Peace, Peace, Far and Near

Tuesday night

2012-01-31T20:35:00.002-05:00

A milestone: I saw Dr. R this afternoon. My next CT scan will be at the end of April but - BUT - but I don't see Dr. R again until July - I have graduated to seeing her every 6 months. How about them apples?

As I walked from the cancer center, the sun was setting, the sky glowed that shimmering blue fading slowly to black except in the west, glowing pink-red-orange. Overhead a murder of crows flew from north north west to south south east. Flew and flew and flew. They were continuously streaming overhead for the entire 25 minutes I stood and waited for my bus. How many were there? Thousands upon thousands I'm sure. Where were they going? Do they fly in family groups? Where were they? Why did they leave?

Now that the Republicans are - presumably - leaving Florida since the primary is over, perhaps the crows have decided to really go south.

I'm grateful for good news today. I'm grateful for good doctors, for having a job, for having health insurance, for being ... healthy.

Peace.

Sunday morning

2012-01-29T10:56:00.006-05:00

First, photos from Honduras, from Melina and the boys' visit to family there (Cach and his cousin, Gracia! And little Cello-growing!)

Now back to today:

Ella and I went to the park this morning, a little after sunrise. I think we've been going too early; the light of the sun, newly risen, was beautiful. It was brisk but not really cold. Cold enough apparently for the skim of ice on the pond to mostly stick. I was happy to hear the laughing duck this morning as we got out of the car - it's been colder when we've been there lately and the ducks were not visible, making me wonder where they "go". Still the little group of Mallards was confined to a small portion of the lower pond where the ice was melted. Good to see them though.

I see Dr. R on Tuesday afternoon, just the regular blood work and checkup, but I realize the white noise stress is in the background of my consciousness, level rising ever so slightly as the day approaches (and since she postponed 10 days ago or so to this coming Tuesday, the incremental increasing has continued). Once again I realize that in the days/weeks leading up to the appointment, every odd ache or pang or twinge becomes further static in that white noise stress. I'm wondering when you come to trust your body and your mental experience of your body again. It's not that I'm consumed by stress or worry; it's just that it's ... there ... in the background .. like people who have the condition of hearing ringing in their ears all the time. I'm writing about it not because it's especially BAD right now, but because it is apparent to me, I'm conscious of it, and I'm wondering when - or if - it will fade and become part of my background consciousness and be indistinguishable.

My son Sam stopped by for a quick overnight visit on his way from NY/NJ, where he was working, to Boston, where he visits a friend with whom he is collaborating on a new documentary. It was a really nice, if short, visit. My daughter Corinne continues her work in Haiti, planning to stay for 6 months; it seems difficult, rewarding, frustrating, intense, occasionally inspirational, all at once. Yet the rest of her life calls.

Isn't that true for any of us paying attention. What next? It's important to ask, without being paralyzed by the question so that we lose today, which is actually the only real life we live. Still as I enter my seventh decade, I need remind myself.

I've been enjoying - in a perverse sense - the Republican primary race, if watching the stupidity, moral degeneracy, arrogance, and general cluelessness of the species acting out in front of you can be said to be "enjoyable". Not that I'd expect more from the "liberal," "left," "Democratic" side of the American political spectrum. Still, can it hurt to smile and even laugh out loud when the alternative is to weep?

Peace, peace, far and near, Soon, if not soon enough.

Thursday - 2 year anniversary

2012-01-12T20:14:00.000-05:00

Two years ago this morning, the Haitian people woke up to an earthquake - except the 300,000 that died, and the 500,000 that still live in "shelters" - if you call living in a tropical area subject to wind and rain under a tarp living in "shelter." Please do not forget. Please watch this video and read these articles.

lhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=PfTBMeT921c

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/11/haiti-earthquake-recovery_n_1197730.html#s603514&title=Watch_Related_Video

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/01/03/haiti-after-the-quake/

Please do what you can.

If not now, when?

If not us, who?

Wednesday evening

2012-01-11T19:56:00.002-05:00

I was to have seen Dr. R on Tuesday afternoon. Monday afternoon her office called and left a message, canceling; no reason given except she is unable to make the appointment. They told me the new appointment would be next week at 1:30. I called them back, of course not reaching a human being, and left a message to say I can't make a 1:30 appointment; I need the latest appointment available (so I don't have to take a whole or even half day vacation). Long and short, the appointment is now rescheduled for January 31.

I'm not feeling especially stressed about this visit. This is my mid-scan cycle appointment that involves blood tests and a visit/exam by Dr. R. Generally not invasive (unless you consider needles for blood letting invasive, something I no longer do). But somehow I am conscious that this appointment is the turning of the cycle from the good news-based optimism immediately after a "good scan" coasting along until the time to the next scan is shorter than the time since the prior one. That's where I am now. Midway between scans. That means every day brings me closer to the next scan. The next scan - toward the end of April - is a big one. It marks my two year anniversary post-treatment. Assuming it goes well - and I have no reason to believe it will not - then I believe I will go from visits with both doctors every 3 months to visits every 6 months, and from scans every 6 months to 1 scan a year. Two years NED (no evidence of disease) is an important milestone. The first. The next big one will be five years.

Anyway, that's where things stand.

Meanwhile, cat-sitting - actually, not sitting, just stopping by twice a day - for a couple of days for my friend H's new kittens, Pearl and Paulie (who began life as Polly until the first vet visit indicated Paulie might be more appropriate). Not sure exactly how old they are now - but definitely still kittens, 3 months maybe! If watching a couple of kittens tumble around and wrestle and drag a toy "bird" around and pounce on it and anything else that moves - if that doesn't put a smile on your face, then just take a few minutes to enjoy the Republican battle for the presidential nomination.

Peace

Sunday morning

2012-01-08T14:39:00.001-05:00

Odd weather - shirt sleeves in mid-January in New England. Mother Nature is having a hot flash. Does that mean she is menopausal?

Posting really to share this link to a clip from a documentary in the works about a very special school in Georgia. Gives me hope. Keeps the sun in my sky.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ctqfilms/a-place-in-the-world

Please go and share.

Peace.

Friday evening

2012-01-06T21:17:00.002-05:00

The Peace of Wild Things
by Wendell Berry

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

(To hear the poem read: http://being.publicradio.org/programs/2009/rv-listeners/poem_berry-thepeaceofwildthings.shtml )

Peace.

Saturday night - New Year's Eve

2011-12-31T19:12:00.003-05:00

Happy New Year to all. Is it possible that in 2012 we'll begin to treat each other with respect if not kindness and care for the planet as if we understood that our lives and our children's and grandchildren's lives depended on it? I have to hope so and nurture faith in my fellow human beings. I have faith in nature, in its ability to be challenged, to repair itself and go on. And we human beings are part of nature, whatever grandiose (and wrong) ideas we may have about ourselves.

But in the meantime, still so much suffering. Poverty. War. Disease. Hunger. Loneliness.

My prayer of hope for this new year 2012 - may each of us be free of fear; may each of us be healthy; may each of us be happy; may every single one of us live in peace.

Sunday morning

2011-12-18T10:03:00.003-05:00

Ella and I went to the park this morning. I awoke - actually Ella woke me (David and I had gone to see the new Sherlock Holmes movie last night and got home and went to bed later than usual) later than usual, after 7:00 am, so arrived at the park at around 7:30. A bright and beautiful and cold morning. The sun already 15 degrees over the horizon, a position it may usually just be reaching as we leave the park. The season's first skims of ice formed on the pond. We also were at the park yesterday, and yesterday there was a flock of Canada geese there. Yesterday was a still chilly morning and the flock of geese floated almost motionless across the pond, as if planted in soil rather than floating on water. Today no geese at all, a couple of Mallards and that was all. On our way around the western loop we met a friendly man and dog (the latter named Malya) and I let Ella say hello. The man was - as often is the case - quite taken with Ella and asked questions about her. Meanwhile Ella and Malya became acquainted - Ella on lease, Malya (male) not. Eventually I let Ella go and the two had quite a romp. Ella is twice Malya's size but his littler teeth were just as sharp and he was not shy with his nips if Ella got out of line. It was good for Ella. I wish I had more occasions when I felt comfortable letting her romp with another dog.

