My last, best, excuse

13. To explain the whole weired asthma thing I have to go back to where it all began.

12. I started smoking when I was 15. I never really had asthma prior tot this. Almost immediately after I started smoking, I got repeated bouts of bronchitis that one day, didn't go away. I was diagnosed with asthma. Over the next few years, as I idiotically continued to smoke, my asthma worsened. In my 30s, I became "chemically sensitive". I could no longer walk into used book stores because of the powdery mold, or walk down the soap isle at grocery stores. Anything would trigger an attack. When I had a small fire at home I wound up in the ED.

11. In 1995, I asked the physicians assistant at my school for a handicapped sticker because I was so breathless walking to my car. He refused, much to his credit, and told me i needed to move more, not less. I told him i couldn't exercise; i have asthma. He begged me, "you are going to develop emphysema. There is an enormous amount of damage already. It will damage your heart. Please stop."

10. A week later, after an asthma attack that nearly resulted in another 911 call, I finally did. I didn't use patches or pills or gum, just the reminder of that day, November 5th, 1995, when I found myself holding an albuterol inhaler in one hand and a pack Benson & Hedges lights in the other. Idiot.

9. The first thing I noticed after I quit was that my children stopped coughing at night. I had assumed that children just coughed at night.

8. Eventually, the worst of the cravings subsided, and asthma became manageable, but the damage lingered. In 2002 things were so bad my doctor prescribed advaire, which changed my life. I could sleep at night, exercise, almost never needed my inhaler. I was still sensitive, however, and after I took up running, I would occasionally stop running at the end of a workout and cough and gag for quite some time after. Baboo worried and fretted.

7. Now, from time to time, I would run out of advaire. I usually took my daily puffs in the dark, so I often did not see the little counter in the disk telling me how many doses were left. A day or so after it was empty, my chest would start to tighten, and I would notice that I couldn't breathe lying down, and I would look over at my little purple disk, and see the big red 0 in the window. Yikes. Then I'd order another one from walgreens. Such was life.

6. was sensitive. I accepted it. It was my own fault. My asthma was triggered by mold, mildew, dust, all kinds of pollen...the worst was grass and pine...and chemical fumes. Walking through clouds of smokers entering a "no smoking" building...I had to hold my breath. This past winter was very dry, and especially troublesome.

5. It was my favourite excuse, my last, best, excuse, for not training. I would point to any known trigger and say, "i can't work out today because...

• The junipers are pollenating
• It just rained.
• It's really cold and dry out.
• The grasses are pollenating.
• I just walked by a guy whom was smoking.
• The wind has been blowing, and the air is full of dust.

Etc.

4. Then in March of this year, something odd happened. I ran out of advaire....and nothing happened. My chest did not tighten. I slept normally. I waited. Stuff bloomed and pollenated and...nothing. Thick smoke drifted in from Arizona, causing problems all over the city, air warnings, and still...Still nothing. I traveled to smoggy cities...no wheezing. I traveled to wet, green places, and breathed deeply I walked down isles full of scented detergents, drove past road crews spray oil on roads, Still nothing.

3. googled; I could find nothing about asthma spontaneously getting better. There were a lot of frightening hits about it suddenly getting worse, howeve. I asked a psychiatrist, at work. Hmm, she said. She had never heard of asthma just 'getting better'. Maybe, she said, there was some psychological component...it's in the DSM as being a medial problem complicated by emotional factors.

2. So I'm cautious, so fat it's only been about three months. But if this continues, and I don't know that it will, I don't know how to explain it, except that maybe it was smoke damage and not really asthma. I smoked for 15 years, and it's been 15 years since I quit.

1. will keep running, and I guess I'll have to run more, because I may have lost my best, last, excuse.

Hammers, Nails. Nothing in particular.

So, this morning, I was trying to get a new button sewn on my pants before I left for work. It had broken BROKEN. OFF. due to the strain on it of encompassing the ever-increasing me. However, I stopped briefly to go hang a picture because Sweet Baboo was taking a shower. These things are related: Baboo taking a shower, me hanging up a picture, and the fact that my hair looks like crap today.

I will explain.

So, not long after we first moved to the new house I was walking across the house one day with a small hammer in my hand and passed Baboo, who immediately deviated from his course to ask, with as much casualness as he could muster (trying very hard to keep the concern, anxiety, and worry from his voice,) Sooooo...where ya goin’ with that hammer?

Have you played this game? You might be tempted to answer with one of the following:

a) I’m looking for a rusty railroad spike to drive into the wall!
b) You know, I’ve had it with those damned cats...
c) I’m going to hang a picture on a nail but change my mind until there’s at least 20 holes in a small area of the wall.

Now, I’ve checked, and this is apparently a question for the ages, asked of many a partner to their significant other, mostly out of concern, sometimes out of a need to micromanage, always annoying.

To be fair to Baboo, I must confess that I have been known to do anything to hang a picture: My mother was a professional artist, and over the years I’ve assembled a collection of certain things that must be hung or it just won’t feel like home. I will generally, if provided with them, use the proper picture-hanging nail and hook, but if they are not available immediately I have been known to use, in this order: finishing nails, roofing hails, wood screws, bolts, rusty bits of metal, bits of hard wiring cut and sharpened to a point.

I have, furthermore, used the following when either a hammer wasn’t available or I was too busy to go look for one: rocks, the heels of sturdy shoes, the heels of lesser sturdy shoes, the back of a cordless phone, a meat tenderizer, spoons, forks, the flat of a sturdy knife, the handle of a screw driver, and a marble rolling pin.

It isn't that we can't afford stuff. We can. It's just that hanging a piece of artwork, for me, is a whole tenstion-release thing. It must be hung. Now. No, NOW. IT MUST BE HUNG. I CANNOT WAIT FOR A TRIP TO LOWES!

And I’ve left some awful holes. Not holes that couldn’t be patched, mind you…with some toothpaste and a wet sponge...many of my skills having never really evolved much further than dorm living, but the holes get patched, y'all. But. Anyway.

So it isn’t strictly for purposes of micromanaging that Baboo began following me through the house and asking me where was I going with that hammer.

However,

He had bought me a tack hammer, and some proper picture-hanging nails and hooks, and I’ve been a good girl; I’ve been using them. Nevertheless, he has been following me through the house and questioning me about every decision I make to hang artwork of any sort...however kindly and patiently he asks, and he always asks kindly and patiently, but the stress of the ever-present question, though, has gotten to me to the point that I’ve determined that the best time to hang a picture is while Baboo is taking his shower.

Which brings me to this morning.

I had just enough time to sew on a button, but Baboo stepped into the shower and I realized that I had some prime picture-hanging time available, so I abandoned the button-sewing and dashed to spare bedroom to hang the picture, thereby squandering the available time to sew on the button. The button was sewn on after he got out of the shower, thereby squandering available makeup time...as I have mentioned in the past, I'll wear makeup in an Ironman, so I'm SURE not going to work without makeup on and I was GOING TO GET SOME MAKEUP ON MY FACE, thereby using up the time to do my hair properly.

See, it’s all related.

...