Blue

• Lori Palminteri
• Uncategorized
• May 1, 2016

Some years ago, I sat in a nail salon with my mother, getting a pedicure, perhaps for a special occasion, seeing that that’s really the only time I ever get my nails done.  My feet were soaking in the little foot bath, as I fumbled with the remote for the back massage trying to figure out a setting that wouldn’t hurt my scoliosis spine.  The Asian woman instructed me to put my feet on the towel, and then she gasped.  My feet were blue.  My toenails, au natural, were purple, and the entire foot was a blueish tone which looked like it belonged to a deceased person.

“You need to see doctor!  This is very, very bad!”  Clearly, she wasn’t joking around.  She used two “very’s.”  Her diagnosis was just that my feet were very, very bad.  I laughed at her.  Not to be mean, I just found her horror at my corpse like feet hilarious.  I had been to the doctor.  I have Raynaud’s disease.

Raynaud’s is not a serious condition.  Basically, your body has a hard time getting blood to your extremities (i.e. toes and fingers).  This is made worse by cold or stress, and in my case, warm foot baths at the nail salon.  My doctor just said to keep them warm, and to try not to let them go white (which happens), because over time that can cause nerve damage.  The doctor also said it will get worse as I age, and I might consider moving to a warmer climate.

Yes, it’s worse in the winter.  And sometimes I can’t feel my feet, only to pull my socks off and all my toes are completely white and numb which is as disgusting as it sounds.  It’s most annoying when I surf.  Even if the water is on the warmer side, I’ll watch my fingers and toes go from blue, to purple, to white, and sometimes, I can’t feel half of my foot, and I remember that the doctor said not to let your feet go white because it can cause nerve damage, but the waves were really good that day.

Then, a blood test would reveal I have a positive ANA (antinuclear antibodies), and while I’m still not 100% sure what that means, because I also have Raynaud’s and chronic fatigue, my doctor said I should be test for Lupus.  I told her I watched plenty of “House,” and I assured her, “it’s never Lupus,” which was a great joke, and to this day, I still think it deserved a bigger laugh.  I am Lupus free (as predicted) but my doctor urged me to keep my hands and feet warm and to regularly get my blood tested, which I haven’t done in years.

I usually don’t let my fingers and toes go white, though sometimes, I can’t help it.  If I’m in the ocean, and I start turning blue, that’s a pretty good indication that I need to get out.  To which my surfer bro’s reply, “your feet look fucking disgusting.”  Indeed.  As I live and breath, rigor mortis has set in on my feet, as they are as icy as the iceberg which sunk the Titanic, and bluer than that diamond that old bitch dropped in the sea.

Blue is my favorite color.  It always has been.  Blue is said to be soothing, and calm.  Like the sky and the ocean.  Blue, the color of my bedsheets, and the majority of my wardrobe.  The color of my teams: NY Giants and NY Rangers.  Blue is the eye color of almost all my past lovers.

The vein which careens from the temple to mid-forehead when I’m stressed, or very angry, is blue, takes up prime real estate on my face.  Blue, the color of the bruise the size of tennis ball on my leg/hip, as a result of skateboarding drunk, which was a decision made in anger, a byproduct of feeling blue.

In Barcelona, at the Picasso museum, I was drawn to the Blue Period Picasso’s, and regarded it as his best work.  How amazing something can be so sad, and yet so beautiful.  Blue, the color of warmth and cold.  Depression, and comfort.  Blue, the color of contradictions.

When Winter blues finally pass, and you realize just how god awfully depressed you’ve been for months, the Spring alleviates the darkness with light, and warmth, and green on the trees.  Then, you look forward to blue skies, swimming in the blue ocean, drinking frozen blue drinks with little umbrella’s in them.  The past is past.  It doesn’t matter, except for that  it does.  The past still lingers, an old tale forewarning what’s to come again.  The things you don’t want to remember are so often the things you can’t forget.  Blue is just the warning before you go numb.  That’s the real depression.  The numbness.  Why didn’t I ever ask for help?  Why did I just swallow it, and not talk to anyone?  Why am I so fucking stubborn?  Because like when  my hands and feet go blue, I know the blood flow will return and it will be fine.  But I have been warned: If you don’t take care of it, you could lose fingers or toes to nerve damage.  How many times can one go blue, I wonder?  How many times before the damage is permanent?

“It’s blue.  Like your eyes,” I’ve been told.
“No,” I say, “my eyes are green.”