Day Eight
Strattera, Day Ten:
(Day Ten technically should have been here but, oh well.)
I've skipped a few days because things have been very unusual around here lately as some of you are already aware. From one morning to the next night plans were very quickly made and flights very quickly booked and before I knew it I was in Phoenix, Arizona. So things in my life the past 48 hours have been a whirlwind to say the least. And I want to be clear on the fact that I am not out in this god-forsaken desert for a vacation, although I respect that many do travel here for planned getaways. It has beauty, especially in the scenery, but it wasn't high up on my list of places to visit before I came here and now it's probably last on the list of places I'd like to return to.
Yes the searing heat is part of it.
I have found, however, out in this gigantic frying pan, that this Straterra is actually working quite well. First of all, I've always been terrible with directions. As is often said, I can't find my way out of a paper bag. To be able to drive in an area well I need to have driven it many times. But... despite a misstep this morning getting back to my sister's house from the Enterprise rental place, driving around here hasn't been too difficult. As a matter of fact, I've been challenged heartily several times tonight and I came out completely unphased and unscathed.
I had to drive out to Mesa, pretty much one of the Phoenix 'burbs, to visit my sister. (Wait, you might ask, you're at your sister's house, but had to go somewhere else to visit her? Well we'll get to that later.) Thanks to Google I had no problems. But I think I also have Strattera to thank because, before, even with Google, I'd almost always make a wrong turn at least once. But there and back, not a single one. It's quite surprising in retrospect.
But the real challenges came driving only a few miles to a barbeque restaurant and back to the house. (By the way, if you ever do find yourself in this suburb of Hell, go to Honey Bears BBQ, it's so far been the only enjoyable thing so far about this jaunt across the country. The ribs were excellent.) We had to go there anyway to go pick up my sister's vehicle which she had hidden there a few days prior. So my grandma and I decided we might as well check it out and I'm glad we did. On the way back we had to make several detours because of construction - they're building a light rail system here presently - and some police activity. I would have watched the news later to find out what it was but apparently my sister's cool television Microsoft Media Center setup does everything but actually let you watch TV.
It was quite amazing. Normally I would have been a basket case, driving in a completely foreign environment, almost no idea where I was going, and suddenly the only directions I have are thwarted... not once but twice, not to mention the fact that I was driving a vehicle I was totally unfamiliar with (I'd never driven a gigantic SUV before).
But tonight, I come across a right I can't make, "OK, just keep going, take the next right, take the next right, go left on the street you'd originally intended on making a right on," boom, boom, boom, done. Piece of cake. I did that not only once but twice. I do not believe I could have accomplished that, at least not that easily with no stress or any wrong turns, before Strattera. My grandmother sure was glad, she was following behind me in our rented Cobalt, and she has absolutely no clue what I was doing or where we were going.
I don't know whether to laugh or cry a lot the past few days. I think that if I didn't at least try to keep a sense of humor about this tragic mess I think I'd lose my mind, too and the mood swings this drug tries to impart on me isn't helping. For example, instead of "Oh my god, wtf!?" I think "Gee, the front lawn is quite an interesting place to toss your computer printer out to" and "Hey, the pool is a great place to throw your dishes into, why didn't I think of that?"
The young woman I went to visit over in Mesa was not my sister. The person I saw at that place resembled her in some ways, but, excepting when I popped into the hallway and surprised the shit out of her and the hug-filled beginning of the conversation, this woman was quite belligerent. My sister doesn't trash her house, destroy furniture and throw it out on the street, and half-joke about it being an art project. My sister would never tell me that the creepy neighbor that she had been afraid of and had gotten a restraining order against was a great guy whom I should totally go introduce myself to. My sister would certainly never swear at dear old grandma. And there is no way she would ever find herself locked away at a place with signs on the doors that say "Close Securely, Escape Risk" and think for a second that she had a handle on things. And most importantly, my sister would never tell me to just go away after only a 20-minute visit after I flew over a thousand miles to just see if she was OK (well, as far as she knew that's all I was there for).
There was one thing the two had in common, though: my sister also wouldn't have fancied having that conversation near a guy who, the entire time I'm there, would sit in a chair looking down the entire time doing nothing but saying "Oooog!" over and over again.
By the way, the people at the facility were super nice and caring, and the place was wonderful, and I have a really good feeling that that they're going to bring my little sister back to me sometime soon.