We got old but we got good
Birthday extravaganza ’07 ensues with no casualties. That’s a good thing. Although I guess it depends who you ask: the compulsive drug abuser might actually prefer to die in the heightened state, where the meth-induced state reveals, with startling clarity, the essence of living. But for better or worse (pointing me out to be the first class weenie I am, on a myriad of levels), the only drug I’ve been abusing is my asthma inhaler. All other aspects of life fade away in the desperate morning, lips pursed as you gasp for air, dizziness ensuing as the oxygen in your blood dissipates and then seemingly disappears altogether. That’s the state I found myself in Saturday morning. And that’s the way it is these days. Oh, dear god, I think to myself silently, what did I do to deserve this, with the newly formed panic attack of the inoxygenated lung. But there are few answers in the life of the uninsured, and sometimes you just have to deal. “It’s OK,” I tell a concerned friend, keeling over and gasping for air. I’m actually getting used to living life on the verge of death. “Well, Happy Birthday,” she says tells me derisively. Happy 29th.