Normal

- Anna Porter

The other day my daughter complained that every time she uses our pepper grinder–which has three settings for grind size–“someone” has changed its grind size to coarse and that she wished people would return it to fine when they finished using it implying, of course, that fine is the normal setting, the status quo.  Any other option is a deviation, translated “wrong.”

I realized then that in our household at least, there exists in other instances this same group think.  There is a “normal” setting such as this for the toaster, dishwasher, clothes washer and clothes dryer.  This setting is so accepted that if someone (i.e. me) changes the setting for a particular load (because that choice is more appropriate) others using the same machine go on using that new setting without questioning even if it is not appropriate for their purposes.  This is because, in their minds, there is a “normal” setting that is “always” used; why would anyone deviate?

This thinking often spills over into other areas like positioning of the driver’s seat and mirrors.  What is normal for me is not necessarily normal for you.  Yet,if I was the last person to drive the car you might expect me to reposition everything so that it was perfect for you the next time you drive (presuming that your setting is right and normal; mine is the aberration).   It’s easy to see why you might think this if you drive the car more often than I.  You might see yourself as the main driver and therefore your settings as the accepted normal.  But the status quo could quickly change if I suddenly started using the car “more” than you.  You begin to see how “normal” is truly arbitrary.

In 18th century America it was “normal” to own slaves.  In most of the 20th century it was normal to smoke in restaurants and on airplanes–even doctors might smoke in their examination rooms.  Group think–often the accepted definition of “normal”–is not necessarily right, not necessarily what’s best.  It is true that in nature sometimes wires get crossed and something “unusual” happens in a species; but sometimes that “unusual” thing starts happening more and more until what was abnormal is now quite normal. 

In reality, what I think of as normal, is often what I have decided I am comfortable with, what works for me, what fits my view of the world.  I might find like-minded people who agree with me but this does not necessarily mean that I am right, that there is, in fact a “normal” and then there is the “abnormal” and the world should side with me and my supporters.

The smaller the world gets and the more connected its inhabitants get the more we need to be open to rethinking “normal.”

Exclusive! Book Excerpt!

- Anna Porter

Rewired

Remember how early on in the book I talked about the “creeping paralysis” that had taken place that fateful day?  Strangely, a year later I have noticed an odd physical event: sometimes I’ll have a persistent itch either at the joint when my right leg joins the abdomen or actually up on the right side of my abdomen and when I scratch it my right leg and foot twitch and jump.  It is as though they have some bizarre new connection.

Years ago an employee of the phone company came to our neighborhood to do some work on the phone lines.  About an hour after he left, my phone rang.  The caller had the wrong number but what was weird was that she was attempting to reach one of my neighbors!  Odd coincidence I thought.  A while later the phone rang again.  Another wrong number.  Another caller looking for the same neighbor!  And then it happened again!  “A coincidence?” I thought.  I think not!  Turns out that in fact while disconnecting and reconnecting our phone lines the phone company lineman had plugged them in backwards!  I wonder if that can happen in the brain.

And why is it that it can work around some damage (I can use my hand and arm normally again) but not other damage (i.e. this darned leg!).  I made an appointment to see my stroke neurologist. 

At the doctor’s office, after catching up, we pulled out the old photo albums and reminisced about my stroke.  I wondered aloud why I had managed to regain use of my upper extremities and looking at my “pictures” he noted a plausible explanation: my brain had apparently reached the limits of its capabilities.  (Not the first time, mind you.  I’ve had that experience frequently over the years.  Especially when it came to algebra.)

It seems that my cavernous malformation[1]  is located along the left frontal lobe’s “motor speedway” (or for those of you brainiacs, the corpus callosum).  According to the Oregon Health and Science University Brain Institute (my italicized comments added), “The corpus callosum (Latin for “tough body”—ironic, isn’t it? Not so tough as you thought you were, huh mister?) is a broad, thick bundle of nerve fibers in the entire nervous system, running from side to side and consisting of millions and millions of nerve fibers. (not just millions, but millions and millions!) If we cut a brain in half down the middle, (Why would ANYONE do that??!!) we would also cut through the fibers of the corpus callosum.” (Duh!)  I prefer the motor speedway image. 

