(Phaysis)

To the concerned, I am bruised but not broken. My heart is ok, but you should see the veins on my left arm. Yesterday’s trip to the ER was humbling but yielded a potentially positive outcome.

It started with a sip of soda; some went down my windpipe and caused me to cough forcefully. This is a bad thing — with me, coughs almost always end in hiccups (after smoking for 9 years, I can’t cough anymore – I have to hack). So, the hiccups inevitably began and I could not silence them soon enough. The unfortunate chain of events ended in tachycardia: the sudden, sustained doubling of my heartrate.

I’ve had this before, too many times. Went to the ER for it on one extremely long case. Usually lasts five to thirty seconds until my heart finally settles down. But yesterday morning, after I tried all my doctor-recommended tricks to end it, I knew it was going to last, so I called to my roomate to take me to the ER.

All the signs, cars, stop lights, people, activity – you notice the absurdity of it all when you’re sitting in a passenger seat and your vehicle is going in slow motion, your pulse is 180bpm and your heart feels like it wants to die. You feel completely unimportant; the world goes on regardless of your emergent health.

Tachycardia is not fatal; there’s a 1% to 3% chance of death from cardiac arrest. It feels like it’s eminent, though; the heart is on a freewheeling feedback where it still pumps blood but does so incredibly inefficiently. When your pulse returns to normal, you almost can’t feel it anymore, but you’re still alive. It’s otherworldly to not feel your own pulse, but you’re glad it’s settled down. You can relax.

I went to the ER hoping that they could get the ECG leads on me before it settled; sadly, my heart once again returned to normal before I could see a triage nurse. For a proper diagnosis, they need to see it happening. I considered trying to induce it, a potentially dangerous proposition, but it’d be the best place to try that kind of thing.

The doctor on staff mentioned that it might be a condition known as WPW, or Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome; the cardiologist on call suggested it, and the staff doctor seemed to agree. Basically, the heart has a nerve bundle between the upper and lower chambers which is responsible for transmitting the heartbeat impulse between halves while in the process delaying the beat of the lower chambers.

People with WPW also have a rogue nerve elsewhere between the halves that causes the impulse to be sent too soon and on rare occasion will cause a circular impulse loop, resulting in tachycardia. WPW is treatable with medication and in most cases (I’m assuming) curable with a procedure called radio-frequency ablation where heart surgeons run a catheter to the site of the rogue nerve and burn it with radio energy.

This errant nerve is formed at gestation but its effects are generally not seen until the person is between 11 and 40 years of age. I’ve had this problem for at least since 25. I had always associated it with smoking or too much caffiene; although that exacerbates the situation, it is not the cause.

The ER doctor recommended I see the cardiologist for a follow-up. Gave me his pager and office numbers. Since I have new insurance, I need to check with my provider to ensure I can see this specialist without referral from my primary physician. Politics and money first, health second. As much as I hate using the phone, I will start making some calls tomorrow morning. Even if the ER trip was a wash, this important lead makes it worth the effort.

I understand, through some information that has been provided to me, that my former company felt some pain for the first few weeks after I left. Before my departure, I made it very clear that I was open and available for advice, consultation, perhaps even onsite setup and training, for whoever remained to do my former job. That offer was not taken up because, and these are the words quoted to me, “we don’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing we need his help.”

I’m not one to enjoy another’s pain, let alone gloat about it. But this prideful cockiness gives me great liberty to smile. I like that company; I miss that company and those I worked with. It was a laid-back affair laden with the personalities and drama that could only exist in a small shop environment. And it is because of that environment that I have to take a light heart about it and laugh. My presence made a big footprint on the soil of that company, and my absence left a painful, gaping maw. I have the satisfaction that I, for once, was able to make that effect.

Now. My current job; let’s just say that unless I learn what the hell I’m doing, do a great job, and ascend the ranks, I will not leave that great of an impression on the company. There are 15,000 or so employees, and I am but a contractor trainee in a testing lab. There are certain parties who may seek the satisfaction of knowing that I am going through trouble, stress, turmoil; they may have a glimmer of it, my treat, because my new job is hard. Damn hard. After years of growing dull, issuing motions to my body in gross movements, turning off my mind while I droned out the repetitive work with music, I am having a damnable time of trying to wake up my mind again, turning on my memory, juggling little bits of facts, events, people. You may have your satisfaction.

