Someone With a Pen: Richard Grayson’s Diary

Friday, March 1, 2002

12:30 PM. I’m home for lunch, and I don’t really want to go back to work. Teresa and Diane have left in Miami, where they’ll spend the night as guests of Diane’s friend, though they left most of their stuff here.

My back is killing me. I don’t know if this is sciatica or not – I don’t get pains going down my legs – but it’s painful to change positions.

I fell asleep after 10 PM, but at 2:15 AM, I was up, and despite taking another Triavil and 0.25 mg. Klonopin, I never got back to sleep.

Teresa had stomach distress, and after coming out of the bathroom, she got back into bed with me, and we talked. She swears that I fell asleep, but I don’t remember it. She was snoring a lot, though.

Not wanting to disturb Teresa and Diane, and since I wasn’t going to exercise – even if they hadn’t been here, my back injury precluded that – I didn’t get out of bed till 7:30 AM.

There was nothing doing at work. Pat took some vacation time, and except for the trial lawyers’ workshop that’s been going on all week, nobody is around.

It’s not that cool, but it’s overcast and blustery. I just feel depressed today. Blah is a better word. Everything in my life seems wrong: this job, this apartment, my lack of a social life.

I know this is just a temporary feeling, created by a bad back, toothache, and not enough sleep – but it reminds me of the feelings I had a year ago. I don’t feel like reading the newspaper or doing much of anything. I feel crabby and irritable. I wish I were a better host.

Last night at the restaurant, I did have a nice time, although I’m sure Diane thinks I’m very strange. She and Teresa made fun of my plastic chairs, and I know I haven’t really made this apartment into a home.

Right now I can’t afford to buy any more furniture – which is to say other things have a priority. Teresa says that like her, I don’t deal well with 9-to-5 jobs. Perhaps. But I did okay working at CGR.

Maybe today at work was bad because nobody’s around and I just don’t feel like initiating anything. If I had vacation days like Pat does, I would have taken today off. Thelma says that Pat will be out Monday as well.

There was really no reason for me to go to work today except bureaucratic rules. Teresa and Diane say I shouldn’t worry about working as hard as Mark Padin and Jane Cross because they are law professors who earn a lot more than I do – and besides, they’re both trying to get tenure.

*

9 PM. I managed to salvage something out of today, and that gives me hope. I just watched a video I got from the library: Pedro Almodóvar’s wonderful All About My Mother, which had me weeping throughout.

God, it feels so good to cry. It’s weird how in my rather bureaucratic job in a law school, I somehow need and crave film, literature, art – yet as a writer at an artists’ colony, I read newspapers and nonfiction.

Well, that’s not exactly true. But it’s a paradox that the further I get from being a writer, the more I feel like one. I had little to do this afternoon at work, so I read the first few chapters of Alice in Wonderland and stuff about the fiction writer John Fante, whose biography I just put on hold at the public library.

I went out for forty minutes to get a baked potato and Diet Coke at Wendy’s. I’ll be glad when my job gets busy again on Monday, and I don’t feel so alone there.

Teresa called this evening from what sounds like a beautiful home in South Miami, where they’ll be spending the night. They’ll be back tomorrow afternoon.

This morning they took Diane’s father out of the assisted living home and drove to the beach in Fort Lauderdale, but it was too windy to leave the car. Then Manny wanted a corned beef sandwich, so they took him out to lunch and brought him back before driving to Diane’s friend’s house.

Today would have been Grandma Ethel’s 92nd birthday. I never mourned her properly. But I’ve missed her a lot, and I think my life would have turned out very differently if she’d been alive all these years. I might have stayed in New York to be near her.

Mom’s 71st birthday is on Sunday, and the older she gets, the more sentimental I feel about her even if she’s sometimes a pain in the ass and I can’t wait to get off the phone with her.

When I went to Arizona for Christmas 1999, both my parents thought I acted coldly toward them, but in the end, I realized it was because I didn’t want to get close to them only to be separated by most of the continent.

I wish my parents would move back to Florida, but that’s not going to happen any more than Grandma Ethel’s death will turn out to have been some kind of a mistake or misunderstanding.