The corpus callosum is in the middle of the brain just above the brain stem running, basically, front to back.  Just a smidge above that is one end of the primary motor cortex which runs side to side perpendicular to the corpus callosum up over the cortex.  Are you with me here?  This primary motor cortex is otherwise known as the “homunculus” or Latin for “little man.”  The homunculus is called that because it—sort of—resembles a little man lying on his stomach with his head twisted around facing outward, as if over a large round rock, only this guy is draped over the motor cortex of the brain. [2]  It actually doesn’t seem very comfortable, at that.

Anyway, this homunculus is thought of as the “body within the body.”  As the blog site io9.com puts it, “We all know what bodies look like from the outside. This cortical homunculus is how your brain sees your body from the inside.”  There are actually two of them, one over each motor cortex.  “Every part of the body is represented in the primary motor cortex, and these representations are arranged somatotopically[3]— the foot is next to the leg which is next to the trunk which is next to the arm and the hand. The amount of brain matter devoted to any particular body part represents the amount of control that the primary motor cortex has over that body part. For example, a lot of cortical space is required to control the complex movements of the hand and fingers, and these body parts have larger representations in M1 (the homunculus)[4]than the trunk or legs, whose muscle patterns are relatively simple.”[5]  

In lay person’s terms, this little dude is pretty strange looking!  His head and hands are much larger than—and out of proportion with—his legs and feet and correspondingly the sections of the brain that control those motor functions are also out of proportion.  That’s because your hands are much more intricate machines than your dumb old legs and feet!  To put it in perspective, the sections of the motor cortex that correspond to the feet and toes (each with only one section) are only about a third as big as those which correspond to the hand, fingers and thumb (each with its own section).

(Can I just say that in researching for this book I have encountered some pretty weird stuff out there on the Internet?  For instance, there seems to be a whole community of homunculus followers out there—like some strange cult—who have written about this weird little man, created at least one Facebook page for him, even created animated videos about him!  Some people just have way too much time on their hands!)

Anyhoo…all this is to say that upon closer examination of my MRI it seems that the cavernous malformation lays alongside this homunculus on the left motor cortex of my brain. (Remember…the left side of your brain controls the right side of your body.  Confusing to say the least!).  The bleed must have begun at Homunculus’ feet (hence that’s where I felt it first) and spread “eastward” past the legs, trunk, shoulder, arm, hand, and fingers stopping just short of my middle and forefinger and thumb.  Which explains why those were the only appendages I could move by the time I reached the hospital.  Another way to look at this is to imagine a paint can spilling: the paint might pool right at the point of the tip over and then depending on the terrain might spread out from there, getting thinner as it spreads until it finally stops.

What does all this mean?  Well, the paint spill started at my foot.  That means the greatest part of the spill was there and caused the most damage to my foot and leg. And quite possibly, this damage is just too great[6]for the super muscle known as the brain to fix.  In other words, the circuitry there is fried.  Specifically, the nerves controlling my peroneus longus and my flexor digitorum are toast! This renders those muscles weakened and unable to win the tug-o-war with the opposing muscles.  Consequently, the outside muscle of my calf that pulls against the inside muscle of my calf allowing me to keep my leg straight when I walk and the bottom muscle of my foot that pulls against the top muscle of my foot allowing me to flex and extend my toes (and wiggle them in the sand) can’t pull their weight any more.  Of course, there are probably other muscles—and tendons—affected which all-in-all makes “walking” impossible and “getting around” a chore.


[1] Did I mention before that months down the road from my stroke, when we had learned of this little appendage in my brain, my darling husband still thought it was a large hole?

