CARE MORE ABOUT THE POSITIVES

Word of advice, make sure to give the lower right side of your abdomen a friendly pat on the belly every now and then to show your appendix a little appreciation, even if you don’t know what purpose it serves in your body, because if you don’t, the lil’ guy just might retaliate on you like it has on me and you’ll find yourself with an appointment the next morning to get it removed.

With my appendix having 6 yrs of experience listening in on all the grievances I had to deal with in HR in my prior employment, I would have thought it would have known my door was always open and that I would have been happy to discuss any frustrations it might have had with me, or my body, but as the Indians like to say around here, “what to do”—can’t do anything about it now. The Dalai Lama mentioned in one of the books I read, that before someone can have compassion, they must have empathy, and in light of this, I do feel sorry for the appendix as it lives a life of complete insignificance. Here you have the heart, lungs, liver, pancreas, kidneys, brain, gallbladder, and intestines, even the small one, that can walk away at the end of a work day and say they contributed to life, but the appendix doesn’t have that privilege as it really serves no purpose in the body as reinforced by me getting mine taken out tomorrow and being totally ok by that. Give me a life too, where all I do is exist, without the ability to live my life with a purpose, and I’m probably reacting no differently than my appendix has—get me out of here! If there’s such a thing as organ karma and it’s anything similar to Hindu or Buddhism karma, I can’t imagine what an organ had to of done in its prior lifetime to be reincarnated into the appendix, but it had to have been real bad.

As to how I feel about 9 hours before my operation if it’s of any interest to you, I’m quite at peace with the situation and the pain I’m experiencing right now is similar to what my reaction has been to the spice up here—it could have been spicier, which means the pain could be much worse. In talking with some people here the last couple days, all of whom oddly enough don’t have appendix’s, it doesn’t seem like I have a lot to worry about since the doctors here perform appendectomies just as much as people back home frequent Taco Treat and that’s a volume of operations I’m comfortable with. Since the Dr. told me I’d have to get my appendix taken out here or at home regardless, another positive I can find in this is that it will cost me about $400 to get it done here where back home it would have cost at least triple that price. CARE MORE about the positives in a situation is also a nice Dalai Lama tip if you're looking to achieve happiness in life.

Looks like I’ll be staying overnight at the hospital Thursday, but I’ll give everyone an update of good health on Friday.

Go Zags!