Gee, sometimes I wish I’d gotten some wisdom with age. There are times when I think I’m getting there, but mostly I feel childishly clueless.

My sciatica or whatever it is really hurts. Of course, a year ago I was in worse shape.

I got some responses from my PlanetOut profile, but I don’t think any of these guys are people I would click with.

“Click” is a strange word, but Gianni used it when we met.

Hey, it’s four years ago that I left my apartment in downtown Davie, a couple of miles from here, for San Jose, and the time I spent traveling in the West: those two months in Silicon Valley at Villa Montalvo, the week at Libby and Grant, six weeks at Ucross in Wyoming, and then three weeks with Marc in that little apartment in Mesa across from Lutheran Hospital.

Then, at the start of summer, I returned to my parents’ home two miles from here in the other direction and spent all that time in Locust Valley, imposing on Teresa and Paul.

I guess I also spent time in Jenkintown that summer before returning here to live with my parents and teach ten adjunct undergraduate classes at Nova the next academic year. I seemed to have so little anxiety then. What changed?

Sure, I was always a worrywart, but in the fall of 2000, it became pathological. And a year ago I was filled with symptoms that have diminished but never disappeared.

When will my courage come back? Or just normality, where I won’t need courage? When will I stop worrying excessively?

I look back ten years to my first year at the University of Florida law school, and I didn’t feel the pressure of the students I’ve seen in the past four months.

Twenty years ago, as a full-time instructor at Broward Community College, making $13,200 a year, I felt I had my whole life ahead of me. My photo and news articles were always in the paper, books were coming out, and I was in love with Sean.

Teresa said I look good, but I feel so damned old – and of course my body feels that way, too. Okay, I guess I also had back pain when I was younger.

I hope I can sleep tonight.

---

Monday, March 4, 2002

6 PM. My back pain became excruciating today.

At first, I thought it was somewhat better because I slept well. But once at the office, I could not get up from my chair or sit down again without great effort and wincing in pain.

I began to feel scared, so I made an appointment with a chiropractor near here for 5 PM. But as the morning wore on, and I met students on or near probation status, I realized that I needed relief as soon as possible.

Yesterday someone mentioned that I might be passing a kidney stone, and that frightened me. So at noon, I went to the urgent medical care center here at NSU. The doctors who saw me were osteopaths, like the students at NSU medical school.

I know this is the same problem I had a year ago, and on a milder basis, three weeks ago.

The doctor said my sacroiliac joint is inflamed but that I had generally good hip flexion. He put some electric stimulation on it for a while, and then he did some adjustments. I heard pops and clicks, and he said that should give me a little relief.

Another doctor gave me prescriptions for Flexeril, a muscle relaxant, and an NSAID to relieve inflammation. But I didn’t fill either prescription yet: I’m afraid of taking drugs that may give me side effects.

After my experience with Paxil and Serzone, and since I’m taking other drugs, I’m hesitant to try these new prescriptions.

Maybe I should have gone out and had these prescriptions made, but without insurance for two weeks, I spent $100 at the doctors – and I made an appointment for tomorrow morning.

The doctor told me it probably wouldn’t take more than five sessions for my back to get better.

At 5 PM, I decided to keep my appointment with the chiropractor. When my insurance kicks in, he’ll take the Humana PPO I signed up for. But he charged me only $65 for today, and he also did the electric stimulation and made some adjustments.

Neither doctor led me to believe the problem was critical, and they said it didn’t seem to be a disc problem.

I guess at 50, I can’t do stuff I could do when I was younger – at least without consequences for my body. I don’t remember a specific cause for this injury, but I know that it’s almost definitely stress.

On the other hand, I wonder why the stress has built up to bring me to this point now. Last year I had all kinds of back problems, and in the past three weeks I’ve had recurring lower back problems. It scares me that I’m going backwards.

For the second half of last year, I felt basically all right; while I may have been anxious because I didn’t have a job, I was basically at leisure then.

As I said, I met with some students today, and I made appointments to see others. Nobody seemed to notice my two-and-a-half-hour absence from the office, but being away during the noon hour meant that I couldn’t observe any of my ARP groups during that time.