Today's walk in the park reminded me of why I love going to the park. It reminded me of how good it is to pay attention to what is happening in your life right at this moment, since there actually isn't any other moment. To be caught up in what already happened - which is gone, done and over - or what might happen - which hasn't yet happened and may never happen or may happen entirely differently than you imagine - what a waste. And yet we do it. I do it. My guess is I do it more than I do not do it. In other words, most of my life I am living and not paying attention to it, but thinking (in my case at least) usually of what is to come. Why? What is so intimidating or frightening about paying attention to now? Is it that we think we'll be unprepared for what comes? The closer the end of my life comes - and even believing that I am well and cancer-free and going to stay that way, nonetheless, the end of my life is coming closer, no two ways about that - the more afraid I become of getting to the end and realizing I didn't pay attention to my life, I didn't LIVE my life, and now it is too late.

Christopher Hitchens died this past week, may he rest in peace. I type those words and wonder what he would think of them. I think he would appreciate the sentiment but not the factual content. I've been reading quite a few obituaries and appreciations of him and I realize that he seems one person who actually did live his life in the now, paying attention. His writing certainly evidences the breadth of scope of his attention. So he died at age 62, but boy, did he live those 62 years. Would that we could all say the same.

Okay, time to go pay attention.

Peace.

Friday night

2011-12-02T21:42:00.004-05:00

I saw Dr. M this morning. I remember that there was a time when I wasn't so enamored of Dr. M; after all, it was someone in his office who initially blurted out to me on my very first phone call to him before I even had a diagnosis that "he recommended chemo therapy and radiation" when I had asked whether he recommended me coming into the office or consulting with him by phone. But I am enamored of him now. Some how, every time I see him, I leave feeling great. He radiates confidence in my continued health. One more check up with him before my 2 year NED date of April 2012. At any rate, a good visit, good discussion with him about a couple of things. Just good. I told him that Friday after Thanksgiving was the 2 year anniversary of having my fuzz cut off after I loss my hair from the first chemo. He thought it was "an emotional" or "draining" experience, recognizing the anniversary. No, I told him, it was a good, joyful experience. I am grateful I lost my hair from chemo. It did something wonderful for me. Freed me in some way from some hair-bound insecurity. At this most recent hair cut I asked the hairdresser to cut my hair "shorter" than usual. It's very short. I'm happy. Now if I can learn what "product" to use and how to use it to give a little spiky edge, I'll be even hap;pier.

I am a lucky person.

Had a scare about my son's health tonight. Turned out fine. Another reminder - I am a very lucky person.

Truly.

This old tree has, I believe, been standing on this slight rise in the park since before any person alive today was born. The blizzard of this past October stressed it but it stands.
Peace, peace, peace to all, all, all.

Saturday

2011-11-26T09:27:00.008-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving. I just skimmed an article that said that the fact that Obama gave a speech on Thanksgiving that did not expressly mention "God" caused "outrage." Not here. Yesterday I was listening to an NPR show - that hotbed of left-wing socialistic godless atheism - on historical issues relating to Thanksgiving. It was pointed out what a perfect holiday Thanksgiving is for America, exactly because it is a non-religious religious holiday, being "thankful" for "blessings" without actually being tied to any particular religion and therefore being inclusive in a way that religious religious holidays are not. Perhaps that is where Obama was coming from? But, gee, why give him the benefit of the doubt.

I had a wonderful visit to Atlanta. Pics to be attached.

Big brother helps little brother who pulls himself to his feet and investigates big brother's Monopoly game.

Yesterday, "black Friday" after Thanksgiving, I went and got my hair cut. I was reminded that it was the second anniversary of the day I had my hair cut off after beginning chemo therapy. Two years. Seems longer. And also, seems like just yesterday.

Ella and I went to the park in the morning yesterday and again this morning. The park is full of overturned trees and giant limbs torn from still standing trunks, from the October 30 snow storm. While we were there a full complement of Canada geese flew in and landed on the north pond. It was good to see them back.

Peace, peace, far and near.

Tuesday morning

2011-11-08T05:55:00.002-05:00

Power to the people.

At least, power to this people - David called me at work at around 2:30 yesterday afternoon. Power had come back on. It was weird coming home to a lit street and lit house. Even this morning when I turned on a light switch, I didn't really expect anything to happen. And yet, it was almost as if nothing happened. When the local news came on, I couldn't believe any story came before the power outages. I checked this morning, and there are still 23,000 people in the state without power. I feel for them. I'm grateful to have power back. And I'm pissed at CL&P and Butler in his $1.8 million house. Worst part is, if anger swells and he loses his job, he probably has an employment contract that will pay him millions in "severance". Golden f'ing parachute. Someone needs to snip those strings.

Power to the people.

Peace.

Monday morning

2011-11-07T08:09:00.001-05:00

Still no power.

Saturday morning

2011-11-05T09:43:00.002-04:00

No power since 8:00 p.m. Saturday October 29. We had a snow storm - about 8 inches in my area - but with leaves still on the trees, there were branches, limbs and whole trees down everywhere. More than 800,000 customers without power. 8 days later, it's down to 230,000 without power - our neighborhood among them. It's been an interesting experience. I've been able to shower at work in the women's locker room, only having to wait in line for 20 minutes or so. David has made do with heating water on the store (we have a gas stove and that is working) and then taking a Haiti-style bath: get in the tub, ladle warm water over yourself, soap yourself, and ladle more warm water over yourself to wash off.

It's cold at night. About 50 degrees in the apartment. That doesn't sound that cold, but it grinds you down.

Still it's been interesting. I'm at Panera Bread this morning using Wi-Fi. One evening David and I went to Barnes & Noble to check email. Both times, both places have been real community scenes. People talking to strangers, getting to know each other, helping out. Perhaps we should lose power more often.

I wish there was a place that would take bets (actually, come to think of it, there probably is) on whether the power company will restore 99% of customers' power by Sunday evening at 11:59 p.m. I would bet against them. From what I've been hearing, it would be hard to find someone betting they will do it.

Many people have given up and gone elsewhere - to family or friends who do have power, to people whose power has been restored, to hotels. Some have traveled out of town. David and I (and Ella) have hunkered down.

Well, wishing peace and power (people power and otherwise) to all.

Saturday night

2011-10-15T22:48:00.002-04:00

I can't believe I'm up this late. David and I went to a concert sponsored by a local organization - Red Hen String Band. Fun. I came home to find a message from my daughter. She sent me a 1,000 word piece she'd written for a Canadian on-line journal about SOIL's work in Haiti. I have known that she's a wonderful writer; I've read other stuff she's written, but even so, I was impressed. Once the piece is published, I'll see if I can link to it here.

The main reason I'm writing actually is that my sweet Dr. R also left a voice message for me yesterday afternoon that I didn't listen to until tonight. I don't actually see her until this coming Tuesday but she must have remembered how nervous I was last CT scan time, during the period between the scan (Friday morning) and my appointment with her (Tuesday afternoon), so she called to tell me the results were excellent. Happy news.

Occupy this has spread not only across the U.S., but the world.

Peace.

Out.

Friday

2011-10-14T18:01:00.002-04:00

Another CT scan down. Nothing unusual except that while I got down the Mocha barium cocktail more or less easily, later in the morning I felt kind of queasy. No results until Tuesday afternoon, when I see Dr. R. I'm thinking of talking to her about talking to someone - does the hospital/cancer center offer some sort of counseling - about the fact that the further away from end of treatment I get, the more nervous I get about check-ups. Logically it would seem it should be the opposite.

It's raining. Again. I'm reading "The Big Thirst" about water. Amazing.

Feeling for the Occupy protesters in downtown Hartford in their tents in the rain. Feeling for the people in Haiti - years after the earthquake, in less than tents in every kind of weather.

Peace.

Thursday morning

2011-10-13T08:55:00.002-04:00

The city of Hartford is permitting the Occupy Hartford protesters to re-pitch their tents, and the tents are back. It is raining - last night and today. Power to the damp protesters.

Herman Cain leads the field of Republican nominees.

I started yoga. Two classes so far. I'm liking it. Like trying to turn a rusty hinge to get certain joints to move, but so far so good.

CT scan tomorrow.

I'm keeping Christopher Hitchens and Steve Jobs in mind.

Peace, peace, far and near.

Tuesday night

2011-10-11T19:08:00.003-04:00

Heard that the police made the Occupy Hartford people take down their tents. After work, I saw from the bus on my way home that the tents were down. Now what? I'm sure something is simmering.

Meanwhile, this: when Ralph Waldo Emerson visited Henry David Thoreau in jail, who was imprisoned for not paying a poll tax. Emerson asked his friend why he was there. “Why are you not here?” Thoreau replied.

Indeed.

Peace.

Monday night

2011-10-10T21:38:00.002-04:00

In the news this past week, the death of Steve Jobs at 56 apparently from pancreatic cancer. His public persona at least was inspirational on the subject of facing up to one's mortality and from that, living, really living. May Steve Jobs rest in peace and may his memory be a blessing for his family and for his friends and for his employees and for his customers - that probably covers quite a few million people, myself among them.