It’s a drain on me, this trying to keep up. I have filled pages upon pages in my journal about my internal struggles and storms. All the shit I’ve held hidden below the waterline for years is rising to the surface in murky curls of fetid water. And it startles me; smacks my face and laughs as I drop a few balls while trying to do my juggling act, trying to perform. Makes me want to scream, makes me want to run. But the urge to collapse and do nothing takes hold and pulls me back to zero where I do nothing extreme. A zombie. A real, live zombie.

You may have your satisfaction.

This has been a lonely journey, these thirty-five years, these past 4 years, these recent 2 months. Within the withering crop of people I consider friends, there are the usual few who know of my situation, but there are none who are in my closest circle. My weight is my own to bear, and it is my fault. That is my feeling; my fault for shutting them out. I suppose when I am ready I will reach out again; maybe this is my reaching out. Until then, I likely won’t be talking much.

So. To you, the people I most likely know who read my words anonymously, this is my state. Thanks for the concern. And for the satisfaction: you’re welcome.

My new job…oh my god, my head is constantly on the verge of exploding. Not a day goes by that my eyes don’t glaze over from being overwhelmed by new information. It has been a long time since I’ve needed to use my brain to hold bits and pieces of minor and major data. My old job was mostly physical and partly figuring out what a machine was doing and how to make it do it better. Once the weekend hit, I forgot the week; now I don’t really have that luxury. It will take me a long time to rebuild the mental faculties that I’ve let slip away in the past N years. I guess that’s the hardest part of the new job: the trying to keep up, trying to not crack. Gives me pause to wonder.

But the job is good, more or less. Pay is respectable. Coworker environment is pleasant but determined, hurried. We have a product hitting the market in a few months, and right now my lab is busy trying to come up with performance numbers that will go into the finalized product. The longer we take, the later the product ships, so we’re pretty damned busy. Helluva time to start training.

I’m wrapping up my second week, and I’ll admit that my manager’s words are true: “The first two weeks are like sipping water from a raging firehose.” I’ll most likely feel that way for another two weeks as I’m taking the time to get up to speed on things. I’m catching little bits, jumping in and helping my trainer by doing some of the more mundane things; but what I’m missing is the bigger picture, the outline of the workflow, what is expected when testing a new part, what numbers are required, what tests are required to get them. I’ll learn all that in due time naturally, but I sense that I’ll have to insert some initiative to learn them faster. It’s not really a job where all relevant data is fed to me automatically. I have to ask the right questions.

For those of you who may not be in the know: I have changed jobs. You can read that again if you like. After five years, two months, and one week, my time of working at Morgan Printing has come to a whimpering end. My last day was friday of last week.

The question now is why; I couldn’t take that place anymore. When I started back in 2002, there was enough work to keep 7 people in my department very, very busy. Five years later, we’re scraping for work with a staff of 3. It was clear that the business was not growing. I would have very little work to do, but by day’s end I was exhausted from trying to keep busy and not look like I was slacking. When that is your full-time job, it’s time to go.

After a six-year hiatus from the tech field, I decided that it was my time to get back into it. I had several standing invitations for jobs, so I didn’t worry too much about looking. A friend pointed me towards a job listing and over one weekend I rebuilt my resume, wrote a cover letter, got some references, and applied to the job. By week’s end, I had talked to a contract agent, had an interview with the company, and gotten selected for the position. That friday, I submitted my two-week notice.

Yesterday, I started my new job as a technical contractor at Advanced Micro Devices (AMD). It’s a one year contract; AMD has the option to bring me on board permanently at the end of the contract (or any time if they really like me). I am doing what is called Power Analysis; due to recent EPA legislation, low power consumption in computers is a major selling point. It’s my job to assist the performance lab in determining how much power AMD’s processors consume under various loads. And that’s probably most of what I’m allowed to say under the non-disclosure agreement I signed.

