Last week, Tina and I took a walk with the girls on inauguration day to head down to the U Street Rite Aid. I actually felt pretty good on the walk — something that seemed to impress my doctors when I saw them later in the week.

U Street was filled with vendors hawking unofficial Obama souvenirs — everything from posters to calendars to books and videos. It was pretty overwhelming. There was even a store called “Everything Obama” which, I presume, is being honest about its wares.

One cannot underestimate the power of Obama’s inauguration for the African American community, but I worry that the expectations on what he can achieve are too high. Many of the posters I saw for sale depict him as a messiah figure, some even quoting prophecy and scripture describing him as the one that was promised.

I’m a supporter of a pragmatic, center-left politician named “Barack Obama,” but this other Obama, Obama the savior, is a bit disturbing. It reminds me in some what of a mirror image of the evangelical view of Bush as being god’s own President.  I like my Presidents as human beings — capable, but not infallible.  I loathe the idea of American Caesers and the cult of personality that develops around human beings.

When human beings get elevated to messianic god-men, there’s nothing but disappointment ahead for their supporters. I have high hopes for Obama, but there’s only so much one man can do.  I just wish some of my political allies would dial it back a bit and try to think of how crazy some of this sounds.  Obama can be a great President and leader, but he’s not a prophecized prophet or anything.  Setting him up as such doesn’t serve our side very well.

I had my first doctor’s appointment today after being hospitalized nearly three weeks ago.  My cardiac team is about my age and really, really good.  I felt great about them — there’s something comforting about being treated like a peer, rather than being treated by some aging gray-haired cleric of medicine who treats you like a test subject.

But the reality hasn’t changed much.  I’m doing really well for someone who’s been through what I’ve been through. Almost normal overall — that’s pretty surprising to the docs given the state of my heart.  But a weak heart means different things for different people.  My body has healthy reserves that are keeping me going in the face of all this.  If I was in my 80′s, they said, this would be catastrophic.  But I can go back to work tomorrow.

But I’m not 100% by any stretch of the imagination.  What I have will not go away, and it will almost certainly not get better.  All I can hope for is stability — being able to function as normally as I can and live as long as I can.

It changes your worldview.  I can’t think about what I’ll be doing next year, or five years from now — I have to live in the moment, in the now.  I feel fine right now.  My heart is beating right now.  I’m alive right now.  I will not die today.

And if the now stretches on for another 10 – 20 years, then all the better.

Let’s hope that’s the case.

So, it’s been a week since I came home. I’m doing better — I’m not gripped by a constant sense of despair, but I am learning my physical limitations.

For instance, I can no longer play video games. I find the physiological response extremely unpleasant — a feeling that my body has been scrubbed out by something and a wash of anxiety. This applies to nearly every game I’ve tried, but especially my old favorite, the first person shooter. I was once a fairly competitive player, but no more. I can’t help but wonder if this is ultimately for the best.

I have cabin fever — I’ve been out of the house just once since I returned a week ago, and there is a part of me that has anxiety about leaving.

However, I am able to watch scripted television again — last night Tina and I watched an episode of Sarah Connor on the DVR, and the night before we watched the Doctor Who Christmas Special. During Doctor Who, I was filled with anxiety and worry, but watching Sarah Connor just 24 hours later, my spirits were better and I was able to pay attention and enjoy the show. This is good.

I’ve also been reading “Team of Rivals,” something I was unable to do last week. I can pay attention and actually get something out of the book.

So things are getting better, but it’s a slow process — a step at a time, and despite the presence of Tina and the girls, it’s a journey I’ve largely undertaken alone.

But incrementally, I’m feeling better. Sitting up longer, on my feet longer, going without anti-anxiety medicine. As each day passes, I begin to realize that sudden death is as unlikely as it was before — that my heart has been like this for a very long while, and gradually I will return to normal. Or what passes for normal for someone with a weak heart.

It’s a hard thing knowing that you’ve crossed the line between your mortality being something amorphous, vaguely present, but hard to define, and the moment that you learn that it is most definitely finite.  I’ve cross that line.  I am going to die.

On Christmas morning, I suffered heart failure at my mother’s house in Hagerstown, MD.  My lungs were clouded with fluid, my heart too weak to pump it off.  That problem was taken care of with medicine, but I was transported  home to Washington, D.C.’s Washington Hospital Center for further testing and evaluation.

It turns out that I have an extremely weak heart — probably have had one my whole life.  The question is not if it will give out, but when and how.  I’m on medication to help regulate it, but if it doesn’t work, I will be given a defibrillator implant to make sure that if my heart stops, it will resume.  I will also be placed on a transplant list for a new heart.

It is very hard for me to type these words, to accept them.  Just two weeks ago, I was a 34-year-old man with a chronic cough.  Now I’m a man who could die tomorrow, today, in a minute.  It’s hard to even bring these thoughts into my head — but they’re true.  Now I have to learn to accept them.

I have panic attacks — and the only thing that makes me feel better is anti-anxiety medicine.  I am afraid to get up and a walk around — is what I’m feeling a cardiac event or anxiety?  

I must regain control over my life — what’s left of it — but to do that I have to accept the fact that I will die.  Submit to it.  And only then will I be able to stand tall and move forward, marching toward the inevitable while still enjoy what’s left.  I don’t know if I’m up to the task.

Wish me luck.