Also read a book review of new book of essays by Christopher Hitchens, another person facing his own mortality with courage and even flair. Esophageal cancer.

I have a CT scan - regular 6 month - on Friday. I find I am nervous about it. No particular reason, except as time goes by between the regular scans, I find that in the last 3-4 weeks before the next one, my anxiety level increases. For whatever reason, the further in time I get from the end of treatment, the more nervous I feel about each scan. As if I have more to lose. A friend at work pointed out that the further in time I get from the end of treatment, the more statistics are in my favor. I guess it's true but I never really got into the statistics of my own "case".

A nice longish talk with my daughter while she was in the Miami airport, on her way back to Haiti after 10 days in the U.S. Another way to remember what's what.

This past Saturday was Yom Kippur. 26 hours of fasting. Synagogue services. The old melodies. Community confessions. One thing Yom Kippur does for me every year is physically remind me how spoiled we living in fat capitalist western societies are. One day. A mere 26 hours without food or water. Yet we think it is difficult. For how many people is a "fast" day not a once a year experience but a "normal" routine?

Occupy Hartford has pitched tents kitty-corner from the railroad station in a little patch of ground cut off by I-84. There appeared to be 15 or 20 tents. The news reported that several hundred people marched and fewer pitched tents and prepared to stay. But they are staying.

I am sick of the media and political pundits criticizing the Occupy Wall Street-99% movement for not making concrete demands. Put all of those responsible for the "great recession" in jail. How about that for concrete? Tax the rich. How about that for concrete? Rent don't foreclose. How about that for concrete? Impeach every national politician. How's that for concrete. Wait, wait... I've got it. How about this: Get rid of capitalism and start constructing a society based on justice, equality and peace. Concrete enough for you?

Peace, peace, far and near. OWS. 99%

Sunday - proud to be part of the 99%

2011-10-09T09:32:00.002-04:00

What inspires you? What inspires me today is my friend J, who joined the 99%, got arrested and wrote about it. Read it here!

http://my.firedoglake.com/bluewombat/2011/10/07/in-which-bluewombat-gets-arrested-on-purpose/

You rock, J! My turn soon.

Peace, peace, far and near.

Friday evening

2011-09-23T20:28:00.002-04:00

I am Troy Davis.

Who are you?

One month later

2011-09-10T09:41:00.007-04:00

A month since I last wrote. As I recall, we were getting ready to go to Maine on vacation. It was a good vacation. David made a pair of beautiful oars for me; they have a little more final finishing work to go, but they are essentially done. I sailed and rowed 6 or 7 or maybe 8 different boats. It was mostly good just not to go to work for a whole week and to get "away". I will post a few photos here.

Since then, busy at work. Right before we left, Ella was diagnosed with what the vet thinks is a food allergy (of course, it was diagnosed the week AFTER I bought a 25 pound bag of her old food for $50). We've been feeding her a special canned food for diabetic dogs, followed by gradually introducing a mixture of a dry food brand that is a "limited ingredient diet". Over time, more of the dry and less of the canned food. Hopefully this works.

My grandsons continue to thrive. The older started 4-year old kindergarten, going to school 5 days a week. Cello just grows. I'll post a new photo if I can.

Since my previous post, an earthquake in Virginia, felt through New England (even i Canada I heard). The person sitting in the office next to my cube came running out of his office, "What was that? What was that? Did you feel it?" No. I didn't. Apparently I was deep into whatever work was on my computer. Also I had just come back from Maine where I spent the week on sail boats. Perhaps I thought the swaying was still in my head and heart.

Then came Irene. Luckily we were not personally affected - did not lose power or have flooding - as were so many others.

Then Tropical Storm Lee dumped 8-10 inches more water across the region.

This week another Republican "debate". New front runner Rick Perry says Social Security is a ponzi scheme. Romney tries to be witty and quick on his feet. Sort of like seeing some of those football players try to do the quickstep on Dancing with the (Ex) Stars. Michelle Bachman keeps talking like a wind-up Barbie Really Wants to go to the White House doll. Huntsman says a few interesting things - like suggesting science has a point. Same week, Obama's "jobs" speech. At least I didn't have to hear him say "win the future" again. The best news is that Congress has a 14% approval rating. The most recent poll showed that the vast majority of American people think EVERYONE in Congress should be kicked out. If only sentiments expressed in a poll could carry people through to elections and beyond.

Meanwhile, the heron is back at the pond - larger than ever, grey-green and beautiful. This morning standing in the shallows of the larger side of the pond, seeming to look down her long beak with some arrogance at the little brown ducks stirring the waters around her. Perhaps they stir up the fish, bringing breakfast her way.

I'm ready for fall.

But I'd rather have peace, kindness, justice and equality.

Wednesday night

2011-08-10T21:07:00.002-04:00

No writing for some time - sorry.

Today Ella and I were able to go to the park - where we saw the heron, back after quite an absence - because I went into work late. I had an appointment with Dr. M, my regular check up. It went well. I told him - and it is true - that I feel great. I actually think over the last couple of months my ... I guess ... endurance ... has improved. The indication of it is that I do not feel the need to be in bed EVERY night by 8:30 or 9:00. I have actually stayed up until 10:00 and felt fine the next day. Imagine that. Anyway, another milestone. No more doctor appointments until October. The next thing is the October CT scan, followed by Dr. R. Then Dr. M again on December 1st.

Over the weekend, Ella and I made it to the park only one day - but we saw the muskrat, also absent for quite some time. It made me ask a question: Where did the muskrat in this small pond in an urban park come from? I mean the ducks, the Canada geese, the heron - they all fly in. Even the fox - who I haven't seen yet this year - presumably slinks from tree-lined property to tree-lined property to the park. But how does a MUSKRAT cross a city and get to the park? I know they "stock" ponds with fish sometimes. Is it possible they stocked this one with a muskrat?

That's my question for the day.

Yesterday was one of the best days of my life. Why? I received my first ever letter from my grandson. Very very very cool. Perhaps I'll scan it at work and post it here.

Peace.

Friday night

2011-07-22T18:10:00.002-04:00

Too long, too long since I wrote. Right now it's the hottest day of the year here - supposed to have been 99 today - and the electricity is off in 1/2 my apartment. David couldn't get it back on with the circuit breakers in the basement. Both of the landlords are "out of town" and not very pro-active. I got home and we figured out that part of the problem is that when the electricians re-wired to install the circuit breakers vs fuse boxes, they apparently mislabeled our apartment and the one upstairs. So when David flipped the main breaker, it did nothing to our apartment but turned off the juice in the apartment upstairs for a second. Then we learned that we still have fuses inside the apartment. There's a 100 amp circuit breaker for the apartment int he basement, but there's a 20 and a 30 amp fuse in the apartment. The 20 amp fuse blew. It supports 2 bedrooms and 3/4 of the living room. Can't run 2 tiny air conditioners at the same time - it'll blow the fuses.

Maine sounds better and better. And not just for a week once a year.

I saw Dr. R this week for regular check-up. She was happy and said I "looked great". I feel good, but I think I just look like me. Which I guess means just normally healthy. She deals with people going through chemo etc and often with less hopeful prognoses than mine. It probably is nice to see a normally healthy person who used to be grayish green from chemo poisons and puffy from steroids and now looks ... normal. Glad to make her happy to see me. I'd like to keep her that way.

Meanwhile, a pox on the government of the United States of America. Every single member of Congress and the President should be ashamed of themselves. Where are all their mothers when we need them. They need time outs. They need to be sent to their beds without dinner. They need to be made to go pick a nice snappy switch and then get themselves a good whippin on their bad asses with it. I'm sure the volunteer whippers would be lining up for miles. Most of all every single damn one of them needs to be booted out of "office" and made to go dig some ditches. For a decade or so. Don't we need someone to scrub the rust off bridges and highway overpasses with Brillo pads for the next 50 years or so? Then there's cleaning limestone buildings in the nation's capitol with toothbrushes. We can keep them busy I think. And USEFUL for a change.

I hope Michelle Bachman gets the Republican nomination. I might vote for her. If things are going to go to hell in a hand basket, let's just go ahead and get there sooner rather than dragging out the suffering, and do so in a way that no one can deny. Then maybe we can start doing something about it.

Maybe.

Peace.

Out.

