All In a Day's Spanish Class

Conjugations, verbs, stem changes, me gusta.
Our professor guides us through exercises and asks us questions in Spanish - we respond back with what we hope is a semblance of the correct answer.

My blood sugar is cruising at 85 - no worries here.

Me, te, le, nos, os, les...
fui, fuiste, fue, fuimos, fuisteis, fueron.


I grip my pencil in my hands, jotting down the occasional note or two.

Is it just me, or is it getting warm in here?
I push up the sleeves of my jacket and shift in my seat.

A wave of dizziness gently rolls over me, and it's easy to miss. I put it in the back of my mind and focus on class.

Tap, tap, tap.
The pencil shakes softly in my hands.

Streams of voices assuage me, abrasive, and my head spins.
A bead of sweat drips down my back.

I close my eyes and concentrate, drowning out the excess, listening to the unfamiliar words, forming them in my head and on my tongue.
I strain from the effort, working hard to grasp my fleeting focus.

My arm is shaking now, my mind a slur of voices and verbs and the blue sky outside.
Birds land on the tree outside the window. Somebody walks up the library steps. A train sounds its whistle somewhere far away.

I close my eyes, and the all-too familiar feeling of weakness closes in on me.

Silently as I can, I unzip by backpack, pulling out the meter inside.
Trembling, I grasp the lancet in my hands, gripping it hard, test, wait for the result that I can already guess.

48.
I grab the granola bar sitting within arm's reach inside my backpack, eating it and trying to keep the spinning at bay.
The 17 carb granola bar is all I have, and it should do the job, but it works slowly.
I sit, immobilized, until 20 minutes later the low finally edges off.
Class is over, and we are free to go. I gather my things and leave the room.

Lows have no language barrier, no concept of good timing. Diabetes doesn't wait. It's just another infinitesimal event in the day for most, but another battle for me - one of the many battles I fight, each day, between my body and myself. A battle that, for now, I've fought and won - All in a day's Spanish class.

Te odio, la Diabetes. Por favor, vaya.

Beware of "Fair"

What is fair?

Fair is undefinable. 

Fair is nothing but a product of our imaginations; an idea in the mind of the beholder.

Beware of the politician that uses the word "fair", because he clearly knows nothing about the law.

Years ago on my first day of College (wow, that makes me sound old), I stepped into a classroom that changed my life. 

My eyes were opened in Micro and Macroeconomics as I learned about modern issues, the beauty of a free economy, the eloquent words of Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations. I struggled through the slow read that was Bastiat's The Law, but came out with a far greater understanding of Government's purpose than I could have ever learned elsewhere. 

Liberty, we were taught, was a privilege that our fathers and their forefathers fought and died for - a privilege that, if we do not remain ever-vigilant, will be lost to us before we even knew what has happened.

I didn't learn to bash Democrats or people with opposing views from me. Mr. Chambless taught us that there have been plenty of great men, Democrats and Republicans, some not either, who, while certainly not perfect, have changed the world for the better. 

Last night I watched as our President talked about how he wants to make the economy "fair".

For those reading, I think that this message is so pivotal because we all need to realize that a politician's definition of "fair" is never going to happen. 

Bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people. If we spend our lives continually focusing on our resentment of the rich, many of whom (Oprah Winfrey, Bill Gates, etc.) have earned their money, then we will get nowhere. Would taxing the rich raise Government tax income? Yes, in theory it would, but not as much as you might think. What if, instead, we stopped our resentment in the name of "fair" and put less tax stipulations on the rich? Might this encourage them to use less offshore accounts and bring the money back to America through positive incentive, allowing them to grow and expand business even more while benefiting the country through the jobs and market that their goods and wealth will create? You see, when the rich in America prosper, you may not realize it, but Americans do, too. You have been lied to - the rich aren't bad for our economy, they are good for it! Who do you think supplies you with goods and products every time you walk into the store? What would you do in College without the use of Microsoft word, or powerpoint, or excel? No one forces you to give up your money (okay, maybe professors, but all us student's know that we'd fail without spell check) - you give it up because there is an agreement between you and the seller that you have each reached a good deal. Who do you figure pours money into the economy in the means of jobs, labor, products, and advertising, for the sake of business? The rich do. Contrary as it seems, their self-love has benefited countless millions. When a computer is built, where does the plastic come from? The material for the screen? The cords? Who ships the computer? How many people work in stores selling the computer? Or when Oprah flies to get her donuts, who do you think pays for the gas to fly the plane? Who pilots the plane? Who sells the donuts, or works in the air traffic control tower? Who built the private plane that she flies in? I'm not idolizing the rich. The rich have their faults. The rich can be greedy, or unjust, but one cannot deny the fact that they do create jobs for the economy and pour money into America. And if they decide to, God forbid, keep some of that money because they earned it, then more power to them! (You pay $450,000 for a Rolls Royce and tell me you don't pay a lot of taxes.)

Article 1, section 8 of our constitution reads:

"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;"

The founders knew that Government could never give the people "fair". When you take from one hand to feed another, well, that's violating someone's liberty, isn't it? How is taking anyone's money without their consent "fair" in the first place? How is somebody benefiting from that money that they did not work for "fair"? You see, there can never be a true "fair".  The founders, knowing this, acknowledged that the less Government, the better. That's one of the reasons why when this country was founded, there was no income tax. (I encourage you to read the article in this link.) 

Government's purpose? To uphold the law, to protect the right to life, liberty, and, here's the clincher: 

The pursuit of happiness.

We are all endowed with a single right which, without the help of Government politicians, welfare, or taxation, grants us the single most fair thing that we could ever be given:

The opportunity to make of our lives all that we want them to be. 

Back Away From The Low-Carb Ice Cream, and Nobody Will Get Hurt

I am misunderstood. 

No, this isn't the angst of the everyday over-dramatic, pity-party of one teenager.

I don't feel unwanted, mistreated or neglected.

I don't feel like the world had done me wrong, and that "no one understands me".

But there is a part of me that many don't understand - my Diabetes. 

There's a lot of things I am not - weak, sick, depressed, angry at life's circumstances.
There's a lot of things I am - healthy, filled with love for life, happy, strong... and frustrated. 

I'm at the point where usually I go into a conversation already expecting someone to make some kind of uneducated comment about my Diabetes.

"You got Diabetes because you didn't take care of yourself."

"It must suck cooking and not being able to eat any of it!"

"Oh right, you can't have any of the Brownies, can you? Sucks for you."
"Ugh, please don't do that right next to me. Can't you go do that in private or something?"

"I can't stand needles. I don't know how you do it."

How do I do it? Umm, how about, what's the alternative? Death? Sound good to you?

You might not have that much respect for your life, but I can guarantee that I have enough for the both of us. And as long as I take each blessed breath that God gives me, that Christ allows me to live yet another day, I will fight for the precious life that I have been given. I refuse to just give up because life handed me something unexpected. My life is harder, sure, the needles hurt me and insulin stings and makes my skin sensitive sometimes. I get bruises whenever I give myself a shot in the arm, my fingertips are nothing but ugly, pinpricked calluses and I'm sick of people staring at me like I'm a heroine addict in a restaurant. I hate counting my carbs, having to guess and worry about the world-spinning, falling-out-from-underneath-me feeling of a low or the hit-by-a-bus feeling of a high. Sure, it sucks, but it would suck a lot less if people could just keep their ignorant comments to themselves.

"Oh, you're one of those health freaks?" A man serving food to me at the mall sneered at me when I made a comment to my father about the chicken being low carb. I stared at him for a second, chewing my lip and pondering how to tell him off. "I have Diabetes," I told him, giving him a glare. "So yeah. I guess you could say I am one of those "health freaks".

