In this universe effect follows cause.
I've complained about it but—
Thursday, 27 February 2025
When a patient receives a terminal diagnosis, a clock starts.
In an instant, the future becomes finite. Doctors do their best to predict life expectancy based on median survival, the period of time after diagnosis when half of patients with the disease are still alive.
But statistics can't tell you if you'll host Thanksgiving dinner...
..or attend your grandkids' recital.
Wednesday, 26 February 2025
It is a curious thing, the death of a loved one.
We all know that our time in this world is limited, and that eventually all of us will end up underneath some sheet, never to wake up.
And yet it is always a surprise when it happens to someone we know.
It is like walking up the stairs to your bedroom in the dark, and thinking there is one more stair than there is.
Your foot falls down, through the air,
and there is a sickly moment of dark surprise as you try and readjust the way you thought of things
When we die,
as when the scenes have been fixed on to celluloid and the scenery is pulled down and burnt
— we are phantoms in the memories of our descendants.
Then we are ghosts, then we are myths.
But still we are together.
We are the past together, we are a distant past.
Beneath the dome of the mysterious stars,
I still hear your voice.
There's difference between being dead and dying.
We're all dying.
Some of us die for ninety years,
and some of us die for nineteen.
But each morning everyone on this planet wakes up one day closer to their death.
Everyone.
So living and dying are actually different words for the same thing,
if you think about it
We are going to die, and that makes us the lucky ones.
Most people are never going to die because they are never going to be born.
The potential people who could have been here in my place but who will in fact never see the light of day outnumber the sand grains of Arabia.
Certainly those unborn ghosts include greater poets than Keats, scientists greater than Newton.
We know this because the set of possible people allowed by our DNA so massively exceeds the set of actual people.
In the teeth of these stupefying odds it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here.
We privileged few, who won the lottery of birth against all odds,
how dare we whine at our inevitable return to that prior state from which the vast majority have never stirred?
die with dignity.
There’s no such thing.
Our bodies break down, sometimes when we’re ninety, sometimes before we’re even born, but it always happens and there’s never any dignity in it.
I don’t care if you can walk, see, wipe your own ass, its always ugly.
Always!
You can live with dignity, you can’t die with it.
Death is not about the disposal of the client.
What do the Dead care what happens to them? They're dead.
All the trappings of Death are for the living. It is the final reconciliation. The last farewell.
- the life force that all beings share and which animates them.
This enters the body at conception and returns to God, to the point of origin, at death.
Death is a stripping away of all that is not you.
The amazing miracle of death,
when one second you're walking and talking,
and the next second you're an object.
Tuesday, 25 February 2025
Because God is never cruel, there is a reason for all things.
We must know the pain of loss; because if we never knew it, we would have no compassion for others, and we would become monsters of self-regard, creatures of unalloyed self-interest.
The terrible pain of loss teaches humility to our prideful kind, has the power to soften uncaring hearts, to make a better person of a good one
Monday, 24 February 2025
Friday, 21 February 2025
Brenda Ann Spencer
Spencer was charged as an adult.
She pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder and assault with a deadly weapon.
On April 4, 1980, a day after her 18th birthday, she was sentenced to concurrent terms of 25 years-to-life in prison.
Under the terms of her sentencing, Spencer became eligible for hearings to consider her suitability for parole in 1993.
Spencer has been denied parole in
1993
2001
2005
2009
2022
2025
She is currently imprisoned at California Institution for Women in Chino.
Spencer is often regarded as the first modern high-profile school shooter.
She is eligible for parole again in 2028.
Brenda Spencer Denied Parole
Brenda Spencer Denied Parole
San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan said today the woman who opened fire on a San Diego elementary school as a teen in 1979, killing two people and injuring nine others, has been denied parole following the strong objection of prosecutors. The decision to deny release for Brenda Spencer, 62, came after a Board of Parole hearing which included three victim statements and input from the District Attorney’s Office. During its deliberation, the Board considered Elder and Youthful Parole Laws when reaching its decision.
“The shock of this brazen crime rippled through the community in San Diego at the time and it continues to hold a place of infamy in the history of mass shootings in our nation,” said DA Stephan. “ While new laws are in place that can potentially speed up releases for individuals who were convicted as minors, as well as inmates who are over 50 years old, our position is that the totality of the horrific circumstances of this crime and this case do not warrant release and we are gratified that the Parole Board agreed with our position.”
On the morning of Monday, January 29, 1979, Spencer began shooting from her house at children waiting for 53-year-old Principal Burton Wragg to open the gates to Grover Cleveland Elementary School. She injured eight children. She began with nine-year-old Cam Miller, since he was wearing Spencer’s favorite color, blue. Spencer shot and killed Wragg as he and teacher Daryl Barnes tried to help children. She also killed 56-year-old custodian Mike Suchar as he tried to pull a student to safety. A 28-year-old police officer, Robert Robb, had responded to a call for assistance during the incident, where he was wounded in the neck as he arrived.
