Russian Roulette, wheelchair racing, packages from Japan, gifts arrived & expectations to come

Likely by the time you read this I will have finished my game of Russian Roulette. Outcome, unknown.

At 7:50 a.m. July 1st, is the HBC 10K start for wheelchair racers. Since I did my training run, a heat wave has hit us, day after day. This morning at 10:00 am it was 24 degrees centigrade. Anything above 19-20 puts me into heat exhaustion and moving toward heat stroke, yup, I’m that heat intolerant. Cheryl has come over to as we put it, “Try and take one bullet out of the gun” (in our Russian Roulette game). At the halfwaypoint I am going on oxygen for the rest of the race. I have a camel pack under my racing wheelchair with over a liter of Gatorade. Cheryl will be at the first aid tent. Linda will be at the halfway point to put on the oxygen, she will also have a spray bottle to cover me with water because I won’t be sweating.

Ironically, the HBC put the jersey number ON a FREE wicking t-shirt. Which means you ‘have’ to wear a t-shirt which takes all liquid on your body and pulls it away from you. For someone like me who makes no liquid or needs any liquid to evaporate that is like the “Shirt of Death!” (We cut out the number and put it on a mesh top). So, I am hoping that tomorrow I will update with some pics, but right now I have a bad case of the nerves (which means jittery, irritable and often in the bathroom).

Going off and doing a training run is one thing. Doing a race the first time in my race chair with other people in race chairs (where I hope I don’t hit them and make an ass of myself), in front of a crowd on a day 10 degrees hotter than last run after having about 10 seizures, TIA and a partial stroke over the last three days…..yeah, no worry.

So instead of focusing on that I am going to talk about goodies, particularly the ones I GET (Hoo hoo! Prezzies!), and the ones I am sending out. I did another 10 postcards over the weekend (sent! I hope the US people get them before July 4th!) and am planning to do another batch tomorrow (using the endorphins from the race!). The problem is that I am sort of getting carried away. For example, this is the sort of Goth Extravaganza I got into with stickers and spiders.

So much stickered excitement that the amount of space for writing (and the NAME and ADDRESS!) was somewhat reduced (oops!).

The GOOD news is that two of my orders from Japan have arrived which means we are chock-a-block regarding anime postcards, so let your Yoai and other anime needs be known. Here is a sample of some of the nice Anime girls (a bit of a Yuri scene going on in that one on the left…) who might show up in a mailbox near you.

Again, remember, to have your very OWN postcard show up, just email me with the title POSTCARD (mpshiel@hotmail.com). Seriously, I LIKE doing it, even if I have sort of gone from Art Form to instead: Over The Top. Yup, I am a combo of trailer trash and the people who can’t stop adding stuff to their big rig until there are flashing running lights, and a “Rudolf the Reindeer” horn. Here is an example of a card I did which I thought, let’s go elegant (hence the cranes), then I thought, let’s go boy/boy love, and well, it just sort of grew from there. More, need MORE stickers!

Also, for no reason at all people send me things. Which I think is pretty cool (wouldn't you!). For example here is a necklace that Neil sent me which tells me that a) Neil is really into Zen (don’t those look like Buddhist bells) and likes me OR b) IS NEIL TRYING TO BELL THE CAT? I haven’t decided his motivation yet, like I am not sure whether he sent these for me to wear so the local population would hear the warning: “Elizabeth a coming! Lock the doors! She’s a coming!”

Dawn, sent me this stone which seems very Taoist. I am not sure whether to wear it or just stare into it for long periods of time (“let the stone stare into you, and the answers will come....”). Thanks to both of them.

I actually have so many problems with short and long term memory that I have a chronological stack of all the mail I have received, so that I can know who sent what and when. Then I will be able to respond and send thank you back to them. When your memory can and is wiped at regular intervals I found a need to make a system. So when people who come near my computer find me shouting as they touch the stack, “Don’t move your foot, you have it lodged in my mind and if that comes crashing down I won’t know who sent me what and when!” So, I do care and thank you for every card and post card and gift and I am trying to get it together enough to get back to each and every person. I may have forgotten the arrival of a card, but I have not forgotten the importance of each one, telling me, “I care about you.” I wanted those who sent postcards to gifts to know that.

In another shipment from Japan my Ghibli Studio postcards have arrived. These cards were created as a promo years ago and not available to the public for sale but I got them because…..I am obsessive, and the seller in Japan was a Ghibli fan and I explained the Postcard Project and he helped me buy them. They show the diversity of Ghibli Art, often from movies that are not seen in the USA. The first two are from the early Ghibli Studio days, and the one with the girl is from a film called, “I Can Hear the Sea.”

This second set of Ghibli cards includes a picture from the Ghibli classic Pom Poko which will NEVER be shown in North America because it is about Raccoons who fight against the incursion into the forest by using magic powers. Thy have used their magic powers to transform themselves (often into humans) or other objects (by stretching body parts often....testicles). Even in this picture, while turning himself into a lantern, the um, male parts are still present. The other card is from Laputa, Castle in the Sky, based on Miyazaki’s love of Wales (odd when you are living in Wales seeing this Japanese interpretation of Wales, UK.

So I am all set to send more postcards tomorrow, let the requests flow and I hope as time goes on the postcards I send will get more extravagant or at least much more exciting to receive. I even managed, in all my Anime Postcard buying to find a little postcard for myself. You KNOW how I like redheads, and golly, what CAN she be doing in this picture (this postcard is rated PG if you are pure of heart and mind, or R if you are not – I’m not!)

Before I go, I wanted to thank SharonMV who just sent me STICKERS to put on the postcards I send. I appreciate all the people who have sent me stickers (seriously, thank you), but hers are such works of art that I didn’t want to end up getting credit for art that I only at best borrowed to pass on. For example, these are flowers that she grew herself, then pressed into what looks like handmade paper before turning them into a sticker. And she GAVE them to me! So yes, I am definitely going to pass them on, so I hope if you received one of these that you think of her too, and how thanks to her help I was able to make something (like a postcard) more beautiful than these hands could do by themselves. The same with these pressed and coloured stickers she sent. This is just a selection. So as you can see, at least SOMEONE is bringing class to my tendency to go sticker crazy on the back of postcards. Thanks Sharon.

So I am looking forward to sending the postcards out and for now, since tomorrow is the end of my week of “How do I go on?” The answer, if you will allow me a little vanity, is that I am still, if not needed, at least desired. I bring added value to lives by sending out postcards, and they bring extra value to my life. And all the people who send me mail, and gifts and stickers and art, and let me into their lives, and who I want to let into mine; that means something…..I cannot make the earth thunder, nor cure the sick, or right the wrongs. I can send postcards. Even if I don’t know the day or the time; even if I am seated, supported by arm and head rests, on oxygen, I can sent postcards. The ones I received mattered, to me, each one. And the sending matters to me, each one.

Time to go but I will, in all that I do tomorrow, on the road with my wheelchair or at the desk with my pen, do my best in all that I have set before me. Promise.