Saturday morning

2011-07-09T08:57:00.004-04:00

Ella and I went to the park this morning, arriving about 5:50 am. (Ella seems to think it is her job - no, vocation - to ensure that I am awoken by no later than 5:30 am every day, week in, week out, fall, winter, spring and summer. Forget weekends, forget holidays, forget what time I made it to bed the night before. At 5:30, occasionally as early as 5:15 or as late as 5:45, I am ... nudged ... awake. Interestingly, since cancer, I have no desire really to "sleep in" (other than a physical need to get some minimum number of hours of sleep). It's as if the cancer experience awoke some physiological awareness in me that there are only so many days in a life, so many hours in a day, and sleep is sleep, a necessary part of life, but not "life" itself.

Anyway, we arrived at the park early and found many cars already there. Then we saw tents going up on the meadow by the rose garden. By the time we had walked the eastern loop, more cars, people wearing official vests, orange cones going up, signs indicating "Athlete Parking" over there, and "Volunteer Parking" over here. Some kind of road race, but not sure what. As a result, the wild life was pretty subdued, even the birds weren't seizing the opportunity to sing for a wider audience, but quieted. Oh, well.

I've been thinking about time, specifically about the span of 60 years. (Okay - I will be 61 in a few weeks, but "span of 60 years" is a neater figure to consider.) As a starting point, I've been considering the malleability of our sense of time, its relativity . How a trip to a new location appears to take a long time, while the return along a known path feels much quicker. You know how you read in the news periodically about scientists learning more about what happened in the first "nanosecond" after the Big Bang? Creation of matter, expansion in space, etc. In brief - a lot! So I've been considering a comparison between what happened in that compressed first nanosecond versus the 60 years thereafter. We're used to thinking about the history of the universe either in those tiny nanosecond chunks or in Carl Sagan's "billions and billions and billions..." of years, not in human lifespans. So I have lived 60 years (so far). What is 60 years? To me it is birth, a childhood, adolescence, youthful rebellion, marriage, children, divorce, single parenthood, spiritual exploration, career, grandchildren, cancer... To a child in so many countries today it is an extremely optimistic expected lifetime. To a fruit fly, it is tens of thousands of generations. To an albatross, a typical lifespan stretching over hundreds of thousands of miles of airborne travels, paired with the same mate.

In the west, how many of us treat our own life span as if a cicada, spending 99% of it unconscious, buried in whatever constitutes our form of the "ground" in which the cicada larva lays and waits for "life": fear, pride, jealousy, envy, indifference, greed - and then awakening at last and trying to cram actual "life" into the last moments it is ours?

Maybe the "slow food" movement should become the "slow life" movement. It might be why David rides bicycles, why H walks. I read this morning that Thoreau is said to have walked at least 3 hours every day. Imagine that. Imagine that today: 3 hours! And not 3 hours to "get somewhere". 3 hours of walking for the sake of walking. Of being while walking. Of noticing. Of paying attention.

To what do any of us pay attention for 3 hours in any given day? Work, maybe, although I doubt if we do so for 3 consecutive hours. More likely in spurts of 20 minutes, broken up by "multi-tasking" in some fashion, by having our attention diverted to something else. Anything else? Even movies, which used to be 90 minutes, don't usually run longer than 2-1/2 hours.

I think one thing I appreciate about T'ai Chi is that it is a slow process. Slow to learn and, learned, slow to practice.

What might happen if we were to start to pay attention? If we were to aim to pay attention in 3 hour periods? If we paid attention to a person we care about for 3 hours? A child. An elder. If we paid attention to a knotty problem - not worried about it, not vacillated between anxiety over it and avoiding it, but paid attention to it? What if we just took Thoreau's example and picked a day and a place and walked for 3 hours, paying attention to where we were?

What might happen?

Peace. In time.

Tuesday morning

2011-07-05T08:16:00.005-04:00

(A photo of Ella at "camp" last week, where she seems to have had a good time)

It's been so long since I last posted here, I would not be surprised if anyone who had still been periodically checking in here to read this blog had given up, assuming I would not be back. Sorry; I'm back. I'll try to write a little more regularly, so that each post can be shorter.

Since last I wrote, I made my trip to Atlanta to meet my new grandson in person. I had a good visit, although my brother J was ill - appears to have had the flu - so I didn't get to spend as much time with him as I would have liked. The new baby - whom his older (and wiser) brother calls "Baby Cello" - is very sweet and seems to be a very good baby. S and M seem very relaxed, so much more so than with Cachao. Even I - going back almost 40 years for the first child and nearly 35 for the second - recall the utter fear of bringing home my first, and of every "first" experience with her - first bath, first taking outdoors, first leaving with a friend for a couple of hours, first doctor visit, first cold, etc. Cachao is very good with his little brother, considering the little guy is not a lot of "fun" yet. I spent most of my time with Cachao. We built towns out of Lincoln Logs, drew maps, played a little catch. It was a good visit. I'll post a photo or two.

I came back home and within a few days came down with a bad cold. I am sure I caught it on the flight on the way home. We were held on the runway for 2-1/2 hours while a storm cell passed over the Atlanta airport. That meant my "direct" flight took 5 hours instead of two and a half. Five hours of breathing the same air with a packed plane load of passengers. Luckily I had a lovely several days at home with David - who was also on vacation the same week as I - before the cold attacked me. We boarded Ella and went down to Mystic Seaport to attend the Wooden Boat Show on Saturday, had a lovely dinner sitting on a patio next to the Mystic River, spent the night at a cheap motel nearby, got up early and were kayaking by 8:30. We kayaked on the Mystic River at the Seaport. That was interesting. On Saturday we saw all of the visiting wooden boats from the shore; on Sunday we saw them all again from the water. It was a very lovely weekend. On the drive home Sunday night I felt the first scratchy throat signs of the cold, which hit me hard by Monday morning.

I managed to make it in to work every day, although I worked "short" days (just 8 hours), and by Thursday, turned the corner. And then - of course - David got the cold. He finally began to feel better yesterday.

One very nice surprise was that my daughter called me over the weekend. From Haiti. Imagine my surprise when an unknown phone number appeared on my cell phone and I answered it and it was C. She's doing okay. She moved out of SOIL's house into another small house almost across the street. It's thought-provoking to hear about it. She has no electricity except in the evening hours when it is turned on for the city as a whole. (To have it at other times you have to have a device that draws power when it is on and stores it in a battery from which it can be drawn at other times of the day). No power means no refrigerator. She had no gas when she moved in, but has since bought some propane so now she can make coffee and cook a little. But she has screens in the windows (no mosquitoes!) and privacy, and is still almost next door to where she works. She knows that she is living in luxury compared with hundreds of thousands of Haitians.

Ella and I have been to the park many mornings since I last wrote here, including this morning. Some days we have managed to get there very early; others, not so much. Today for instance, we arrived at 6:30 and today, as a work day, there were already many runners, walkers and joggers there. I have not seen the heron recently. Also the Canada Geese appear to be elsewhere. A lot of Mallards. Last week when we had so much rain, the Mallards were able to "swim" in "ponds" which formed on top of the the grassy meadows due to the saturated ground. Strange sight.

June was a lovely month of no medical appointments! I see Dr. R in about 2 weeks. Then I see Dr. M in early August before David and I go to Maine for our classes at the Wooden Boat School. Then September should be a DR-free month again. And then October - and another CT scan. Sometimes I find it difficult to believe that in October it will only be 2 years since my diagnosis and surgery, and it has only been 18 months since I ended treatment. It feels a life time ago. I feel healthy and good (although arthritic and old!).

I am sick already of the posturing of the elected politicians. I am thinking seriously of not voting, at least in any national election, again. Another subject, another day.

Peace.

Sunday morning

2011-06-12T08:56:00.003-04:00

Ella and I managed a walk in the park both this morning and yesterday morning, squeezed in between downpours and showers. It has rained for what feels like 40 days. The potted flowers and plants I put out on the back steps 2 weeks ago are so saturated that the latest rain just lays on top of the soil so the plants appear to be growing in 3 or 4 inches of water. I keep pouring it out. Rain keeps putting it back. Still we squeezed in walks both days during a period of non-rain, still damp, but not soaking.

I had thought this week would be the peak of the roses in the rose garden at the park, and perhaps it would have been if the ceaseless rain and accompanying wind had not beaten down the bushes creating what I admit is a lovely scattering of multi-colored and sweet smelling petals below the rows of rose bushes. Only the newly planted annuals in the annual garden seemed to be thriving; elsewhere the plants had a worn out, damp and distressed look. Good for the ducks and geese, however, who have been venturing from the pond into the various open fields of the park to graze, I presume on worms and insects driven out of the ground by the water to avoid drowning, only to be gobbled up by hungry fowl. No heron either yesterday or today. Perhaps she's seeking shelter under the tall pines on the little island in the middle of the north side of the pond.

