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Am in better shape today. Digestive system heading back to normal. Was able to exercise today (walk and so forth). Yesterday, I really felt the impact of skipping just one day of exercises (although I was weak from my stomach being upset and me living on the toilet). Anyway, it felt good to be back to somewhat normal today.

Bumped into JV when I went out for lunch and a run (no, not that kind of run) to the library. J's in a wheelchair from an automobile accident that damaged his spinal cord. He's totally mobile with his electric wheelchair and super van with lifts and so on. He's one of the more peaceful people I know despite his injury and circumstance. He shared a lot of good information about finding oneself in either of our situations. He gave me a lot to think about, which I'd already been kicking around in my own head.

He said one thing that really focused a key point--the idea of knowing the reality of a situation and acting accordingly--knowing, in his case for sure, that he unequivocally knows how he has to live the rest of his life. I think of JV and the guy who bums around town in his wheelchair and pesters people--what a contrast of coming to terms with an impossible set of situations.

JV shared that he just recently had to fly back east to see his brother, who was also in a terrible accident. He didn't get any damage to his spinal cord, but he got major damage to his head and bones--many breaks, staples in the skull, and so forth.

So it was a timely conversation--given that things in my court are starting to get cluttered and not very simple to unravel. How am I supposed to live the rest of my life? This illness has brought me face to face with the reality of my mortality, my mortal being--and it's frightened me and helped me to paralyze myself in many ways. It hasn't turned out like the pictures I was carrying around in my head of how it all was going to be. Now, I have to abandon those fanciful images and deal with what's so for me. And, I have no idea of where to begin or what to do--and I also have to keep on keeping on with a lot of what I'm doing (exercise, health monitoring, digestion and foods I eat, etc.). I know I can't stop some of these things since they are critical to my current state of balance.

So many questions! So many issues! Where do I begin? As the Buddha says, "If your in a home, the way begins in a hole." So be it!