My favorite video at the moment:

“The compromise of sleep …”

I’m not particularly interested in pornography or vintage pin-ups, but I am interested in how a regular person can become an icon — particularly many, many years after their original brush with fame. That’s the story of Bettie Page, the famous pinup model who was rediscovered in the 1980′s and became a powerful brand akin to say Mickey Mouse or Elvis Presley.

The thing is, I thought that Bettie Page was already dead — long dead, in fact. It’s somewhat sad to think that this person whose image has become part of our popular culture psyche was still alive, yet few of us knew it.

You can read more here.

Oh yes, Obama’s centrist language that appealed to progressive moderates like me was just the outrageous lies of an unabashed Marxist. It’s nothing but leftist stalwarts in his cabinet — not a centrist to be found, much less a conservative.

Of course, the radical left is ecstatic about the way his appointments have gone thus far. According to Politico, it’s like all their dreams have come true:

OpenLeft blogger Chris Bowers went so far as to issue this plaintive plea: “Isn’t there ever a point when we can get an actual Democratic administration?”

C’mon Chris, you don’t get more progressive than Robert Gates or General James Jones! Someone needs to pull out that old dog-eared copy of Das Kapital to refresh himself on what real leftism is all about.

All you have to do is read the conservative blogs to realize just how crazy and radical this guy Obama is. These socialist appointments, of course, have worked to distract us from the real challenge ahead — the return of the fairness doctrine.

Not a single Democrat I’ve seen — including comrades Obama, Pelosi and Reid — has even brought this up as being part of their legislative agenda. Which means, of course, that there’s a secret conspiracy to push Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Hugh Hewitt, etc. off the air and replace them with guys like Ed Schultz, Bill Press and Randi Rhodes! I can only image how smoky and sinister those Democratic caucus meetings must be, between the fairness doctrine conspiracy, these liberal appointments, and the cover up of Obama’s true father (none other than one Malcolm Shabazz, aka Malcolm X!) and secret birth place somewhere in Kenya or Indonesia or the communist Ukraine.

There’s been an ongoing discussion on progressive blogs regarding the D.C. statehood issue. Some, like Kos, believe that D.C. should be annexed into Maryland or Virginia. Others are suggesting abolishing the federal income tax and creating “Hong Kong on the Potomac.” But how about a simpler approach — why not just grant our congressional delegate a vote?

The idea of dumping D.C. into Maryland or Virginia is just offensive to Washingtonians — D.C. has its own unique culture and history, and I’m not sure Washingtonians (and I’m referring to the real Washingtonians, those of us who love this city and consider it our home, not the transients who come here for government jobs, appointments, or internships and then run back home to Minnesota or wherever when their job ends) would be too excited about suddenly become Virginians, or helping to expand the tax-base of Prince George’s County, MD. We could live in Virginia and Maryland if we wanted to, but we choose to live in the District instead. Some could say that we also choose not to have congressional representation — that’s a true statement, but it misses the point that the world’s greatest democracy purposefully denies the residents of its capitol city congressional representation. How can we argue for democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan, if we don’t believe the residents of D.C. deserve adequate representation in congress?

I think a single congressional vote is a fair compromise. It wouldn’t have the unbalancing impact of adding two more votes to the senate, but would be just one more progressive vote in the House. I’m still in favor of last year’s failed plan of giving us a vote and then balancing it out with a vote for a growing red state like Utah. Our population is bigger than the population of Wyoming — we should get some representation, but full representation seems unrealistic to me.

Paramount has released an updated version of the Star Trek trailer featuring Leonard Nimoy. His appearance is brief, but it’s a nice addition.

Only about seven months until the movie releases.

There’s a lot of growing frustration on the part of progressives that there isn’t a single hardline leftist in any of Obama’s cabinet positions. I know this comes as some surprise to McCain voters who see Barack Obama and his former primary nemesis Hillary Clinton as harbingers of Marxism in America, but the reality is that the American left is very displeased with these choices.

Here’s what the left doesn’t get — the country, though not “center right” as the Republicans believe, is neither conservative or liberal: it’s centrist. People take and pick their viewpoints from a variety of sources and don’t necessarily view two policy positions as incompatible if one rises from leftist thought and the other rises from conservative thought. There is general disgust with hardline ideological positions, as many Americans just aren’t that ideological.

George W. Bush governed from the hard right. Iraq, Katrina, Social Security privatization, purging the Justice Department of Democrats, Terry Schiavo, etc. were all extremely partisan, hardline conservative positions. And Bush failed because of them — his support collapsed because he governed from an ideological position and not a fact-based position. People who normally didn’t care about such things started to think of him as a right wing nutjob. And that was that. But just because they dislike a rightwing nutjob, doesn’t mean they won’t also dislike a leftwing nutjob. I think most ordinary people think that hardline positions of any stripe are bullshit.

Obama is smart. He knows that the only way he can govern successfully and gain consensus is from the center. Anyone who read either of his books should understand this. That’s why he’s got sensible centrist picks, and not a single avatar of the left among them. This may be disappointing to my fellow progressives, but we need to suck it up and accept that we’ve got a competent team of people at the helm at last. Change may happen, but it will be moderate change. Such moderation may seem radical to Americans in the center after eight years of Bush, but progressives are just going to have to accept what we can get. The Republicans didn’t accept what was realistic, and now they’re out in the wilderness after six years of overreach. If we want to stay in the majority, Democrats are going to have to learn to provide sensible progressive solutions and not try to radically change the country as the Republicans did.