xanga site.   For those who are not familiar with my old purple hat, or who did not think to roll their mouse over it, I will point out that the hat is a link to PayPal.  …aaand– HEY!  It is all right to comment on this entry, even if you don’t contribute to the cause.

Progress on the physical healing:  a full night’s sleep, lying down.  I so do not like to sleep sitting up, and so do like sleeping and the way I feel after having gotten some much needed sleep.

Doug and I sorta “spoiled” each other’s Christmas fun, but I suppose there was no serious harm done.  A week or so before Xmas, I asked him if he would get out some decorations and make a small festive show for me.  He refused, saying it was a waste of time and effort.  My reason for asking had been a case of the holiday blues, which I thought would be helped by some colored lights and tinsel.

Early on Christmas morning, I woke out of breath.  Doug was in the kitchen, so I called out to him to come help me set up the nebulizer for some inhalation therapy.  His response was an audible snarl.  I was taken aback, because although his responses to my calls for help are often unenthusiastic they had never before been hostile.

I asked if he was okay, and got in response a muttered yes.  I asked if I was interrupting anything, and heard something between a sigh and a growl.  Then he walked to the doorway and said it would spoil the surprise, but he was preparing to put up some holiday decorations.  It was to have been my Xmas morning surprise.  He said he supposed he should apologize for “lying” in the time since my original request, trying to keep his intention a secret.

Then he disappeared back into the kitchen to safeguard the decorations from the cats, and I told him it had been a sweet thought, but he could put them away and skip the whole thing.  Then I explained that I had wanted the pretty things when I asked for them because I hoped they would lighten my mood, but I had already fixed that by listening to Xmas music and focusing on the spiritual side of the holiday.

That was my third screwup in connection with his Xmas.  First was deciding to make his gift a practical one, a pair of wood-splitting wedges, and second was forgetting to stop at the hardware store to buy them on the way home from the clinic.  At least he’s getting another story he can tell, along with the one about the year that all he got for his birthday was a Twinkie with a candle in it.

The comment from warweasel on my last entry expressed some of the same amazement I felt at just how sick I was.  I had never before been so bad off that I had to choose between breathing and controlling my bladder and bowels.  I had never before heard nor read of such a thing, either.  Sure, I’ve heard of people losing control of their sphincters, but not of having such a forced choice between breathing and keeping other bodily functions together.

Something similar came up when I was returning home from the hospital.  I’d had a stressful time at the pharmacy, with Greyfox’s stunned  reaction to the cost of my meds and the compressor that powers the nebulizer (After he’d reluctantly made the decision to pay for it [$300+], he turned to me and said, “Merry Christmas, Sweetie”.  Thus I managed to extort from him a Christmas present.  Otherwise, I’d not have had one at all.  I responded with thanks, saying it was the best gift I’d ever gotten, on which the clerk looked from him to me, rolled her eyes and said, “Yes, your life.”), and just the physical demands of being there were extreme, even with the little motorized cart the store provided.  When I got out of the car at home, I had both hands full of bags and stuff.  A few steps up the driveway, I had to stop for breath.  Before I could catch my breath and continue to the house, I had to release my grip on what I held in my hands.  I still had my purse strap over my shoulder and shopping bags hung from both wrists, but had to leave a few other items alongside the path for Doug to retrieve. 

I don’t think that is necessarily directly related to the pneumonia, asthma, COPD, etc.  It seems more likely to me that it’s part of the M.E. syndrome.  It is hard to tell which of my current symptoms are from the acute lung disease, which are side-effects of or adverse reactions to the medications, and which are the effects of my chronic illness.  Maybe sorting such things out isn’t absolutely necessary, but it could help to keep me from being blindsided by some new acute illness or a drug reaction.

I can’t tell if my (acute) condition is improving.  I have enough of the inhaled steroids for two more days, then we shall see if the inflammation flares up, or if it is under control.  The chronic stuff, consisting of fatigue, sleep disturbances, weakness, vertigo… just the usual “fibro” bullshit, has followed the usual pattern:  worsened by activity, improved by prolonged rest.  One way or another, I must get better and get back to work on my memoirs because I owe benevolentMitch a copy of the book.  His reminding me of that was instrumental in my decision to keep on breathing, at whatever cost.  That Mitch is a lifesaver.

