[Sam]

This was a bad day. I worked in school for 8 years, hard, then another three to finally start a business with a friend that has a good reputation. In the last ten years, intractable pain has slowly eaten away at my ability to keep that alive. First it was at least five days a week, then four, then three, and now, sometimes only two. Rumors have gotten back to us on several occassions after an extended battle with pain, one of which was that I was dying.

Today after an hour and a half, I had to close for the day. I'd already lost Monday out of a M,W,F schedule. We had lost last Friday as well. On the way home, we stopped at the Dr.s to pick up perscriptions, then to drop them off. As I waited in the car, a man, probably in his eighties walked by the car. He was a bit bent and a bit slow, and it struck me that at an age where I should be saving for the future and at my peak at work, he moved better than I.

Neither my friend nor I are ready to pack it in, but at the rate we are going, I may not be walking in 5 years. Usually I try to push those thoughts away as they are not useful, but couldn't today. There are people out there much worse off than I, and it seems selfish to have those thoughts. but they are there.

Sam