Having this back problem just makes everything more difficult. Simply going from one position to another is a problem. I’m alternating cold and heat with an ice pack and a heating pad.

---

Friday, March 8, 2002

6 PM. I’m exhausted physically and emotionally. I have a cold, and although my back is better, I went to the chiropractor at 4:30 PM, and he made some adjustments. I’ll go back on Tuesday. I’d like to spend the weekend in bed.

Last night I didn’t sleep much because of my cold and my anxiety about today at work. Once again, I was up at 4 AM, having slept maybe five hours.

Tonight Deborah Grayson is reading at the Stonewall Library, but I’m definitely not up to going. I feel so drained. I did meet with one of the remaining students on probation today, and I will see the other two on Monday, so we’ve got 100% compliance.

I emailed my proposed report to the faculty to Joe, and he made comments on it. Stupidly, I forgot to put it in a subject line, so he must think I’m a jerk.

When I finally did meet Pat, since she wasn’t feeling well either, we decided not to go out to lunch. But she wanted to go over my evaluation after the 90-day probationary period.

The scores were one to four, and she’d misread the number chart, so she listed me as “unacceptable” or “less than satisfactory” on nearly every category. As it turned out, after she realized her mistake and corrected it, I didn’t do that well, either.

She rated me “less than satisfactory” in communications and wrote, “Richard’s shy manner and newness in the program have made him hesitant – but I am confident he will be more outgoing as he develops the ARP program.”

I rated 3, “currently meets expectations,” in planning, leadership, and interpersonal relations.

I rated 4, “consistently exceeds expectations,” in concern for quality/continuous improvement, problem-solving/decision-making, and job commitment.

On fiscal and budget, supervisory, and faculty and staff development matters, I was rated “N/A: not applicable yet.”

Overall, I rated “consistently meets expectations” (with a +).

Pat wrote, “Richard has taken over a difficult and visible program within the Law Center. He has tackled the challenges and staffing issues with diligence and skill. His strong intellect and kind nature have been and will be an enormous resource as he develops the ARP program. I am very pleased to have Richard as a member of the law school administration.”

I admitted to Pat that I know I’m diffident – she didn’t know what the word meant – but I said I could be outgoing although it was hard for me to initiate contact with faculty when I am physically placed in the classrooms wing among students.

I said it’s been hard for me to make the transition from undergraduate faculty member to law school administrator, and we discussed my need for our research assistant; I guess I don’t delegate well. I’m still finding my comfort level.

Pat says that by the fall, I should be doing okay. Maybe. If I’m not, I guess they’ll need to get someone else for this job.

I told her that I was surprised they hired me when I didn’t have law school academic support experience, and she said one of the finalists did have that experience, but they preferred me because my high intelligence would win the respect of the faculty.

Maybe they should have gone with the practical, nuts-and-bolts choice.

Next Tuesday, I have to meet with Joe, and on Wednesday I give my report to the faculty. I’ll probably be nervous, but why? They’re only human beings like me, and besides, I am so tired of being anxious after nearly a year and a half of extreme anxiety.

Besides, I’m all congested now; I’d probably be worse off if I weren’t mainlining zinc lozenges.

It’s the weekend, and I need to rest and forget about NSU Law for a while.

Besides, it isn’t as if my job is the deanship of the law school. If I don’t succeed, no one will blame me; it means only that I was a bad fit for the position.

Yes, now I can fantasize about what would have happened had I not gotten this job and stayed in Arizona, but I was very unhappy there. It does seem that I’m no better off financially, but that really shouldn’t be important.

What is important is that whatever happens, I view this position as a learning experience – that I learn stuff about myself as well as about law school academic support.

I went to Tanya’s and Casey’s ARP session for Flynn’s Civil Procedure. They were awesome as they went over a great hypo, and over forty students were in attendance.

This afternoon, after talking to Pat and having lunch at home, I worked on my report to the faculty and visited Mark Padin and Jane Cross, who are both very busy. Pat, of course, is going to tonight’s alumni dinner and tomorrow’s Barristers’ Ball. I guess I need to start doing stuff like that.