One of the comments on my last entry, about my post-hospitalization followup trip to the local clinic, reminded me that I have not told the story of how I ended up in the hospital.  All the time I was in there, I thought that Doug had blogged it.  He came out just before the ambulance pulled away and asked me if I wanted him to blog it, and I told him yes.  After I got home, he told me that when he got in the house he couldn’t remember what my answer had been.  His confusion is understandable, I guess.  It had been a hectic day and horrific evening.

To backtrack:  first I came down with an atypical fungal pneumonia in September.  Thinking at first that it was just an ME flareup, I rested, took in lots of fluids, and tried to keep breathing.  As it worsened and I went farther and farther down, I finally figured out what it was.  Some online research told me that the only treatment for it was bed rest and fluids, so I did less and drank more.

Things were looking up, my lungs were clearing, and I was breathing more easily by the latter part of October, when I caught the flu — or some flulike disorder — from Greyfox on his monthly supply run.  Down again, lots of liquids, plenty of rest, concentrate on diaphragm, in with gusto and out through pursed lips to force open the little tubes and alveoli, and in a while I started feeling better.

That upswing lasted until a few days after Greyfox’s next visit, when I came down with his head cold.  Same treatment, plus chicken soup, acupressure on lung 9 and spleen 6 (or vice versa — I got the points right for the massage, but may not have them right for this blog), prayer, gasp, wheeze, and down and down until I was too sick to have gone to the clinic even if I’d had any confidence that they could help me.

Friday, two weeks ago, I came in from the outhouse, leaned on the desk inside the door to catch my breath as usual, couldn’t catch it, saw the gloom and gray closing in as the area of my visual cortex that processes color shut down for lack of oxygen, and felt myself losing control of leg muscles and sphincters.   I rested on my knees until I could catch my breath, then got Doug to help me to bed, change my pants, and set up a potty bucket beside the bed.

I hung in that way until Monday, hoping for improvement.  I had lost all appetite for food, but was drinking herb tea, diet 7-Up jazzed up with pomegranate juice, water and more water, my usual daily coffee ration, soups, broths… anything to stay hydrated and keep the mucus loose.  By then, I could either control my diaphragm to pull air in and push it out or I could control my sphincters, but not both at the same time.  I was sitting on the potty until my legs fell asleep, then sorta keeling over to kneel in front of it, dribbling and laboring for breath.  I had just changed into the last clean pair of pants in the house, old sweats with an elastic waistband I’d had to cut to keep it from impeding my breathing, when the thought of calling 911 came to me.

Not wanting to act rashly from fear, knowing that paying for such a trip would be a long-term hardship since we have no insurance, I asked Doug to get out my Crystal Oracle.  He spread it on my bed and cast the stones and I read the answers.  The first question was, “What is the outlook if I don’t go to the hospital?”  That reading was negative, but not conclusively so, with two stones on detriment lines, a probable negative (3 in detriment is a definite negative).  I then asked for the outlook if I were to call 911.  That one was positive without any stones on detriment lines.  To be doubly sure it was the right move, I asked if my survival was at stake.  That was one of the most interesting crystal castings I have ever seen.  Amethyst, stone of spirit, was in the center, with the other four stones strung out in a gentle curve, touching each other and all on the “self” line, an unqualified yes.

Doug called 911.  First two trucks with med techs arrived, followed soon after by the ambulance.  I stayed on the potty breathing until they had maneuvered a stair chair into our close and cluttered quarters here.  They strapped me on and slapped on an oxygen mask, which happened to be attached to an empty bottle.  That was the worst part of the entire experience, with the much-anticipated “help” being no help at all.  I kept working at breathing until they got me onto a gurney at the end of the driveway and into the ambulance.  Then they discovered that the O2 bottle was empty and got me some oxygen.  After that came a nebulizer and bronchodilators, and within ten or fifteen miles I could recognize the roadside surroundings and talk sense to the attendants.

It was about midnight when the ambulance pulled onto the highway headed for the hospital.  For most of the sixty-some miles, I conversed with the ambulance crew, a mother and daughter pair, and we listened to the radio chatter of our driver and two others, discussing moose sightings and where they were along the highway.

To be continued….  

COLD

I am having trouble with these gloves – polar fleece mittens with a front flap that turns back to convert them to fingerless gloves.  I started out with silvery mylar liners inside them, but could not touch type without feeling the keys, so now my fingertips are bare and the bulk of the gloves between my fingers is an added challenge to my keyboarding skills, in addition to the cold and numbness.

