A calm and peaceful weekend

Saturday and Sunday went pretty well. My appetite is coming back and I've been strong enough to go back and forth from the living room to the bathroom (I've continued to sleep in the living room). The main difficulty right now is that Marty has a terrible head cold. He feels awful and is trying to rest as much as possible, and is also making every effort not to pass his cold on to me, which would be disastrous.

Yesterday afternoon we settled in to watch the Patriots play the Ravens, after watching the Jets beat Cincinnati on Saturday (with the Giants out of the picture, we've switched our allegiance to New York's other team). To our complete shock, Baltimore ran completely over the Pats, running back the opening kickoff for a touchdown and never letting down from that point. The final score was Baltimore 33, New England 14, so there will be no more Pats games, and I'm not sure if we will sustain any enthusiasm for the Jets. But it was nice to sit and watch the game together and enjoy each other's company. On Saturday, Marty was gone for most of the day helping Donna, who's having car trouble again and needed groceries, and when he came home he was exhausted. I keep reminding him that after a bad cold or flu the body has no reserves, and when you get tired you just have to stop right away.

Aside from feeling just slightly weaker, I'm feeling all right. My mood is good; once I start functioning on an intellectual level again, I feel like there's a reason to go on existing, but when I feel as awful as I did last week, I really long for the promised coma in which I will feel no pain. I don't see any point in living just to feel pain and suffering--that's where I draw my "quality of life" line, although I know different people will draw theirs at different points. In some religions, I know, pain and suffering have value and meaning in themselves (one of many reasons why I don't have much interest in religion). But now I still see things I can do both in support of hospice/end of life issues, as well as in the psychiatric survivor movement. And to me, work gives meaning to life.