Believe in Me--Reissue by Jessica Barksdale Inclan

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All my life, my body has a barometer of my emotions.  I was somatizing before I even knew how to solve algebraic equations (I still don't know how to solve anything math like that contains letters).  Upset?  My stomach would be roiling.  Depressed?  My back ached something fierce.  Irritable Bowel Syndrome?  Clearly I have been working too hard. 

Strangely, though, I always forget that this is how I am.  Instead of thinking, Gee, you need to get a massage.  I think, Holy shit, you are dying of an incurable disease. 

The somatizing swells increase.  I grow even more deathly ill, and then, oh yes, I remember.  This is what I do.  The pain decreases.  And then I forget again.  Suddenly, I have every known disease on the planet.  I have them all right now.

I seriously told a friend last week that I think I have congestive heart disease.  You should have seen her face.

Getting married in a small ceremony in my backyard seemed like a great idea on December 26th, 2009, the day after Michael proposed.  I thought, yes, this will be the perfect blend of formal and informal, family and friends all gathered together with a lot of great food and cake afterward.  Party!  Laughter and joy!  Good music and conversation.

But I forgot that to even have 10 people over involves a whole load of stuff.  You know.  Cleaning and washing of windows.  Scrubbing the toilets.  Stuff.  But a wedding of 50 involves not only hiring those needed to help, but buying the right clothes and cleaning the yard, too.  Hiring the musicians, creating the playlist (At Last by Etta James made the first dance cut).  There is so much more I could list here (like buying small, attractive paper bathroom towels, bitters, and a pair of Spanx!), but let it suffice to tell you that today I decided that I have some strange degenerative muscular disease that comes and goes but is, of course, fatal.

I think I will be cured Saturday afternoon.  Around 2.30.

Jessica