Just before Valentines’ day, I went through my fourth surgery because of cancer. It was a success (much better than the last one). These doctors are almost done with these cancer cures.

These medical doctor/scientists are very sure that they know how far to push me. I hopw they are right, but I’m weary of the load they are putting on me.

I’ve found an audiobooks to listen to as I fall in and out of sleep: Caliban’s War

The sci-fi in the story gives me some science to hang onto as a part of the story. There’s a botanist in the story that is part of terraforming a moon. They had done such a good job of it that it fed most of non-earth humankind

UNTIL

Disaster struck. And humanity had to be saved. Of course, humanity was not at all concerned about the danger it was in because it was too focused on the political power struggle.

The botanist could see the problem clearly, because he understood the systems at play. He knew where the tipping was and what the consequences were. He called it a complex simple system. There were a limited number of systems that balanced the biosphere on that moon, not enough to be fully redundant—that made it simple. But there were enough systems that meant you couldn’t predict which ones would fail.

I am not a simple system. I”ve got so many interconnected systems that I’m pretty sure there isn’t even a full tally on what’s happening in my body. So many systems are in motion to keep me alive and healthy, I stand amazed.

That complexity in my system is what the doctors are leaning on when they cut me open and mess around.

I am both weary and weak from the medical interventions. I like imagining myself like the heroes of the space epic. I’ve read it a lot, and every time they make it through. I know what’s going to happen.

So when I wake up in the middle of the night—which happens most nights—I can play the audiobook and fall back asleep hearing the adventure again. The heroes encounter all kinds of obstacles and they make it through

That’s what will happen for me too.