talismans

I am not one for symbolism, or at least I haven't been in the past.

Until now.

Now? I'm amassing as many good luck charms as I possibly can to let the universe know I'm not kidding around—I want this surgery to be all that it should be. Successful and easy with reasonable recoveries and healthy, long lives for all involved.

It started at Christmas/Hannukah. I bought me and my brother matching elephant bracelets strung on red cords. I wear mine all the time and have recently discovered he's been wearing his too. As the surgery's getting closer I've decided to make more of them for people close to us. I've been searching, obsessively, for just the right elephant charm for weeks. Finally, this morning, it appeared. Turns out the google search I needed was "silver vintage elephant button" and the perfect image popped up.

I'm making 18—a lucky number in Judaism. It represents chai (forgive my spelling), the 18th letter of the alphabet which represents life. I'm all for that. And so, today, I'm heading to the bead district to see if I can find these charms in person, along with cord and clasps.

Or, I could pop over to a gem and mineral show to search out even more gemstones with properties that might help. I know nothing about this but at the moment am sleeping with 12 or so rocks under my pillow, each supposed to help with either kidneys, or healing, or anxiety issues. Yesterday Iz put together a master list for me of what I need and we went rock shopping. Another thing on my to-do list is to crochet a pouch in the shape of a kidney to carry them in.

I'm (seriously) not kidding about that one.

I'm not one for praying and yet I'm asking everyone I know to send all positive thoughts, good wishes, healthy intentions in our direction. I blog here. I started a Sidney's Big Adventure fanpage on facebook. I tweet about the transplant all the time.

I designed a transplant logo and ordered buttons. My brother's having the logo put on t-shirts and mugs for the hospital team.

I've started working on a show based on this experience with a dear friend of mine.

I've got a list of things to bring to the hospital: photos of my family, the pups, a buddha statue, pink and purple mardi gras beads, a lava lamp, a needle felted ganesh Iz made for me, my bag of gemstones, rocks and shells from the beach . . . I'm sure plenty more will be added in the next couple of weeks.

Intellectually I know these objects won't really make any difference. But searching, making, shopping, planning is helping ease my anxiety right now. And I could use as much of that as possible.