Bugs And Drugs In Us

Truths And Remembrances

Alaska shots from a very very small plane. The only reason I got in it was to see brown bears. Thanks to the pilot (and friend), Frank who made me feel at ease. Once up there, it was surrender. As you can see why. Nessa, Alaska 2020.

Dear Ones,

Be gone hottest year in 125,000 years! It is 123123 today. Howdy, 2024! The year of sweet relief. The year of fire in our spirits. The year of grace in our hearts. The year of openness to something fundamentally different.

I discharge wild words straight into inboxes of your sage hearts. Storytelling worlds. I have a tattoo on my right ear. A prompt to listen. To discern ear-splitting humanity.

What makes you do what you do? What stories do you tell yourselves? Diamond thought revelations. Some of my thoughts are not diamonds- flake away like talc.

I do not mind dark. There lies an analogous world of enchantment there. A backdoor.

I heed my digital consumption habits for sustenance and for survival. Distorted information and misinformation are modern-day weapons of mass destruction. I prefer lived experience over digital. I grew with no cellphones. It is hard to weed through the trash of human thoughts. The trash of human words. The trash of human imagery. Paralyzing stench.

How did we get so addicted to garbage? Media-addicted humans are like fois-gra’d geese. Force-fed garbage. Force self-fed of all things. Marinating in tabloids of a dog eat dog world. Burgeoning sickness. Bursting at seams maladies. The future human will think it a horror movie. It is real (-ish). Uncross my heart.

I buzz about in the modern physical human world. Twist my limbs. Ungraceful jumps over fissures. Like track and field hurdling. I knock them all down. Or they knock me down. Soul grating shrills in my hatchling state. So I am instead drawn to peace of nature. Spellbinding desert acoustics.

In the valley between the sunset and the moonrise. Nessa, Joshua Tree 12/29/23

IMPERMANENCE

This could be my last day. This could be your last day. Just throw me back to mother for decomposition. No need to even pick up my death certificate. Why do we need a certificate for everything? Good point. It is hard to know who is dead or alive these days.

Modern worlds uninspire me. I struggle with the pedestrian. Don’t look at me. Look at my heightened awareness. Don’t look at me. Look at the weight of my newborn senses.

Where can one find truth touchstones? Is there solace in the teachings of the FIVE Remembrances of Buddhist practice? For me, a resounding YES. I call them freedom remembrances.

1. I am of the nature to grow old. There is no way to escape growing old.

2. I am of the nature to have ill health. There is no way to escape having ill health.

3. I am of the nature to die. There is no way to escape death.

4. All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change. There is no way to escape being separated from them.

5. My actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand.

*Nessa Tip*: Try reciting these remembrances. If bold enough, share with others. When hearing human pain stories, push the pause button on your brain’s judging and fixing tendencies. My theory is that the like, dislike buttons on social turned us all into kneejerks. Don’t be a kneejerk (this goes for you docs out there too).

DODGEBALL

My patternings engulf me. The discoveries of my patternings rocked the earth beneath my feet. Thank goodness for gravity! Why do I feel sick in the isolating modern world? Is it persistent world-weariness?

I am on to something.

This life is a big game of dodgeball. Dodgeball perplexed my traumatized child brain. Violence is not my preference. Why is everyone trying to bruise me? The ball sound still fresh in my gyri. Ahh, the foreshadowing gymnasiums. No mercy for wounded souls.

How is it possible that the act of writing you keeps me awake? There must be an explanation. I tire of usual opaque human explanations, don’t you? Old classifications keep us small. It is sandpaper truth.

Imagine a different kind of being. Imagine new planetary intelligence. Can we dream of a higher consciousness? Of expanding the real estate of our habituated brains? Of different ways of connection?

Imagine a more evolved, inclusive, connected, calm, and whole future human.

Microscopes and telescopes are amazing inventions. Geometric codes create some life forms, including DNA molecules, crystals, galaxies, stars, snowflakes, the cornea of the eye, and snowflakes. Patterns of natural systems are pretty cool.

