Perspective

It is time to hit politics head on now, which I thought would start out with some of my problems with Romney, then build into how that reflects the current state of the Republican party, but starting that on a Friday night doesn’t seem right, so I guess I will start that Monday.

Since we are holding off on that, and since I went to the doctor yesterday, I guess this is a good time for a health update. I am doing well.

The thing is, I weigh myself every day, and I test my blood sugar every day, and these are reasonable things for me to do. The downside of that is that anything that happens is very gradual, and I don’t notice dramatic changes. Also, I only know me. I do know other people with diabetes, but not well enough that we discuss it.

The doctor hasn’t seen me for three months, and she sees diabetic people all day long, and here are the things that I did not think of on my own.

·         I am at my lowest weight in six years. Actually, from when I first went in I had gained, because I was put on insulin and that contributes to weight gain. I went from 330 to 350 to about 319 now. The fact that I am going down while on insulin is pretty good.

·         Right now my average score is around 120, but recently it was 140 and when I first went there it was around 220.

·         Since my scores are pretty good, we can reduce the my nighttime insulin dose, which could help with the weight loss a little.

Obviously, that is still horribly overweight, I am still diabetic, and I am still taking a combination of six medications including two types of insulin, and none of that is changing any time soon. However, when it is just me, all I think about is what I have not achieved, and how slowly I am going, and how much better I think I should be capable of doing, and that’s not the full story.

I still have ideas for ways I could dramatically accelerate my progress, but the truth is, even if I could pull them off, I could not maintain them, and I am maintaining this level of progress now.

And, it’s sort of that way with everything. For instance, one thing I wanted to do when I finally finished the comic book script was to dig in right away, and write another three screenplays before the end of the year, because then I would have the magic 9, that average number before the first sale. And then I didn’t have any idea that I was in love with, and also I felt like I really needed to revise some of the existing six.

Also, I need to get over the “9”, because it’s not magic. It’s an average, and I think the reason that average is so high is because you need to write a lot, and keep at it, and I have done that. Yes, I only have six screenplays that are wholly mine, and at least theoretically commercially viable, but I also collaborated on a 7^th, there was the pilot and series outline for the drama, and let’s not forget that the comic book script is the equivalent of three and a half scripts in length. Keeping at it is valuable, but giving myself artificial deadlines is not.

Looking at all of the goals in the 10-year plan, I’m not nearly as far along in any of them as I would like to be, but good things have happened nonetheless, and life remains interesting and vital and joyful, and that was the point. It’s not that the ultimate goals are not truly desired, or that they won’t happen, but it was giving myself something to work towards that would keep my life as the kind of life I want. And that is happening.

So, just for the record, I am still overweight, but less so; I still have not sold any writing, but I have written stuff that I’ve loved; and I have still only been on 3 continents, but I’ve still been some cool places and seen some cool things. It’s not bad.