Just spoke with my daughter who is on her way from Atlanta to Miami and from there back to Port au Prince. She expects to be in Haiti at least another 3-4 months. SOIL ran into abrupt and unexpected funding problems not too long before she came to the US 12 days ago, and that has changed the outlook for the organization and the environment for her job quite a bit. It's hard to accept that agile productive organizations like SOIL lose funding while big top-heavy inefficient NGOs earn a return on donors' moneys and spend on bureaucratic processes more than productive actions. Anyway... it's been good to know she was on the same continental land mass as I for the past 12 days, even if it didn't work out for me to see her. It's hard knowing she's being carried so far away, not just geographically, but in other ways, too. I keep her and her work in my heart.

I read some articles this past week from an on line edition of a recent special issue of Time magazine on cancer. One of the articles was on cancer charities. Really disturbing, but interesting. I learned there exist non-profit organizations whose mission is to check on other non-profit organizations/charities and how they use the donations they receive. What does that say about us human beings? Anyway, one thing I learned that was of note was that the Susan B Komen breast cancer organization that sponsored the Race for the Cure I wrote about last week is actually highly rated as a cancer research non-profit. That was good to know in light of some of the not-so-positive visceral feelings I'd experienced about the size and marketing-heavy aspects of the event. If it actually ends up significantly benefiting cancer related research, that's all to the good.

Shall we turn our eyes to the wider world? Chaos among the field of those running for, thinking about running for, denying they are running for and being watched to see whether they will ever run for the Republican presidential nomination. I heard an interesting discussion of Mitt Romney the other day, saying he is more of a technocrat pragmatist than an ideologue, and is having to bend himself into unnatural shapes to satisfy the Republican powers that be. And it was pointed out that if he won the nomination, instead of disavowing the Romney-care health plan in Mass, he might be able to use it to attract independent voters. He's very much like Obama, it was said. I agree with that. Pox on them all.

All this talk about "the economy," the "debt ceiling," "creating jobs," etc. etc. etc. It seems like no one that I'm reading in the mainstream media including on line - except possibly Paul Krugman - sees what I see when I look at the underlying conditions we face today. We don't just have a "recession" and some "unemployment" that can get "fixed" by "creating" jobs. We have bigger deeper issues; we sent the American, and to a large extent, the world economy in an untenable direction, permitting the financial markets to puff themselves up with artificial "growth" like a blow fish. Puffing up a blow fish doesn't make it a shark; it's still a puffed up blow fish. Now the air (albeit in my view not ALL the air) has been let out, and we're back to being what we were all along - a not very healthy, increasingly inequitable economy. How do you "create" jobs on top of that? We have 10% of our population in prison, for God's sake. Another 10% (in the narrowest definition) are unemployed. That's 20%. 1 in 5. And over the past 2-3 decades, our schools have sunk into and beyond mediocrity into disgrace. Kids leaving with degrees from many colleges are less well educated than kids with high school diplomas were 30 or 40 years ago. I see those college graduates in my job. Many can barely write a sentence. My guess is they are uneducated as far as history, geography, the arts and literature.

We won't be able to overcome in ANY president's 4- or even 8-year term what we (including me) people permitted to take place over the past 3 decades while we paid attention to other things.

And, for good measure, global warming approaches that tipping point - beyond which today's half-assed "solutions" fail to do anything whatsoever toward solving the problem.

I guess it's the non-stop rain that puts me in such a cheerful mood.

Perhaps the sun will come out, tomorrow.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2011-06-04T07:33:00.002-04:00

After a rough 3-day work week - which just goes to show me that Big Mama, as we called my grandmother, knew what she was talking about when she said "Be careful what you ask for; you might get it." since I was so gung ho about having a 3-day work week - Ella and I went to the park this morning. Goslings. Fuzzy, creamy light brown, very very cute goslings. Hard to believe they grow into the great stately honking hulking Canada geese. We had a good walk. Cool morning, supposed to turn sunny and warmer later. No heron, no muskrat, and the Mallards' ducklings apparently haven't hatched yet.

Today is the Race for the Cure event to support breast cancer research fundraising. I signed up and solicited donations last year, and received a lot of support (thanks again to all). It was moving to participate, in part because I had finished chemo only 6 weeks before, my hair was just coming back in, there were so many other women who "looked like" me. At the same time, the whole thing was so ... corporate as in structured, programmed, choreographed, and massive. Also I had some sense of an odd elitism or at least silo-ism, as is, "this is a BREAST cancer event, BREAST cancer kills MORE women is a BIGGER threat than XXX cancer." No one said those words, there was just some sort of underlying thrum. As I said to some one this week, all I guess I was looking for was to hear the message that while breast cancer is a huge problem for women and women in CT in particular, ALL cancer is horrible and all cancer survivors and families and friends of all cancer survivors are welcome to join Race for the Cure (even if the $ raised goes to breast cancer research, in some ways that benefits ALL those dealing with cancer). But that message was missing.

At any rate, I did finally register this year, and thought about going, but have decided not to. I figure my registration fee is a donation. I wish the event well. Perhaps I will participate again in the future more fully.

Otherwise, looking forward to a quiet weekend. My daughter is in SF, visiting for 10-12 days from Haiti. Her organization, SOIL, is having funding difficulties. Too bad, because here is a small group of committed young people actually doing somethign needed in Haiti - assisting people in creating and learning how to manage ecologically friendly sanitation facilities - what can be more basic than sanitation? without sanitation, the quality of water is affected, disease is rampant, etc. - working on a really shoestring budget, living simply themselves right in the community (not in some NGO compound) - and they can't keep their funding, while across town, multi-million dollar NGO's employees are driven around in big gas-guzzling cars while donations sit in the bank. It's not right.

I heard an NPR story this morning about a new documentary just coming out about mining in West Virginia, strip mining or whatever they call the type of mining nowadays where they basically blast the top of mountains off. Unbelievable the details about how corporations have purchased the political process in the towns, counties and states involved.

Supreme Court decisions permit corporations to buy political elections.

Kids getting college degrees incur $100,000 + in college loans and start their careers as indentured servants.

One in 5 people in America has or will develop type 2 diabetes.

One in 5 people has no health insurance.

What's wrong with this picture?

It's a beautiful early June morning. There must be in the birds' songs outside my window, in the wisp of cloud passing overhead, in the sun striving toward the top of the day, hope for better times.

Peace.

Tuesday midday

2011-05-31T12:37:00.002-04:00

My fourth day off of work in a row - a 4 day weekend. If every week were 4 days off followed by 3 days of work followed by ... how lovely it would be.

Ella and I made it to the park for the fourth day in a row, this morning we arrived early, around 5:50, sun just up and over the horizon. A line of Canada geese were walking from the small pond, crossing the pavement of the drive that winds through the park and onto the grassy lawn. One neat, straight line of geese. The geese already on the lawn were grazing there, while their compatriots plodded along, webbed foot by webbed foot - reminding me of being 8 or 10 years old and trying to walk with flippers on my feet. When I saw the geese, I parked a little further away that I would otherwise have done and we went to the path we take by a slightly circuitous route so as not to disturb them. At the larger side of the pond, male Mallards rested in the grass. I think all the females are on their nests, hidden in the brush nearby. The heron was back, standing in the water at the edge of the small side of the pond. Long, grey-green. Birds everywhere calling, singing, flitting, swooping, chasing. Today the air was dryer, the hot humid mornings seem to be put behind us for now, over head the pale cloudless sky portended the hot day it is now turning into, but at that hour still cool and breezy.

A good start to day 4 of my 4 day weekend.

Peace.

Thursday night

2011-05-26T21:51:00.003-04:00

Quick note. Although I thought I remembered Dr. M telling me as I was rolled out of the operating room after the biopsy that everything was "fine," I wasn't absolutely positive. I was positive that he said - BEFORE I went into the operating room and got the anesthesia - that he would call me in a day or two with the results. So when he hadn't called by today, 2 days later, I called his office this afternoon. Finally he called me back around 4:00 p.m. Everything IS fine. The pathology came back clear and he was satisfied with what he saw, too. The "thickening" is scar tissue from the radiation. He told me I'm fine, not to worry, to have a great summer and he'd see me at my already scheduled next regular appointment in August.

Good news.

Thanks to V for driving me to and from, to David for being so supportive not only the day before, the day of but also since, while waiting for final word. To H for thinking of and checking on me while so enmeshed in so much more significant issues. I continue to be a very lucky person.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2011-05-21T08:08:00.003-04:00

(Picture from last year, not this morning; and I even thought about bringing my camera today and thought the batteries are probably dead or almost dead and so left it at home.)