After firing thirty-six times, Spencer barricaded herself inside her home for several hours. While there, she spoke by telephone to a reporter. Spencer told the reporter she had shot at the school children and adults because, “I don’t like Mondays. This livens up the day.”
Spencer was charged as an adult. She pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder and assault with a deadly weapon. On April 4, 1980, a day after her 18th birthday, she was sentenced to concurrent terms of 25 years-to-life in prison. Under the terms of her sentencing, Spencer became eligible for hearings to consider her suitability for parole in 1993.
Spencer has been denied parole in 1993, 2001, 2005, 2009 and 2022. She is currently imprisoned at California Institution for Women in Chino. Spencer is often regarded as the first modern high-profile school shooter. She is eligible for parole again in 2028.
The DA’s Lifer Unit is responsible for handling parole hearings for inmates serving life sentences in California state prisons. The unit’s main role is to represent the interests of victims, their families, and public safety by advocating against the release of dangerous offenders when appropriate.
Thursday, 20 February 2025
Wednesday, 19 February 2025
Remember to act always as if you were at a symposium.
When the food or drink comes around, reach out and take some politely;
if it passes you by don't try pulling it back.
And if it has not reached you yet, don't let your desire run ahead of you, be patient until your turn comes.
Adopt a similar attitude with regard to children, wife, wealth and status, and in time, you will be entitled to dine with the gods.
Go further and decline these goods even when they are on offer and you will have a share in the gods' power as well as their company.
That is how Diogenes, Heraclitus and philosophers like them came to be called, and considered, divine
Tuesday, 18 February 2025
Despair is the price one pays for setting oneself an impossible aim.
It is, one is told, the unforgivable sin,
but it is a sin the corrupt or evil man never practices.
He always has hope.
He never reaches the freezing-point of knowing absolute failure.
Only the man of goodwill carries always in his heart this capacity for damnation.
Tuesday, 4 February 2025
If only life's variables were as cut and dried as the rules of mathematics.
If only there were clear answers, certainty, clarity, right or wrong.
But all you can do is eliminate as many unknowns as possible.
Then pick an answer and hope.
Hope that at the end of the day, it's an answer you can live with.
On average, a healthy heart beats 115,000 times per day.
When excited, the heart rate can double.
The heart pumps 2,000 gallons of blood through your entire body 24 hours a day.
It never rests.
The heart is the hardest-working muscle in your body.
But when it’s damaged, it’s just like skin. It scars, and scar tissue can be very dangerous in a heart. It weakens it. And eventually, a heart full of scars stops working.
Scarred hearts don’t heal, but over time, the scars can change.
They can become smoother, softer.
And some scars can even fade away.
Life doesn't owe us a thing.
It just is.
Like a river, it goes where it goes.
You can try to fight against the current. Or you can learn to ride it.
All day, every day, we fight against the current.
Sometimes we lose, sometimes we win.
Sometimes, the current carries us exactly where we need to go
. And sometimes, it slams us right into the rocks.
24 hours.
1,440 minutes.
86,400 seconds.
One day can bring you back from the brink, change your entire life in one heartbeat, one single breath.
That's all it takes to save your life. To change your life.
One single day can pull us from the depths of despair.
And one single day can fill us with more possibilities than we could imagine.
Have you ever had the starring role in a play?
A solo in a recital? All eyes on you. Waiting for you to do what they came to see. Feeling the incredible pressure to perform.
There was a time when they used to call operating rooms an operating theater. Scores of people get ready for the show, the sets are arranged, there are costumes, masks, props, everything has to be rehearsed, choreographed, all leading to the moment when the curtain goes up.
You know what they say about Carnegie Hall? There is only one way to get there.
If only life was just a dress rehearsal... And we had time for do-overs... We'd be able to practice and practice every moment until we got it right.
Unfortunately, every day of our lives is its own performance.
It seems like even when we get the chance to rehearse and prepare and practice, we're still never quite ready for life's grand moments.
The human body is designed to compensate for loss.
It adapts, so it no longer needs the thing it can't have.
But sometimes the loss is too great, and the body can't compensate on its own.
They say the inability to accept loss is a form of insanity, it's probably true.
But sometimes, it's the only way to stay alive.
Carpe diem
Carpe diem.
How annoying is carpe diem?
How are you supposed to plan a life, a career, a family, if you're always carpe-ing the diem?
We'd all be too busy, living in the now. Whatever that means.
I'll admit, the Romans had a point. You gotta live life. And living means that every morning, when you wake up, you have to choose.
It means seizing what life offers in the moment and forging ahead, no matter the weather
... or closing the curtains, and shutting out the day.