It’s not a fun job, it’s not a glamorous job, it’s not a repetitious job. But once I learn what the hell I’m doing, once I get a sense for what is expected of me, once I see how it all fits together, then maybe I’ll be able to stretch out and start enjoying it all. Yesterday blew my damned mind; I was a deer in the headlights, a babe in the woods. So much info to take in. So much to figure out. By day’s end, I had a raging headache and a glassy-eyed stare that didn’t want to go away. I went home, took my mind off the day by cooking dinner and watching TV. I passed out before midnight.

This morning, I slept well but all that was destroyed by my first thought of my new job; the headache returned and has stayed with me most of the day. Couldn’t eat my breakfast. Didn’t have much for lunch. The stress of having to adapt and adjust for the first time in 5 years is a lot to bear. By the end of the day, I had spent some time under the wing of my coworkers; I was starting to figure things out, starting to talk, starting to see the light. I’ll quote something one of my managers said to me: “The first two weeks is like trying to take a sip of water from a roaring firehose.” I agree. I’ll get used to it some time soon; I better, because I left my old life behind. Now it’s drink or drown.

On an Enigma listening kick tonight. Michael Cretu’s fledgling project has left an indelible mark on my adult life; each of the six albums is etched permanently into the soundtrack to my life. I listen and I’m swept backwards into times far-receded and fading into idyllic pastels of halcyon days.

1. MCMXC A.D. – my sister was given a copy of this by an uncle; it punctuates first the summer of 1990 and later the spring of 1992 when I was able to borrow it from a friend at college. I dedicate this album to my sister, to Ryan who loaned it to me, all my other friends at the time, and to Melissa, the girl closest to me who dug it most.
2. The Cross of Changes – I got into this album heavily in the summer of 1995, several years after its release. I borrowed it for a long time from my friend Steven down the hall. It punctuates that summer, the lightness and heaviness of everything, the passion of my first love. It’s dedicated to my first love, Donna, and to our friend Liz who talked me through the rough parts.
3. Le Roi Est Mort, Vive le Roi! – I discovered this album while driving a delivery van during my early months in Greensboro; I thought it was a new Yes album at first; glad to be wrong. Picked it up and didn’t put it down for weeks; it carried me through my tribulations there, kept me warm on the chilling nights of late autumn. First album where the romantic ties are slim; it hit me more on an interpersonal level. Dedicated to Stephen and Misty, Paul, Pam, and Joelle, my only friends-with-history at the time.
4. The Screen Behind the Mirror – arriving to me in the heady buzz of the early tech boom of 2000 in quiet Texarkana, it gave me impetus to keep pushing for escape into the world at large. I was living at home at the time and working at a hotel, so anything to make me get away from it was a welcome relief. Strongest memory is cranking this album at top volume with an empty house while getting dressed for one of my rare nights off. Dedicated to Josh, Jon, Laura, Liz, mom, and Sandra.
5. Voyageur – I discovered this album while hearing the title song playing before a movie. It was Cretu’s first departure from the slightly-worn chant formula that made his project famous, and cemented his place in the league of extraordinary electronic musicians. Of note is the song “In the Shadow, In the Light” which gives voice to my loves long-lost. Dedicated to Amy, my highschool crush to whom I drove to see for the first time in 13 years at a weekend festival near Houston.
6. A Posteriori – Possibly Cretu’s final album as Enigma, this album has a stark poignancy as either the end of something good or the transformation into something better. I was in a hard time emotionally last year when this came out, and I came to appreciate the smoothness, sensitivity, passion, and light that the album offered me, carrying me through another rough time into redemption. I dedicate this album to MaRanda, to whom I sent a copy, in whom I respect, from whom I’ve gained a new interpretation of love.

The emotional heaviness brought on by these albums causes me to reflect on my past; some people have no use for history, but it is my poison, tonic, elixir and medicine. I require a soundtrack for my life, and I gladly take its doses to give me perspective on my present.