Ella and I got to the park around 6:30 this morning (she let me sleep late!). The weather was warmer than the past few days, not raining, but kind of spritzing, as if mist were bursting out of the air spontaneously to dampen us. Almost the first thing I saw was the heron, standing in the grass about 10-12 feet from us next to the small side of the pond. Thankfully Ella's attention was fully engaged toward the large side of the pond where a couple of Canada geese floated languidly. Having a chance to see the heron really close up, I am not sure he/she IS a great blue heron. I need to check the bird book again. If he/she is a great blue heron, he/she is a juvenile - but then that would mean not the same heron as last year. I stood and watched him/her and then the heron leaped into the air, unfurled his/her wings - which seem huge when extended, his/her heck crooked, head pulled back, making him/her look like an entirely different bird than the tall, sleek stately thing that poised in the grass, stock still - and floated across the pond and disappeared behind the trees. I didn't see him/her again this morning, although we walked around both loops once and the north loop twice.

It was a good morning in the cool (but finally spring-like) morning air, face and hair ever so slightly damp with morning mist, like a flower must feel when touched by dew.

Peace.

Friday afternoon

2011-05-20T17:35:00.003-04:00

This past Tuesday I saw Dr M for my regular appointment. Everything was fine except ... except in doing the internal exam he thought that there was a little more thickness than he expected, and tenderness (I winced when he put pressure) at the top of the vagina. He didn't seem really concerned, and said he was 99% sure it was just the effects of radiation on that area, but he suggested he could do a biopsy as an out-patient procedure under anesthesia. Not really surgery, just a needle biopsy. It seemed as if he might have been able to do a biopsy right in his office, but because it had been uncomfortable for me, wanted to do it under anesthesia. I decided to go ahead and do it because even if he is 99% sure everything is okay, why should I live with 1%. It seems to me when an oncologist suggests a biopsy, a cancer patient probably should agree to do it.

So that led to a bunch of other arrangements needing to be made. I had to go have an EKG because it's been more than a year since I had one (before the original surgery in October 2009) and I am over 60 - well, I am 60 and some months so I guess that is "over" 60. And I had to have blood work done. And on Monday night I'll have to drink icky stuff to "clean out my colon" - wonderful expression, isn't it? And I'll miss an entire day of work.

Today I tried to find out what time the "procedure" is scheduled for so I can talk to a couple of people about the possibility of bringing me there and/or picking me up afterwards - and I had to (and I am NOT exaggerating) call 6 different numbers and speak to 7 or 8 different people to find out a time that isn't even certain yet, and in the end, it was Dr. M's office that told me, even though they said the hospital doesn't want them to (because the hospital wants to be able to reschedule people at the last minute presumably so doctors can go play golf if the weather is good). So (tentatively) the procedure is at 1:00 pm (which means I'll be starving and dying of thirst by the time it is over) and I have to be at the hospital at 11:00 am - unless they call me on Monday and change it, which I would be willing to bet good money they will do.

My emotions swung wildly in the hours following the appointment with him - from thinking that it means the cancer has or will come back - which is unlikely as I just had a very clean CT scan and blood tests and feel fine - to thinking of the whole thing only in terms of the inconvenience and cost (to date this year - in which all that I have done is have regular checkups and blood work and 1 CT scan, my out-of-pocket medical costs have exceeded $700 and that was before this "out patient surgical procedure" - who know what that will cost, but in the thousands I'm sure).

And it's been raining. Every. Single. Day. All. Week. Long.

That's the good news.

The bad news... let's see, what have we this week: flooding along the Mississippi, HIV in Africa, Cholera in the Dominican Republic as well as Haiti, who knows what the Japanese people are going through - that's not "news" any more, etc. etc.

My new grandson still had some jaundice on Monday for his first doctor visit, but was otherwise fine.

Tomorrow, Ella and I to the park.

I need to see green, hear birds, watch the waters of the pond stir slowly.

Peace.

Friday evening

2011-05-13T20:39:00.006-04:00

Welcome to the world, Daniel Cello!

Your big brother Cach will watch over you.

Cello's big brother, Cach.

Peace, peace near and far, may the stars smile on us all.

Monday evening

2011-05-09T18:46:00.003-04:00

My new grandson Daniel Cello - 7 pounds 6 ounces (approximately - my son wasn't sure of the exact weight) was born today, May 9th, some time this morning (between 9:30 and 10:30, approximately). His mother and he are both doing well. That's all the news so far, but what good news!

May little Daniel grow and thrive in peace and well being.

May his little light shine a blessing on us all.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2011-05-07T09:23:00.002-04:00

So many strands converging.

My new grandson is due to be born tomorrow morning

Today is the 32nd yartzeit (anniversary of Jewish date) of my father's passing. My mother-in-law, Corinne, passed away from metastisized breast cancer a few years later within a few days of the same calendar date.

Ann F passed away this past week. Ann was our neighbor in Jackson Height, NY for many years. She found us the apartment we lived in. She helped furnish it with donations to the synagogue's thrift store and some of her own (we ate from her former dining room table for years). She watched over us. We celebrated Jewish holidays in her home with other families in our building. She yelled at the kids to stay off the grass she had planted in our building's little court yard. She was truly my Jewish mother and I am sure I would not have made it through those years, newly divorced, drastically changed path in life, new convert to Judaism, single mother - without Ann and her husband Sol. May they both rest in peace, their memories truly a blessing to their families and those they cared for as family.

Ella and I went back to the park this morning, early, before 6:30. Birds everywhere. A Mallard male paired with a female apparently nesting in a small pool-really a puddle- of water in the woods, lifted into the air and flew by me at eye-height about 6 feet away. It was still cool and there was a silver coat of mist covering the meadow between the rose garden and the pond. Except for the singing calling birds, all was quiet, peaceful. I guess we arrived early enough to avoid others, dog walkers, runners. There were 2 people taking photos - 1 in the tulip garden and 1 in "my" rock garden. A restful walk.

Peace upon us all.

Thursday - upside down

2011-04-21T21:27:00.002-04:00

There is a tear in the fabric of the universe. Up is down and down is up. The center does not hold. I was on the bus this morning at a little after 7 am when my cell phone rang. It was the rabbi's wife. For some strange reason it didn't occur to me immediately, as it should have, how odd it was - not that she called me, but that she did so at 7:15 am. She said she was at H's house - that strange fact didn't register either - and said she had some terribly sad news - H's husband M had died suddenly that morning. Today. Just today. At the beginning of this day M was alive. Now he is not. How do I make sense of this fact? I went on to work and told them I had to leave. I called and David came and picked me up and took me to H's house.

How can it be that this has happened? (Oh, I know the terrible facts - an aneurysm, probably aorta, the EMTs were there almost immediately but still too late.)

The jolt of shock gives way to bone deep weariness, to wrenching sadness. He was a gentle soul, a brilliant mind, unfailingly kind, committed to family, community, colleagues and math. How can it be I won't be out tomorrow - or ever again - in the early morning, walking Ella as M comes riding up the block toward me on his bike - bundled up in wool hat and gloves even on a spring's chill morning - to call out, "Good morning, Laurie." How can it be I won't call back, "Good morning, M!"

Every day from the day M learned that I battled cancer, M said a mishaberach - a blessing for health - for me in synagogue where he went every morning and every afternoon/evening for daily prayers. Every day, my name, a blessing, for health. How can it be there is no time for me to say a prayer for M's health, for his recovery, for his life. How can it be that M was snatched away - from H, from his children, from his work, from his shul, from his friends, snatched away at 64. Too soon, so much too soon. Too cruel. How can it be?

I don't know how to pray any more, I don't know to whom I pray when I find a shaky path there, but there I find myself tonight and so I pray - May M's memory be a blessing most rich and wonderful, lasting and affirming, enfolding H and his children through long nights ahead to lighter days, may M's memory bring his kindness and compassion to comfort each of us his memory touches. How grateful I am to be among them.

Peace, peace be upon M's soul, now and always.

Monday evening's good news

2011-04-18T18:22:00.003-04:00

Good news - CT scan was fine per Dr. R today. I told her I had been particularly anxious this time. She questioned me closely to make sure I wasn't having any "symptoms" that were giving rise to the anxiety. I told her other than arthritis and a cold - no. So - one year down, many more to go I hope and pray.

Thanks to V for the comment here and the call. Thanks to all who have kept me in your thoughts.

Now back to getting ready to have a little mini-seder with David tonight, on this first evening of Passover. May all who hurt, who fear, who struggle, who hunger, who hope, who dream find their path from war to peace, from darkness to light, from slavery io freedom.