[2]Turns out those brainy folks who studied and named all the parts of the brain that we know something about can be somewhat imaginative as well.  It’s a little like ancient people seeing a face in the moon.

[3]Organized in a point-to-point representation of the surface of the body.

[4]My insertion

[5]www.brainconnection.positscience.com

[6]Or perhaps, not important enough to bother with, as far as my brain is concerned.

 

Exclusive! Book Excerpt!

- Anna Porter


Driving Miss Crazy
We make a lot of assumptions—and assume that we must find solutions—based on personal experience and cultural norms.  For instance, we might assume that a single person is not single by choice so we’ll encourage them by trying to play matchmaker.  Or we might assume that a childless woman is just that because she can’t have children, not because she chooses not to.  Or that something must be done to get that reclusive widow back out into the world because, well, she just couldn’t be happy being on her own all the time.
One of my favorite stories that demonstrates this tendency is when my second son was four.  My mother had recently died—much too young—and our family had all attended her memorial service.  Back at home a few weeks later I was working in the kitchen and Kyle was playing quietly alone not far away.  Then suddenly he approached me.  “Mama,” he began his query, “Nana was your mama, right?”  “Yes,” I replied.  “And Nana died.”  “Yes,” again.  I could almost “see” the wheels of his little brain working on this human algebraic equation.  So next, logically, “So that means you don’t have a mama.”  “No, not anymore.”
The sheer emotional weight of that conclusion must have been sinking in as he remained silent for a while.  Then, suddenly and brightly he bounced back.  “I know!” he exclaimed, as though he had been called upon to find a solution.  And he had.  He had ticked off in his mind all the potential “mama” figures that were left to us: his GeeGee (his father’s grandmother) and his Gramma (his father’s mother) were still alive and available for the job.  “GeeGee can be daddy’s mama and Gramma can be yourmama!”  And with that he mentally rubbed his hands together as if to announce that the problem was solved, the problem that only a four-year-old could truly appreciate: no one should be without a mama.
I think this phenomenon is responsible for the numbers of people who feel the need to suggest solutions to my not driving.  The assumption is that from their perspectives not being able to drive would be a fate worse than death and therefore I must have the same outlook.  They also assume, presumably!—that I’m not driving because I just hadn’t thought about the solution that they are about to put forth.
I am reminded of the day that I announced to a dear friend (a woman who is 10 years my senior and whose children were entering college when mine were just entering school) that I was pregnant with a little surprise—our fourth child.  I was shocked by the intensity of her irate response and the venomous attack on the supposed irresponsibility of my husband!  In a word, she was furious at him for doing that to me!  Later she revealed the cause of her anger—she had responded not as she would as my friend but as if it were she who was again pregnant.  Projecting herself into my situation, ten years older and thoroughly done with raising children, she naturally had severe anxiety which manifested itself in rage.
So it seems to be with my friends who would empathize with my predicament.  Now I know you all mean well.  And I know you might just find this hard to believe.  But I just don’t miss driving!!  Really I don’t!  I’m not just saying that because I can’t and I don’t see any solution to the problem.  I really don’t mind it.  I know!  I’m surprised to hear it coming from my own lips but it appears to be true for me.  It is rare that I feel trapped by not being able to hop into my car and drive any where I wish.  I feel quite content to be driven where I need to go, perhaps in part because I don’t feel a need to go too many places.  I especially don’t feel a need to go where your kind advice is driving me!
Recently I’ve begun to have dreams about driving—or contemplating driving—and then remembering that I can’t.

An End to Religion

- Anna Porter


The following first appeared in “Reflections” in the St. Andrew’s Lutheran-Bellevue WA newsletter, “The Voice.”
 