When we got up today, it was -24 outside.  Some of my medication, Pulmicort, is supposed to be kept at “room temperature, between 68 and 77 degrees.”  In consultation with the pharmacist, I established that it will probably be okay if I don’t let it freeze.  To ensure that, we hung it from the ceiling in a basket near the woodstove, and hung a thermometer from the basket to monitor the meds’ temp.  It was reading 40 when we woke today.    That is above the thermocline, which is above our heads — above Doug’s unless he stands up, above mine all the time.

Water jugs on the floor were freezing, so Doug raised them onto the tops of empty buckets, milk crates, etc.  We have to thaw the animals’ water periodically.  The last five hours have been spent in an effort to raise the temp in here.  As outdoor temp rose to eight below zero, indoor temp has come up to 48.  I just paused to put my fingers on my neck to restore some feeling and circulation.  Kind to the fingertips, cruel to the neck, it was a shock to the whole system.

Following Doctor’s Orders

The doc who admitted me to hospital from ER, and who discharged me three days later, ordered me to get evaluation and followup at the local clinic in five days.  I did it, but sorta wish I hadn’t.  My only profit from that visit was a disposable nebulizer unit that they let me keep after they had to give me an emergency dose of bronchodilators.  I think the whole experience, especially walking the length of my driveway in the cold, to and from the house and car, set back my recovery.  Dealing with the nurse practitioner there almost sent me over the edge into violence, the urge to which might be a side effect of inhaled steroids.

The clinic had my hospital record faxed to them.  Despite having the papers in her hand, the NP said she was going to put me on Atravent, which the hospital had tried and discontinued because I had an adverse reaction to it — it increased my lung inflammation and bronchospasm.  Then she said she would give me a prescription for prednisone, a drug that is listed in both the hospital record and my clinic file as unallowable because of a previous reaction to it.  After I explained that the doctor who first prescribed prednisone for me recommended that I never take it again because of the psycotic reaction I had to the first dose, and that several others had since then reinforced that warning, she seemed to think that the risk of psychosis was worth the anti-inflammatory effect.  I refused, once again reinforcing my reputation as a non-compliant patient, but perhaps saving a life or two in the process. 

I’d like to dismiss her from my mind, but I have a recurring image of her disapproving face and tone as she said, “Then I can’t help you, Kathy.”  My response was a relieved sigh, and, “Good, then I don’t have to come back here.”  I wasn’t there for her help.  I was following orders, dammit, and told them that, “…evaluation and followup.”  I returned home to my pediatric dose of inhaled steroids and tried and true Albuterol for bronchodilation, plus all the tricks and techniques I have practiced for years, and despite the lack of her toxic “help” I am getting better now that I have begun to recover from the setback of that clinic visit.

Today I did more “work” in the physical sense of moving weight around, than I’ve done in weeks.  I helped Doug clear the (somewhat) warmer wood from the woodbox so it wouldn’t be buried under the frigid stuff he is now splitting to bring in.  He just came in with the first armload and said it is snowing.  That is very good news because it means that warmer air is moving in.  Today’s efforts got me slightly winded, but there was none of the severe dyspnea and desperate gasping for breath that even the slightest movement was triggering before the hospital stay.

My intuitive senses and psychic/spiritual “sources” tell me that I can recover from this crisis.  I choose to believe that, rather than accept the word of those who say that without their killer drugs I cannot recover.  My way might be slower, more gradual, less impressive, but that is much more acceptable to me than giving over the care of my body and mind to those who do not know my history, allergies and sensitivities, and cannot be bothered to learn or choose not to believe me when I tell them.

Life is inexpressibly good, especially now that I can feel my increased capacity.  Keyboarding has warmed my fingers and I’m getting used to the bulky gloves between them, so I’m having to correct much fewer typos than I did at the start.  My cat, Fancy, is playing with a string dangling from the sleeping bag I have draped around my shoulders.  I’m wearing a pair of polar fleece pajamas with feet and a hand-warmer pocket like on an anorak, plus fleece socks and down booties, but this is still one of the colder spots in this inhabited (not closed off) portion of the house, and CallWave just told me Greyfox is trying to call, so I’m outta here for now.  Seeya later.

Doug here again.  Mom’s hanging in there, but it’s -21 Fahrenheit outside, around 50 inside at head level, and below freezing on the floor, so she’s just staying in bed and trying to stay warm.  The computer desk area is very cold, so she herself will be blogging when it warms up more.

I will keep this brief for the same reason that I have not been on here at all for a while:  I have very little energy to spare.

I just got off the phone with Sydney/Sarah/JadedFey or whoever she is currently, my Anam Cara, the sister of my very soul, who was worried and said that some of you are worried, too.  Quit that.  I’m breathing.