Turbulence.
It means anything from a few little bumps to a catastrophic weather system that could knock your flying tin can right out of the air.
We've hit a snag, a bump in the road.
Turbulence. So, you know, you better buckle up.
One of the most unpredictable things about encountering turbulence is its aftermath.
Everything's been shaken up. Undone. Turned on its head.
So, if you have the choice to avoid the plane crash, do you take it? Do you play it safe?
Or do you get on board and take your chances?
Just like we need food and water, humans need each other.
A brain study revealed that when placed in an MRI, a patient's reward center lit up when another person sat in the room.
Neurons fire when we talk to someone, think about someone, and they go haywire when we hold someone's hand. Our brains and bodies are actually programmed to seek each other out and connect.
So then why do so many people prefer being alone? Why do we often run for the hills when we feel the slightest connection? Why do we feel compelled to fight what we're hardwired to do?
Maybe it's because when we find someone or something to hold onto, that feeling becomes like air. And we're terrified we're going to lose it. And trust me, you can get pretty good at the alone thing.
But most things are better when they're shared with someone else.
Sunday, 2 February 2025
In Japan, when a piece of pottery breaks, some potters fill the cracks with gold.
The potters, they see the repair as something beautiful. They know that the unexpected happens. Change happens. They know that nobody gets through this world in one piece.
That doesn’t have to diminish us. The cracks are part of our history. They will always be with us. They made us better. They made us stronger.
They made us something new.
Time
Time is a strange thing.
When you're waiting for something good to happen, it can feel like time is dragging on.
But when you want it to slow down, it goes by in the blink of an eye.
The odd part is time isn't real. It's a concept imagined by scientists based on the imperfect movement of the Earth around the Sun.
So why do we put so much importance on something that's just a theory?
Because it's all we have.
There's never enough time. Work. Kids. Life. Death. Something always cuts our time short.
So our best bet is to make the most of the time we have. Or make up for lost time.
But sometimes, if we're really lucky, time stands still.
phlebotomy
Before the advent of surgery, many illnesses were treated with phlebotomy, also known as bloodletting.
Bloodletting is the withdrawal of blood from a patient to prevent or cure illness and disease.
It was one of the most common medical practices performed by surgeons from ancient Greece until the late 19th century.
The practice has largely been abandoned because we now know that in the overwhelming majority of cases, the use of bloodletting is harmful to patients.
And yet, we did it as a standard medical practice for over 2,000 years.
It wasn't a blip in the history of medicine. It was an era.
For decades, many doctors were convinced that bloodletting was harming more than it helped. But just as many were convinced that it was the only cure.
Doctors, like most human beings, are risk-averse. They prefer the safety of what they know over the thrill of new innovations.
change requires incontrovertible proof, which is not always easy to come by.
It has been theorized that surgery itself is just an era that will pass. But that's a long way away.
And in the meantime, there are eras within eras.
We discover new science, we posit, prove new theories. And then we bang our heads against the wall trying to convince ourselves to actually change our practices in line with what we know.
Because the end of an era is easier said than done.
Friday, 31 January 2025
The organs in the human body have entirely different functions.
The cells which make up those organs act independently of each other.
But in a healthy body, seemingly independent cells quietly depend on the functioning of the others. Because when one system stops working, the others can't function for long.
Just as organ systems are codependent for survival, so are human beings. Studies have shown that our happiness and health depends on our relationships not just functioning, but thriving.
Sometimes the best we can do is bear each other's burdens and ease each other's pain.
And hold each other's hands in the dark.
The vagus nerve is longest and most complex of the cranial nerves.
It transmits information to or from the surface of the brain to tissues and organs elsewhere in the body. When a body sustains an extended period of stress or trauma, the vagus nerve becomes hyperactive.
We think of stress and trauma primarily as primarily emotional. The real impact is on the body.
When the vagus nerve is triggered, it fights to slow the heart, blood pressure drops, and you can experience nausea, tunnel vision, ringing in the ears, low blood pressure, an irregular heartbeat.
And when the mind suffers, the body suffers.
And it can be difficult to undo the damage.
Recent studies suggest that when we experience physical sensations related to intense emotions, it comes back to the vagus nerve. We think of the pain of a broken heart as being outside of our control.
But science suggests that if we laugh instead of cry, if we sing instead of ache, we might just heal faster.
Of course, when we're hurting, sometimes it's just easier to keep hurting than to try to heal.
Tensions exists throughout the entire body.
How it affects you depends on how you manage it.
Some people can self-regulate by breathing, meditation, exercise. They develop tools that help them fight the stress and reduce the pain it causes.
But not all people are wired that way. Some people feel completely overwhelmed by it.
And the tension freezes their bodies until they can't move at all.
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