"You're actually looking at the nutrition information?" My Zaxby's server asked, laughing at me. Lighten up, one meal isn't going to make you fat!" 

"You're still on insulin? I'm already off that stuff," an older woman tells me in the grocery store. "I control my Diabetes by diet and exercise. If you'd take better care of yourself, you could, too." 

I'm sick of it. I've said it before, no, I don't want pity - I just want people to be educated. If you don't know about my disease, just ask. I'll happily tell you about it. But don't just assume things, don't just say comments to me that are likely to piss me off because you really don't know what you're talking about. 

I know it sounds harsh, but I don't deal with multiple shots a day just for people to tell me I'm not taking good enough care of myself or that I'm not allowed to have a bite of cake. News flash: Sugar won't kill me. Sometimes, though, I think that might be easier - that way I wouldn't have to disprove all the Diabetes police when they come after me, trying to take away my ice cream and chocolate!

It simply feels that no matter how hard you work at controlling your Diabetes, people always seem to find something about your disease to criticize.

If you aren't one of those people - I thank you.
If you are - just go eat your bolus-free milkshake and hush up!

Correct The Low.

I wake up, unaware of what time it is, where I am, or what's happening. All of my faculties are rendered obsolete with the exception of a single need: correct the low.


My hands are shaking so impossibly much as I fumble on the nightstand, turn on the lamp, and unzip the meter case. My lancet trembles in my hands. I push it onto an area of free fingertip, pressing on the button to release the needle. A single drop of blood pools onto my fingertip as I struggle to stop shaking long enough to place the blood onto the test strip. 1...2...3......4....(this new meter is really slow).... 38. Sweat is dripping down my face and back, and I am struggling for breath. I nearly fall to the floor as I fight to lift myself off the bed, walk the 2 feet to my minifridge and grab some carbs. I am so drained of energy by my trip that I stumble and fall back on the bed, laying down and trying to eat the food. I cannot sit up, and in the lack of saliva, the food tastes like cardboard as I take bite after bite. I finish eating the carbs, but I still lack any strength. I turn off the lamp and fall back asleep, a tear falling down my face as I acknowledge that Diabetes has gotten the better of me for yet another night.

The Same Old New Year

New Year's Day... now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual. - Mark Twain 

Mark Twain says it all. It's a new year - a time of renewal, of change. We write new years resolutions, full of hope, planning to carry them out for the rest of this brand new, perfect year. But of course, this never really ends up being the case. Fast forward a month in advance, and most of us have forgotten what it was that we even wrote on our New Years' lists. Life goes on, as before, and a new year ticks by.

This sounds pessimistic. But that's not the point. Basically, it's that I don't want to go through another new year with a list in hand, trying to force myself to change and bend to the will of words on a piece of paper. Change is gradual, not forced. We don't become new people overnight, but a little bit at a time. When I was little I used to religiously write my resolutions, each year promising myself I'd get it right, that this would be the year, that I wouldn't act up, that everything would be perfect. Come to find two days in that this wasn't my year, afterall. So in the short term - no, I didn't really will myself to change. But looking back, over all of these new years... well, I see how much I've grown, I've changed, and how many New Years resolutions I've accomplished not over the course of a single year, but rather over the course of my entire life, over each and every year. The lessons, the growing, the changing never stops. Each day, each new year is a journey.

So, I go into this New Year knowing that, firstly, this year won't be perfect. I expect failure, disappointment, and upset. Same as always. I also know that this year will be full of changes. Nothing will be the same as it used to be. Things always change - I'm ready for it. But while I'll try in some areas and fail in others, I know that, in many places, I will be met with success. When I stand at the edge of 2012, awaiting the ball drop (assuming the world hasn't ended yet, of course), I know I will be a different person than I was last year. I'll embrace it. The thing about growing up is learning that things aren't perfect, and that life isn't a fairytale. You don't always get happy endings, but it's life's little happy moments in between that makes it worth living.