“By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” Galatians 5:22-23a, NRSV
I know.  I’m taking a big risk by titling an article for a Lutheran church’s newsletter in such a manner but please hear me out.  In the wake of the recent tragedy at Sandy Hook (and the many that came before and have followed) I was browsing through the notes app on my smart phone where I jot down ideas for, among other things, this column and came across this one from last March:  “Seen on a bumper sticker: ‘Clinging to my gun and my religion.’”  It troubled me greatly when first I saw it and it continues to make me ill.  Now lest you think that this article is now going to expound on gun control, rest assured, it’s not.  But the more I think about it, even though I was fairly confident that the owner of that vehicle and that bumper sticker was one of a garden variety of conservative Christians he might just as well been sporting that same slogan in other parts of the world.  Every major religion seems to have—and use—its guns. Much evil has been perpetrated using guns in the name of religion.  Since doing away with guns worldwide seems like a dream reserved for Coke commercials I started wondering if the answer might be to do away with religion.  If the two are dependent on each other as in any symbiotic relationship then stamping out one might result in the demise of the other.
Heresy you say?  Not so!  Nowhere in the Bible (and I can’t be sure but I’m pretty confident the same holds true for the Koran and the Torah) is there any mention of the word or the concept of “religion.”  Religion is a man-made principle and like all things man-made it has flaws—sometimes serious ones.  And religion does not prescribe a path to God. Mind you, I’m not talking about the end of faith or the end of belief.  What I’m talking about is putting spiritualityback in its rightful place as the way to be in relationship with God—the God that every religion claims as its own.  Religion and guns.  A way to God?  I think not!
On the other hand, can you imagine anyone spewing venom such as, “Clinging to my gun and the spirit”?  Doubtful!  First of all, notice that religion seems to be something we have possession of, whereas, spirituality possesses us. Religion gives us rules, responsibilities and a strange sense of superiority.  Spirituality gives us gifts.  How freeing!  And we don’t need violent means to defend those gifts.  We don’t need laws to control them. They are just there, for the taking: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. The gifts of the spirit need no defense; no one will or can take them away. We need only to embrace them, to “cling” to them.  Praise be to God!

I never said I was a poet

- Anna Porter

My darling son asked me a few months ago if I would consider singing a song on his upcoming electronic music album.  I felt honored and flattered…until I found out that I had to write the song!  I mean lyrics and melody line!  Eek!  I am not a poet.  Lyrics are basically poetry.  I can–sort of–sing but writing the words?  That’s not my line.  But now I was committed; how could I turn him down?

Okay, think logically:  first, what was his inspiration for the piece, the working title of which was “god particle”?  That seems like a good place to start–until he began rattling off the following: “…the god particle aka Higgs boson as well as science, dark energy/matter, voyager 1 and 2, origins, humanity, progress…basically recent innovations and discoveries of science/technology coupled with humanity evolving…Also creation, mother/god=goddess/giver of life, what make us human, where we come from”

Phew!  What?!  Okay, that plan didn’t help much.  Now I was stumped and confused.  What the heck is “Higgs boson”?  I didn’t know I was going to have to study for this.  So I started doing research online, beginning with “Higgs boson” which led me to the book, “The God Particle,” by Leon Lederman which led me to studying writings of Anaximander and Democritus which led me to Gregorian chants and the Taize community which ultimately led to this (with my thanks to all of them):

god-particle

Sine tuo numine
Nihil est in homine
Nihil est innoxium

 Without your spirit
Nothing is in man
Nothing that is harmless

Giver of life...who are you?
      What are you?   Where are you?
Giver of life…
      You are so close, everywhere and yet so hard to find.

Sine tuo numine
Nihil est in homine
Nihil est innoxium

Without your spirit
Nothing is in man
Nothing that is harmless

Are you particle or God?
Substance or spirit?
      The earth was a formless void
       And darkness covered the face of the deep
      While a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.
Here we stand at the edge of a precipice
Looking down into eternity.
Are we indeed looking at the face of God?
Or is that our face staring back at us?