Peace. Peace. To far and near.

Saturday morning

2011-04-16T10:11:00.003-04:00

Another CT scan is history.

For some reason, I was really (I do mean really) nervous about this one. And, of course, I don't have the results yet, so the nervousness is still there in the background. I see Dr. R on Monday. I don't really have any concrete basis for the nervousness - or increased nervousness (since I guess I have been nervous every time, just much more this time than the last two times). I've now had 4 CT scans: #1 was before the surgery - Lord only knows what it showed! #2 was a year ago, April 2010, right after all the treatment. I was probably least nervous then, but still a little nervous. Still I figured if any scan was going to be clean, that would be it. #3 was October 2010. I was more nervous before that one. It turned out fine. And now #4 April 2011.

I think part of it is that I've become increasingly aware of odd and end aches and pains here and there in my body. Arthritis. Trigger finger problems. A cold that lingered. Continued tiredness. I think maybe, probably these things have been with me over the past 18 months since the cancer diagnosis but I wasn't noticing them as I had bigger issues on my mind. But there is that little ugly worry in my brain that there is something newly wrong. That my immune system is not only not snapping back, but not quite right.

When I impel myself to consider it all rationally, I think that what may be going on is that I have become invested in life again; I've put my stake back in its ground with a standard that reads: Life is good and I am not ready to give it up. A year ago, the first post-treatment CT scan, what did I know about post-treatment life. I was on its cusp, and just so grateful to be alive at all, to have made it through the treatment. Six months ago, I had begun to live, begun to experience taking life "for granted" but still remembered how close I'd come to the dark places it holds. Now, 18 months after diagnosis, one whole year after treatment ended, one entire year of "No Evidence of Disease," I have allowed myself to have a vested interest in more than today. I have allowed myself to live without remembering to be grateful for that fact once an hour. I guess I think that's both good and healthy and not so good. Good - because it means I have permitted myself to again live with hope - hope to be around and in my children'a lives, hope to watch my grandson grow and thrive and see my new grandson come into the world, hope to finish building my boat, to sail it, to take more classes at the Woodenboat School, hope to make a difference in the world... But in some ways, at least, not so good - because as the cancer diagnosis 18 months ago brought home, there are no guarantees and I do need to, WANT to remember that each day is all there really is, each day is the gift itself.

I have pretty much stuck to an approach I decided to take early on, which is to avoid negative "What if..." thoughts, as in, What if the scan was bad? What if cancer came back? What if... I have become pretty good at avoiding those What Ifs. That means my fears are generally unshaped, non-specific and generic. Fear. Anxiety. Nervousness. But at the top of the roiling worries is the rational thought that cancer could come back. I just don't linger there. I acknowledge it and, I guess I think that if that should happen, I'll deal with it then. Maybe it's magical thinking, it probably is. But I sometimes feel - feel more than think - that going to those negative What If thoughts could unleash something in my body, literally as in bio-chemically, and give rise to, or create physiological conditions for the very thing that is feared (stress cause cancer?). Better to do all I can to make my body's "soil" be filled with hope, even joy.

Anyway, there's where I'm at.

Ella, David and I completed "Intermediate Obedience" and we promptly signed her up to do it again. David and I need it anoither session as much as she does. Starts in May. Ella and I have made it back to the park, last weekend and today. Birds! Birds! Birds! We saw a pair of Canada geese fly in low, just a couple of yards above our heads, this morning and land on the pond. The Mallards appear to be all paired off, mostly not obvious but around. Red winged blackbirds. Black capped chickadees. I saw leaf buds dotting the mushroom brown bare branches of a brambly bush with bright green. Spring gives me hope.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2011-04-02T10:16:00.003-04:00

I'm back from my visit to Atlanta. Tiring, but good, and now I have a cold.

As soon as I arrived, I started suffering from allergies - at least that's what I thought. I bought over the counter meds which seemed to work about half the day (although advertised as 24 hour relief). Then when I got home, I developed what seems to be a full fledged cold, so I'm not sure if it was allergies, allergies plus cold, or just cold when I was in Atlanta. The 12-hour travel arrangement - Hartford-Ft. Lauderdale FL-Atlanta and reverse - didn't help, especially as the final flight from FL to CT was delayed 2 hours so I arrived at 12:00 a.m.

Anyway, I ended up taking yesterday off of work (well, mostly - I worked a little bit from home). I thought I needed the rest and the weather was chilly and dreary. We had about an inch of snow Thursday night into Friday morning.

My grandson is big and bossy (when playing HIS games) but smart and generally sweet with better manners than a lot of adults I know. It makes me very proud of his parents who I think are doing a very good job. It was good to see my daughter. She has returned to Haiti and as far as I know, accepted an offer that she commit to stay and work for SOIL for another entire year. She'll get to come back to the US about once every 3 months or so. She was busy with various SOIL-related tasks and errands, and we spent some time together as I drove her around in the rented car. I stayed with my brother at the new place he's renting. It's a lovely house and he seems happier, more relaxed than the last time I was there. We got to spend some time together, too. My daughter-in-law is very pregnant and we're all looking forward to the new baby to be born in early May.

Now Spring is struggling to push winter out of the way, to the back of climate's closet where it belongs, with mixed success. I hope we've turned the corner. I feel like a week of sunshine would help me kick this cold.

I have a CT scan on Friday, April 15 and see Dr. R the following Monday. That will be my 1 year milestone (1 year since treatment ended; hopefully 1 year NED - no evidence of disease). I guess I am nervous about it. From talking with D at work - who had leukemia 18 years ago! - the nervousness won't be going away any time soon, not when it's time for another scan or blood work, etc. On the other hand, what can I do about it? It is what it is. I feel good - other than having a crappy cold (although it's true that, in the corners of my mind, the places where mental dust and emotional detrius collects - there is the thought that this cold, which is my second in a month, or a continuation of the same one, shows that my immune system is somehow compromised. Oh well, got to just get over it.)

To tell spring to stiffen her backbone and make winter get lost, I'm going to post a photo from my trip of my lovely daughter and my handsome grandson, who love each other very much - as is obvious from the pic - as well as the fact that they are having a good time.

Peace, peace upon us all.

Sunday morning

2011-03-20T09:07:00.003-04:00

I have learned that temperatures on Friday actually broke records. I believe it was 76 degrees in parts of CT. About 70 or 72 around here.

Yesterday cooler, but still beautiful. Ella and I went to the park. It is waking up. Skim of ice on the side of the pond that gets more shade. Ducks doing their mating thing, pairing off. One pair in a large puddle at the edge of the wood on the western loop. Time to keep an eye out for the muskrat. The heron. Even the foxes.

Last night I went to synagogue and heard Megillah Ester read at the start of Purim. I joined the "quiet" reading - there were 3 separate ones. The main one - large, noisy, lots of kids ages 5-12 dressed in costumes, with noise makers - all in the spirit of Purim. A second one with the scroll of Esther read by women for women. And the "quiet" one, for people with small children and babies and others like me who are not in the frame of mind for the regular chaos of Purim these days. Purim party followed but I didn't stay.

This morning Ella and I went back to the park. Many red-winged blackbirds apparent by their distinctive calls. And fat robins. A couple of Canada geese flew in while we were walking.

After millennia, spring goes for it again. Can we human beings learn from that?

Peace.

Friday afternoon

2011-03-18T17:27:00.002-04:00

Short post.

Beautiful day. 60 degrees. Light breeze. Sun. Two birds in a tangle in the front yard. Can't tell if they are males vying for a mate or male and female doing a mating thing. Only small patches of dirty snow here and there.

I took the day off.

My daughter called from Miami. She left Haiti (for a week's visit in the US) on the same day that former Haitian President Aristide arrived. I go to Atlanta next Thursday for a long weekend.

I feel like the universe is humming.

Peace.

Friday night

2011-03-11T22:01:00.004-05:00

Okay, I am a slug. I admit it. And a warning - this is a LONG post.

It has been weeks since I wrote. I have often thought about it. Intended to. Wanted to. Even started to. And then the slug portion of me rose up and took charge and I did not do it. I have sometimes gone days without checking my email. It's true that in the interregnum I had a bad cold that lasted almost 10 days, but ... really ... a cold?

I think part of what stills my rapidly typing fingers is no longer having a real day to day sense of people reading this. Except J. Who does so with regularity and comments, not here, but in separate email messages to me. (J - here's a message just for you: congratulations on receiving the requests to send out parts of the book to be read by those publishers. It will happen! I hope soon. And naturally I hope this is the one that makes you rich - if not famous!) It's not that I really write here for an "audience". In the beginning I wrote here to share updates about the cancer-battle with family and friends, that's true. But soon I found that writing here was for me, too, and even for me, more than for others. Gradually over time, I guess daily life has caught up and filled my physical, intellectual and emotional spaces. I feel myself yearning to write here, but being tired. Etc.