DO NOT DISTURB

My phone is on do not disturb when not on hospital call. I long for no more call. No more beck and calls. I have complex PTSD from the trappings of this pecky world. Sensory-auditory challenges plague me for years now (blobby blur years 2020-2023). My diagnosis is not yet described. I plan to coin it. If I ever discover words for it.

My work phone seeps poison into my skin. That is not helping matters. Do you know what tyranny of urgency sounds like? I do. Like the back of my hand.

The hospital is like an escape room in the twilight zone. It is hard to find the exit. Nessa hopeful of hospital departure in mid 2024.

WISE CELLS

What if it all works out? I prefer the courage of our love. I prefer the science of spirituality. I ride noble truth waves. Waves of mercy. I don’t get seasick for once. How did I come upon such mystical truths? I recite Buddhism’s FOUR noble truths:

1. There is suffering

2. There is a cause of suffering

3. There is a way to end suffering

4. The way to end suffering is in our relationship to the here and now

Every cell in my marrow believes this. My cells have insight about now. Propagate like succulents. They celebrate affinity with other living beings. Nature’s true witnesses. Human cells lie sometimes though. I do not think that my microorganism cells lie. Those spiky lanterns of truth.

Speaking of propagation, I was on my way to the desert (again) this week when I stumbled upon this haven. We face the sun. Accidental find on 118. 12/28/23

HUMAN DISEASE TRANSMITTERS

I was an HIV/AIDS activist before I was an HIV/AIDS doctor. I have so many eye-witness accounts.

Do you know what happened soon after COVID’s tidal wave? We got slammed with another epidemic. The sexually transmitted disease of gonorrhea spread like wildfire. So much for social distancing, sapiens. Cases of never seen before late-stage gonorrhea heart infections blew valves to shreds. Grenade-like bacteria blasted hearts beyond recognition. Hard to imagine that a condom could have prevented heart surgery. Dark age stuff in the poorest richest country in the world.

Good thing we still have effective antibiotics for the U.S. gonorrhea circulating strain at the moment. United Kingdom is facing resistant strains. Honestly, in the backdrop of antibiotic overprescribing, the future remains uncertain. I surrender to our fate.

Cacti remind me of microorganisms. My infectious disease brain cannot unsee it.

*Nessa Tip*- The spread of disease via sex is exhausting to witness and treat. For the love of desert cacti, respect your bodies enough to protect your bodies. I have a great idea for a first date: go get tested together. This has always been a dream. Pipedreams, I know.

AWARENESS OF ALL 5 SENSES IS A CURSE I SWEAR

Awareness is a curse. Overwhelming culminations. Bewitching possessions. Practice is required for cultivating and holding onto awareness. Slippery awareness.

*Nessa Tip*- Make daily appointments with the sun. I play hide and seek with the sun and the moon. Try and match your rhythm with these luminaries. It helps for sleep to synchronize with nature’s metronome. It is human nature.

My oldest reader and friend at 95 years young, David and I in pandemic garden. David and Jackie in my 94 years old home's authentic speakeasy. I am ever so grateful for our friendship. Posted with permission

*Nessa Tip*: Intergenerational friendship heals us. If an opportunity arises for you to foster it, seize it. Connect with the old and young. Share stories.

SNAKECHARMER HEART

The brain and body remodel is a squiggly process. My brain got demoted. My heart is conductor now. I am afraid there was no other option. It was a no brainer. I broke it to my bull brain. As for my heart…each moment, she begins again. Her finger on my thready pulse. Her wide-reaching tendrils of circulation sustain my organs. Got to go now. Got to learn to love this snakecharmer heart of mine. Grow my love.

I have been writing you weekly for 3 months now. I am not sure what 2024 holds in that regard. I am not sure I will continue to write. I don’t know what I will do when I leave hospital work. Uncertainty can be scary and exciting. I embrace it.

May the seas calm.

May all beings find peace.

Nessa