Immortal and indestructible
Surrounds all and directs all
Immortal and indestructible
Surrounds all and directs all

There is some comfort in this, some peace
God or particle, substance or spirit
There is some comfort in this, some peace
God or particle, substance or spirit

Dona nobis pacem
Grant us peace    

 

Handicapped Accessories

- Anna Porter

No, that was not a misprint–or mis-type–I actually have a “handicapped” accessory.  It is my mobile phone.  I have an iPhone 4. The model number proves that this phone is less than 2 years old (perhaps even just about 1 which in mobile phone years is anywhere from 40 to 80 years.  (I use the industry standard: 1 human year is equal to 40 mobile phone years; otherwise known as “near death.”)  At 40+ it should not come as a surprise that my aging phone is starting to fall apart a bit (not unlike me).  It is starting slowly–most everything still works except for the “home” button.  For those of you unacquainted with the iPhone (there are still some of you out there?!) the “home” button resides at the center bottom of the face of the phone and it provides access back to your home screen whenever you have wandered away from home to explore applications (“apps”), the internet, games, music and…the actual phone.  Without a working home button you can get permanently stuck in your weather app or your tide app and are unable to access anything else basically relegating your phone to an electronic weather reporter.

It wasn’t that my home button didn’t work exactly; it just didn’t work all the time.  It would start out working and then suddenly, without warning, while I was cruising the internet, it would leave me stranded on the internet highway.  It was as if it had dozed off while I was driving.  Sometimes I could coax it awake by continuously pressing the button several times.  Sometimes I had to actually turn the phone off and back on again just to arrive back home again.  Needless to say, this was a very annoying habit but what can you expect from the elderly?

 Well, I’m not about to buy a replacement yet (even though that is what the industry would like me to do and even though not doing so is thoroughly un-American!) because other than that one little quirk my phone works perfectly fine. (I know.  What does that have to do with my decision, right?)  It turns out that there is a workaround.  It is not known to the general public but it exists right there in the bowels of the phone.  It is a home-assist button and once activated it provides a virtual button on the screen, a cane if you will for my handicapped phone.  Now I can press that button and get “home.”  Me and my phone, just a couple of gimps.

A Breath of Summer

- Anna Porter

“In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.“–Albert Camus, 1913-1960, Return to Tipasa, 1952.  

Albert Camus was a French “Pied-Noir” (Algerian-born French colonist) author, journalist, philosopher and one of the youngest persons to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. His views contributed to the rise of the philosophy known as Absurdism. 

I hate it when this happens.  I decide to post a photo which leads me to think of Camus’ quote which leads me to read more about Camus (in particular to learn the genesis of the quote) which leads me down the rabbit hole of reading essays on Camus which leads me to a blog  which leads me to this part of the blog post in which the writer (Awais Aftab) observes this about Sisyphus, Camus’ hero in the book “The Myth of Sisyphus,”:

“Yet, Sisyphus is superior to his fate because he has accepted. He will remain in torment and despair as long as he has hope or dream for something better. But once he has realized that this is what his life is, and what it will remain, and there is nothing better at all to look forward to, he will no longer be tormented by the absurdity of his existence. And this would be the key to his happiness.”
And I am struck by the remotest of similarities in my own life as a stroke survivor/victim/casualty.  The remnant of the stroke is my hypertonicity which has left me permanently (?) handicapped.  The question mark is there because, frankly, no one really knows although those with some years of experience with this sort of thing seem to agree that it won’t get any better (and certainly from what I’ve read it could get worse). 
 I am confronted with Camus’ philosophy of the Absurd.  Camus was influenced by Søren Kierkegaard who wrote: “What is the Absurd? It is, as may quite easily be seen, that I, a rational being, must act in a case where my reason, my powers of reflection, tell me: you can just as well do the one thing as the other, that is to say where my reason and reflection say: you cannot act and yet here is where I have to act…”(Journals, 1849)  Camus believed that the only reasonable response to a life which is “absurd” is to live in full consciousness of that life.  Which might beg the question, “what then was he thinking when he wrote his famous line about winter and spring?”  It would seem that if you fully live life in all its absurdity finding the spring within you in winter could be regarded as some sort of escape from the absurdity.
Maybe he means that in only by returning to the “spring” (representing hope and newness) of life can we can learn to accept the reality that is our “winter.”  He writes also in Return to Tipasa, ” I discovered once more at Tipasa that one must keep intact in oneself a freshness, a cool wellspring of joy, love the day that escapes injustice, and return to combat having won that light.” To me it represents the dichotomy in which I find myself:  on the one hand I feel as though I would in general be happier if I just accept my fate and quit believing that it will get better; on the other hand I cannot escape the pull of eternal optimism.