Monday night, Doug called 911 for me, paramedics came with oxygen and transported me about seventy miles to the hospital, where they kept me for a couple of days to get me stabilized.

It is a long story.  All of my stories are kinda longish, aren’t they?  I’ll tell it in little installments, when I feel up to it.

This year, the usual upside down and backwards twelve days of svwX is not to be, alas.  Smile, and keep breathing.

Doug here, blogging by proxy.  Which I suppose is better than Munchausen by proxy.

Mom’s upper respiratory infection is interfering with her recovery from pneumonia.  Currently, she can hardly sit up in bed without getting short of breath.  She has long-standing chronic asthma and COPD (bronchitis and emphysema).

If you’d like to help, she is accepting and/or in need of:
-positive thoughts
-prayers
-distance healing
-energy work
-Reiki, etc.
-expert advice that does not involve calling 911 or going to the hospital.

Several people have asked if cold weather makes my breathing difficulties worse.  I have noticed that when I write about temperatures, whether I mention “cold” or not, comments mention “cold.”  Cold, as I learned in school, is nothing — the absence of heat.  Heat is relative, and the answer to that question about whether cold affects my breathing is, “yes and no.”  My comfort zone is somewhat lower than average, I guess.  I wilt in hot weather, and “hot” to me, since I have acclimated to Alaska, begins in the low seventies Fahrenheit. 

Before I realized, this past September, that I had pneumonia (It doesn’t seem that long ago, but I tracked it back through blog entries.), I thought my breathing difficulty was just the usual seasonal thing, when allergies and myalgic encephalitis / chronic fatigue immunodysfunction syndrome combine to make me gasp and wheeze each year.  It happens twice a year:  in spring when the air is full of pollen, and in fall when it is filled with mold spores.  This year, it worsened as rainy weather began.  That was my first clue that there was something different going on with me. 

Rain usually washes the air clean and gives me some respite.  Each winter, when freezeup comes and the ground gets covered with snow, my allergies get some relief.  Then, when the temperature goes to twenty below zero Fahrenheit or colder, just sticking my head out into that cold, dry air takes my breath away.  Below freezing, down to zero or so, seems to be my lungs’ favorite air temperature — outdoors.  Indoors, the lungs just have to yield to the skin, the ears, nose, fingers and toes, and whatever part of me it is that loves having green growing things in the house.

One can dress in insulating clothing to withstand low temperatures, but the only relief from temps that are too high is escape.  The winter of ’93/’94, that Doug and I spent in the Four Corners of the U.S. Southwest, there were a few times that we needed to escape into an air conditioned building for a while.  Remembering the time I caught myself wondering what the place would be like in the winter has helped me console myself for not having the opportunity to migrate every year like the snowbirds.

Somebody affectionately advised me here to dress warm.  (Please excuse my not quoting and linking.  Just blogging is top priority, and I’ll probably get back to the old routine eventually.)  I laughed as I read that comment, sitting here at the keyboard in my snow boots and polar fleece socks, sweat pants and two sets of underwear, one of them long and wooly, three layers of shirts and a polar fleece jacket, with two hats on my head.  If it had been truly cold in here, I’d have dug up the fingerless gloves.  One of my major winter gripes is over the difficulty of typing or turning pages in mittens.

The two hats are something new for me.  Last winter, I had a Norwegian wool skullcap that I wore day and night.  Sometime between the winters, my nightcap got lost.  Mentioning that in one of my nightly conversations with the Old Fart, I asked him to put the word in with the Dumpster Deva and be on the lookout in thrift stores for a nightcap of appropriate size and shape for me.  Then, one recent chilly evening, sitting propped against pillows backing on the north wall at the head of my bed, I was so uncomfortable from the chill that I asked Doug to check the hat rack in the hall and try to find me a hat.

Doug found one I’d forgotten I had, a big floppy reversible thing made of two layers of polar fleece.  One side is black, the other cornflower blue.  It has a low crown and a wide brim.  The brim flops over my forehead to my eyebrows, covers both ears and my neck in back.  It’s okay for sitting around the house reading, but interacts badly with the pillow for sleeping.  Then, on his next-to-last supply run, Greyfox brought several hats he had found.  One of them is a simple hand-knit skullcap I can pull down over my ears, a shade of blue a bit lighter than that of the floppy one.  I sleep in it now, and pop the floppy fleece hat on over it when I get up.  It may not set any fashion trends, but I can live with how I look because of how they feel.