Saturday, April 4, 2009

The Obsessive Type

When you're a blood cancer patient, it's easy to become obsessed with your blood counts. That chapter is behind me, but now it's equally tempting to become obsessed about the rapidly mutliplying EOS in my blood.

It's nice to take a break and become obsessed with something else. The color of houses instead of the color of blood. The number of coats of paint instead of the number of white blood cells. Paint palette trends instead of EOS trends.

It's doubly nice when you can make that obsession into a story for the Home & Garden section of the LA Times. Read my story, House Paint as Obsession. (The color palette of the house in the photo, by the way, may look familiar. It's the one I poached for my house.)

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Really enjoyed the story Susan! cleverly written.

Nelle said...

Great story and something most people don't think about until they find themselves searching for colors. I understand that monitoring any aspect of one's health can become obsessive. On the other hand we are our own best health advocates. I have found that I often share/exchange information with care givers.

Susan C said...

Thanks, AH. It was originally much longer and scheduled to run later in the month, but a space opened up. Unfortunately, the space wasn't big enough for the entire article and we had to cut.

Nelle, Thanks. Yes, there's a fine line between being vigilant and being obsessive. I like to think that we're both highly vigilant. : )

Ronni Gordon said...

Great story. Not too long ago I wrote a story about people becoming bolder with the colors inside their homes...Hope your EOS calm down...I'm sorry you're having that problem but glad to be reminded that I'm not the only one obsessing about blood counts. I go to the clinic tomorrow and I'm trying to stop obsessing about what my counts will be, but it's hard!

Anonymous said...

"Paint poachers" thats a zinger line if ever. Lets just hope we never see the return of that South West mauve and aqua color palette. You know what they say...these things skip a generation and then they're back. I plan to be dead by then.

That was a fun read and of course I love the subject ...I also like that photograph. I bet that brought in some extra readers.

Susan C said...

Ronni, I hope that all the good parts go up and (in my case) all the bad parts go down. Will be thinking about you today. I wish I could read your story about the bolder interior colors.

PIO, I'd forgotten about that southwestern palette. Best forgotten.

Susan C said...

Oops - Meant PA, not PIO.