What, me worry?

In thumbing through the pages of the daily calendar of Jewish humor that Ben and Meg gave me for Hanukkah, I have fine-tuned my own motto:

"I have to keep worrying, or else something bad might happen."

Most of us Jews have this seed of anxiety embedded in us after centuries of persecution, of always having to look over our shoulder. But still, we can try to re-engineer ourselves to see the glass half full, and that is what I am attempting with another bump in the road coming up. So let's try:

"Why worry when there's nothing you can do about it?"

It's not as funny as the other way, but it is more reasonable.

So, this seems to be my pattern: Get knocked down, get up, get knocked down, get up, etc.

I have regained my strength after my bout of pneumonia. I am more stable in yoga and doing much better at tennis, earning compliments from the tennis ladies for tossing the ball higher on my serve, running after more balls and hitting them with conviction.

I am squeezing in as much tennis as possible before the surgery on my kidney in a week, hoping that I won't lose too much of the progress, but still, worrying.

I am not really concerned about the outcome of the surgery, but rather not looking forward to having to suffer through pain afterwards, again. I know that since I've made it through fine before, I can do it again.

Repeat surgeries for this and that are in some ways like repeat Caesareans. The first was a total shock to my system. I didn't believe it when they said each successive one was easier, but in fact the next two were.

Meanwhile, we crazy tennis ladies have been playing in the heat. I think we're smart enough to stop if we don't feel well, but once we got going on Tuesday it was fun. Also, we are remembering to hydrate.