It’s been a while since I’ve thought of myself as shy, but I guess I’m pretty introverted. I did tell Pat about my going on TV and radio a lot and about running for the Davie Town Council twenty years ago (exactly).

I guess I can call on the salesman’s nature I inherited from that. I suppose that my reticence and diffidence are part of the reason I never succeeded as a fiction writer; I could push myself only so far.

Pat picked up on my intelligence and “kind nature.” It’s obvious that people like me, but is that because I’m so innocuous?

When I’ve been in print or doing stuff in the media, I have a lot of chutzpah. I didn’t care what people thought or who I alienated.

Maybe I need to take the risks that I do in print or in the media in my job here.

Sometimes I think what happened to me in Arizona completely destroyed my self-confidence. I’ve become a Caspar Milquetoast-y middle-aged man, whereas once I was kind of swashbuckling – or at least I could fake it.

Or is it my intellectual detachment that prevents me from being a “man of action”?

I guess – oh, I write I guess and I suppose too much – that eventually I’ll discover how this experience plays out. But I wish I already knew how it would end.

I think I’m going to fill the prescriptions at Walgreens tonight.

---

Saturday, March 9, 2002

4 PM. “Listen to your body,” they say. My body is telling me that my life at present is untenable. I’ve had excruciating pain radiating down my left leg since yesterday, and it’s only gotten worse.

I went for another adjustment today at Dr. Dobkins, the chiropractor whose appointment I canceled last night. When I sit for long periods and then get up and walk around, I get this horrible pain.

It’s especially bad on my upper thigh, but it goes down to my feet. I think doing Body Electric floor exercises yesterday was a big mistake.

I’m also coughing and sneezing, and I’m quite congested, although the cold seems to have skipped the sore throat stage. I just want this cold to go away so I don’t develop bronchitis or walking pneumonia.

With a week to go until my NSU health insurance kicks in, I’ve already spent a fortune on doctors and medicine.

I feel as bad off as I did a year ago – and that was about the worst I ever was. I truly don’t know how I’m going to get through this week with all the stuff I have to do, like meeting with Joe and reporting to the faculty.

Thanks to Ambien and Klonopin, I slept six hours last night, but it was not a truly relaxing sleep. You know, I can deal with my back and my cold, or I can deal with anxiety – and right now I just want to say “fuck it” to anxiety.

Obviously, my anxiety is responsible for my back problems, and it’s lowered my resistance to the point where I caught a cold, but I don’t want to have the feeling of subjective anxiety and I certainly don’t want the trembling and sweating and other symptoms I had a year ago.

My damn job is not worth it.

As I said yesterday, life would have been simpler if I hadn’t gotten the job at NSU Law and I had remained in Arizona. But I might have succumbed to serious depression and anxiety again.

By now in Arizona, I’d be declaring bankruptcy, which would have been kind of a relief – and of course now when I consider bankruptcy, I have to worry about the Florida Bar Examiners.

Except I don’t, do I? I don’t have to worry about anything.

I did go to the law school today, to a session of Tim O’Brien’s Constitutional Decision-Making Seminar, where they discussed the school voucher case and students argued the Sixth Circuit University of Michigan affirmative action cases, with Ken Starr – last night’s alumni dinner speaker – acting as a Supreme Court justice.

Starr was as witty and engaging as he was when I met him two years ago, and of course by now, Monica Lewinsky, the Starr Report, and the impeachment seem so far in the past and quite irrelevant post-9/11.

From the faculty and administration, the only other person there was Gail Richmond even though Tim O’Brien had sent out an email to everyone.

After I’d been to the chiropractor and had lunch, I went back to the NSU campus at 1:30 PM for the last session of the “Day of Literary Lectures” in the auditorium of the new library.

The session was titled “Below the Mason-Dixon Line” and featured talks by Kitty Oliver, Rick Bragg, and two Southern writers I’d never heard of.

Once again, I felt fine sitting down, but oh the pain when I got up and tried to walk around.