Exclusive! Book Excerpt!

- Anna Porter


Here, just for you dear faithful, is another excerpt of my book…
Passages
Truth be told, I was, well I wouldn’t say terrified of going home.  Let’s just say I wasn’t as excited as one might expect.  This surprised and confounded me.  Why on earth would anyone not be eager and ready to get back to familiar surroundings—especially with a view like ours?
Perhaps it was because I was going home to a familiar place but in a stranger’s body.  I knew how to live in the hospital.  I knew what to expect and what my limitations were.  Life was predictable. 
I could get around.  I could do most of the things I needed to do for myself.  I had my little room where everything had its place and was in its place.  I had my routine.  I could manage—even master—this small world where I knew how to function.  And in here I was an overachiever!  I was successful. Compared to the rest of the patients I was highly functioning.  And I didn’t have to explain myself.  Everyone knew why I was there and what could be expected of me. And no one watched me, wondering or judging.
But out there?  That was another matter entirely.  Out there people did things that I could only dream—or reminisce—about.  Out there I was an anomaly, a circus side-show character.  Out there I would have it rubbed in my face every day that I now had limitations and shortcomings, that there were oh so many things that I could not do.  And there would be many more disappointments.  I would be a fish out of water and I was afraid I’d asphyxiate.

Musings…How do you???

- Anna Porter

Maybe I’m alone in this but I just have to say that I really struggle with how to say “2012.”  I know that might sound weird (as do most of the things I muse about!) but it’s not as simple as it looks.  I mean I can say “two thousand twelve” (not “two thousand and twelve” which is totally wrong grammatically speaking and kinda makes me crazy! Especially when supposedly educated people say it that way!) but I’m talking about when I need to abbreviate it as in when I am telling the person on the other end of the phone the expiration date of my credit card.  It is downright tedious to say “two thousand twelve” in that situation (and just wait until 2013 when we have to add a syllable!).

It is also incongruous (which also drives those of us with any kind of OCD tendencies!) to say “two thousand twelve” when the month of expiration falls in the single digit category.  You wouldn’t, for example, say “oh-six two-thousand-twelve” because you’re mixing your formats!  So what does one do?

To maintain some congruity you might say “oh-six-twelve” but that doesn’t seem to separate the two numbers by the appropriate forward slash (/) and feels like there is a syllable missing.  But then it seems too long and tedious to say “June, two-thousand-twelve” and perhaps even a bit formal. And “six twelve” sounds too much like an address and perhaps would throw the person off with the result of you having to repeat the date in another format anyway which defeats the goal of brevity in these situations.

And it isn’t just brevity.  I feel somewhat judged by how well the date of expiration slides off the tongue, as though the other will think less of me if I somehow say it wrong (do you think I have a complex?!).

Ah, me.  I long for the old days, in the good old 20th century when one might say easily, “oh-six ninety-eight.” For some reason that just seemed to flow better.  Or my birth date, “three-thirty-one-fifty-eight.”  Now those are some numbers that just sound musical in their simplicity.  Not so much my grandson’s birth date: “eighteen-ten”??  I could see people looking quizzically at me as if they thought I was nuts in pronouncing that my grandson was born in the early years of the 19th century!

It’s the little things…