I have been blessed with excellent health throughout my imprisonment. That’s why I’m surprised to be suffering through intermittent dizziness here at Taft prison camp. My wife has some theories, and since she graduated first in her nursing class, I know that I should defer to her. Still, I am stubborn and I resist.
I wake each morning between 2:00 and 3:00 to begin my writing. At 6:00 I go outside for two hours of exercise. Then I return to my housing unit and work more on my writing, usually until 4:00 in the afternoon. I am in bed on most afternoons by 5:00, and always before 7:00. Thus as far as I’m concerned, I’m averaging more than eight hours of sleep each night. This abundance of rest seems sufficient to overcome the work schedule I impose upon myself. Yet the sensation of dizziness persists.
The dizziness does not manifest itself when I wake. I’m able to enjoy a few hours of productive work in solitude. It begins to bother me around 5:30 in the morning. The best case, I have found, has been exercise. Once I start running, I begin to feel better. She urges me to report to health services. I resist, however, as I have rarely requested assistance from health services. If this dizziness keeps up, though, I suppose I’ll have to go. I’m 45-years-old now, and although I feel both fit and strong, I must acknowledge that I’m well into middle age. We’ll see how I feel in the days to come. I still want to believe that I can will the feeling away.
Today I ran only five miles because I thought a rest might help. Tomorrow I’ll run a shorter distance, too. My tally stands at 1,433 miles over the past 162 days.
Saturday 23 May 2009
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