This morning I did manage to sleep from 4 AM to 6 AM. I went out early to Albertsons and Whole Foods, and at the Bank of America ATM, I deposited some department store refund checks and got a cash advance at an ATM. Later, at the public library, I picked up a book of John Fante’s stories.

In the late afternoon, I went to Barnes & Noble to read the paper and drink their sour-ish spring cherry iced tea and snack on a low-fat Florentine biscotti.

---

Monday, March 11, 2002

4 PM. Teresa suggested I get one of the books by Dr. John Sarno, Buddy’s brother, who posits that the cause of conditions like ps sciatica (Freudian slip: I started to write it as “psyatica”) is TMS, tension myositis syndrome, which is caused by anxiety and anger.

So I got the book at the Davie public library during my lunch hour, and I’ve been reading it. I’m certainly willing to believe that my back problems, like my cold, are caused by psychological factors.

I’m the kind of perfectionist John Sarno says most TMS sufferers are. But I haven’t had any miracle cure by just reading the book, the way some of the Amazon reviewers did.

What I am doing, however, is trying to ignore the severe pain. Or is it just improving slowly on its own?

When I went to Dr. Dobkins at 10:30 AM, he adjusted me and took an x-ray, although I don’t expect it to show anything.

I’m terrified about my debt problems, especially with my now having to pay off student loans. I got the bill from Direct Loans in today’s mail, and I have to pay $338 a month, $120 more than before, because of the $19,000 I borrowed to go to ASU.

I’ll have to declare bankruptcy. I can keep the credit chassis going only for about another six months, and the only way I can do that is by taking out more cash advances.

And of course that will just make my monthly minimum payments even bigger. My debt is simply unmanageable. Once I get rid of all my debts and credit cards, I’ll be much more relaxed even if it means I can’t do the things I used to.

What the NSU Law job has done to me is made me conform to be “the good little boy,” “the honest citizen.” I can no longer be the outlaw artist or rebel against society the way I was back in 1990 when I went bankrupt the first time.

That’s why the Bar Examiners’ judgment bothers me so much. That’s why Pat’s evaluation bothered me.

But despite my intense pain and my cold, I had a good day at work today. I met with a couple of students, including a Cuban Republican state legislator who’s taking this term’s classes in Tallahassee at FSU.

I reserved a room for Thursday, March 28, so now I’ve scheduled four exam-writing workshops. I posted a notice outside my office in the hall and on the ARP bulletin board.

I also spoke with a couple of potential ARP teaching assistants for next fall, and I talked briefly to Joe Harbaugh, saying I’d see him tomorrow. (I realize that I’m becoming more comfortable talking with students, faculty, and staff.)

I also observed Olympia’s and Laurie’s excellent ARP session for Friedland’s Con Law class. And I sent out a mass email, using blind carbon copy, to the students with GPAs between 2.0 and 2.2 who haven’t yet come to see me.

During the day, people noticed how I was walking and asked me if I was okay. No, I wanted to tell them, I’m in terrible pain. But I didn’t.

I’m still in terrible pain, though I’m trying to ignore it now.

I didn’t read today’s New York Times because I thought Sarno’s book was more important.

I don’t think I’ll take the painkiller and inside and the muscle relaxant tonight. Let’s see if I start to improve without the medicine.

And I had this crackpot idea after reading a bit of Sarno: What if low self-esteem is the cause of some law students’ bad grades?

Claude Steele has theorized that’s why black people, even those from high socioeconomic backgrounds, do worse than whites on standardized tests.

A lot of students I’ve seen have low self-esteem – but then, doesn’t everyone? Today I got my parents’ package with my three book awards and Order of the Coif plaque, but getting those things didn’t have much effect on my own low self-esteem.

Vincent wrote me a long letter that I need to read over again. He says he feels guilty about not working 9-5 and being a “wastrel.”

I also heard from Miriam, Mark B, Teresa, and Sat Darshan, who had called yesterday, wanting to know what was happening with me because she was worried.

I’m still in pain and I still have a cold, but after a decent workday at school and reading John Sarno’s book, perhaps my attitude is better.