I still think there is value to this experience. For me, even if most of my family and friends are not following closely or have stopped all together. The thing is, the cancer experience is on-going. And this blog is a witness and will someday provide a record of the journey. In just about a month, I have my next CT scan - April 15th. That will be almost a year to the day after finishing chemo and having my first benchmarking CT scan. A year post-treatment. A year NED (no evidence of disease). That is a milestone.

I did see Dr. M on the follow-up Monday visit. But ironically I saw him before then, too. That Sunday afternoon I was in the local pet store buying dog food and treats and a guy in line behind me says, "Hello. I'm going to see you soon, aren't I?" I knew I knew him, but couldn't figure out from where (he was wearing jeans, a coat and hat). He said, "Dr. M." So I had the opportunity to tell him that I was upset about having been rescheduled 5 times. I asked him what the best day, the best time to schedule future appointments was to avoid having them cancelled. Tuesday mornings he said. Of course, at least one of the rescheduled appointments was on Tuesday morning. However, the appointment went fine. I do like going to see him. His attitude about my health fills me with confidence. He radiates belief that I am well, healthy and done with cancer. It's not that he says those exact words. But that is the feeling I get. (Whereas with Dr. R I get the feeling of being guarded fiercely by a mother hen who is concerned that something could happen to me and determined to protect me from it.) The combination of their approaches works for me. I don't think Dr. M is the real problem; I think his staff is incompetent. (Remember the woman who blurted out that Dr. M "recommended chemo and radiation" when I was asking whether he recommended seeing me in person or talking to me by phone?) There's been quite a turnover in the 18 months I've been going to see him. So if he has a problem, it may be in staff management.

Today's news was the 8.9 earthquake and tsunami in Japan. This "natural" disaster (quotation marks because manmade circumstances make nature's events worse) follows on the heels of continuing upheaval in the middle east, Libya becoming the latest focus of international attention. If the US weren't already bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan, I could see Libya leading to intervention. Meanwhile the skunk in Wisconsin pulls underhanded strings and forces through the anti-union measures. And then stands up and sticks out his bony white chest and brags about it. Interesting article in recent New York Times about "inaccuracies" in NJ governor Christie's "claims" about public employees. For example, they don't pay any of their health care costs - when they have done so for years, etc. Like Frankenstein versions of the robin I saw today, these guys are the ugly harbingers of a Republican "spring" we may one day wake up to. If we Americans don't put down our IPhones and IPads and pay attention. If we don't DO something besides stuff our faces and follow Lady Gaga on Twitter.

I think that the reason that my two favorite genres of "light" fiction are legal thrillers and science fiction is that one offers a world in which evil abounds but justice can triumph and the other offers worlds beyond this one entirely, where humanity has survived its greatest challenge... itself... often to take that challenge to other worlds.

The weather report tonight forecast 7 days of over 40 degree (Fahrenheit) temperatures. Perhaps the ground will finally dry out. Perhaps the sun will shine. The birds are singing high in the bare branches of trees and hidden in thick brambles of leafless bushes. Even though I can't see them, I know they are there. I believe in them. They believe in Spring.

Peace.

Monday night

2011-02-21T21:43:00.002-05:00

Okay, now maybe I'm getting paranoid. Today Dr. M's office called and again - AGAIN for the 5th time since the original appointment was scheduled in October 2010 - cancelled a scheduled appointment. I was supposed to see him at 8:00 am tomorrow. They offered 10:00 am but I had taken 1/2 day off of work and already scheduled doing something else at 10:00 am. They offered 3:00 pm but I didn't want to take the whole day off of work. Plus the last time I had an afternoon appointment scheduled with him, I was on the bus on my way to the appointment when they called to cancel the appointment so I missed an afternoon of work for no reason. When they rescheduled me the 4th time, I actually offered to BET the woman in his office that she would be calling me again, to reschedule a 5th time. I offered to buy her lunch if he didn't do so. But she didn't accept the bet.

With good reason. Apparently.

Frankly it FEELS as if they are doing this on purpose, to screw with me. I know that's not true. I certainly want a doctor that makes "emergency surgery" the priority over wellness visits, which is what I assume my visits are. But at some point, after 5 months and 5 cancellations, at some point I actually NEED to see the oncologist "in charge" of my care. They ended up rescheduling me for next Monday morning. At that appointment I am going to tell him how I am feeling. I am going to ask for another doctor in his practice to back him up if he ever cancels on me again. I am not going to go through this every 3 months for 5 years. It is too stressful. And, if he cancels the appointment on Monday, then I'm going to fire him and fine another oncologist. I respect his need to "be there" for patients when they are in emergency situations. But it looks like he doesn't have any time at all for other patients. Maybe he needs to stick to the emergencies and let someone else handle the care of patients afterwards.

I continue to be inspired by the events in the Middle East. One, two, many Egypts! And Wisconsin! As far as the U.S., I don't think we've seen anything yet, and I expect things will get worse, much worse, before people everywhere are ready to take to the streets. What the governor of Wisconsin wants to do is what the majority of people in this country apparently just voted for in the U.S. Congress. My grandmother, Mattye Nelson, used to say "Be careful what you ask for - you might just get it." Ain't that the truth!

Likewise, I guess it is being six decades old now, but I worry about what comes after the uprisings in Egypt etc. When you stir the fire, sparks fly and you can get burned. Is it a good thing, even a great thing, to see the people of Egypt and other countries rise up? It is a truly great thing. But the hard work of addressing society's problems isn't a celebration, it's hard work. I hope we human beings are up for it.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2011-02-12T09:11:00.002-05:00

First time to the park in weeks or longer. Ella was excited and we basically had the place to ourselves. A few birds singing here and there, but no sign of the ducks, Canada geese, squirrels, rabbits, the muskrat, foxes or the La-De-Da poodle that named Sophia that sometimes lords it over lesser creatures (like me). There has been so much snow that the park benches scattered throughout the park are buried, with only the top parts of their backs sticking through the snow pack. So much snow, in fact that they have not plowed the road that goes around the western loop and no one has been brave or foolhardy enough to tramp the walking path. Untouched snow pack over there (now crusted over hard with coat of ice). The walk today made me ask myself what my walks were like there last winter with Jessie when I was going through radiation after the chemo. Clearly we didn't have anywhere near this much snow. I do recall cold days. It was good to go back and I'm looking forward to walks with Ella there in the spring.

Thanks to J for his query about my daughter's note seeking an ENT doctor for the patient in Haiti. It is possible one has been found; don't know for sure yet, I'm checking on it.

How about the Egyptian people!?! I like to think about the assorted (and sordid) variety of dime store dictators ruling in other Middle East countries with iron fists, tossing and turning in their beds these nights, thinking "Am I next?" I certainly hope so. Of course, now comes to Egypt a period of instability and - do we know who always steps forward to (try to) take advantage of instability? Is it the forces of Peace, Justice, Equality and Compassion? If only we could learn to do so. No, it is not. It is the next wanna-be-a-dictator types. I head one young woman interviewed (well, sound byte type interview) on TV right after the announcement that Mubarket would step down. She said that yes, she was very excited, but also scared about what would come next. Smart girl.

Hey humanity! Let's get our act together, shall we?

Peace. Justice. Peace. Justice. In Egypt. In Haiti. Everywhere.

Asking for help

2011-02-08T07:36:00.002-05:00

Anyone reading this likely knows my daughter is in Haiti working for a small non-profit called S.O.I.L. I added a link to S.O.I.L.'s web site to the blog. My daughter sent me the following note this morning. In addition to posting it here, I will send it to my rabbi since I know there are several of the members of the synagogue are doctors at the local hospital where I had surgery and received my cancer treatment. Perhaps they know an ENT. At any rate, I post it here because I do believe that each of us must do what he or she can, however small.

Peace to each and every one.

* * * *

Friends,

The email below is from my awesome RN/BSN housemate Brooke here in Port-au-Prince... I met David and his family on Saturday, he is wonderful man and will die without this surgery (Brooke told me this on our moto ride home and I cried with dust clinging to my wet face).

If you know a doctor- ANY sort of medical doctor, please forward this email... It would be a tax write-off, of course. ...and a most beautiful thing.

For those of you I've not written since I arrived in Haiti, I am well and inspired and I miss you and appreciate your support now, as always.

Love,
C

p.s. I mistakenly sent this without Brooke or Dr. Dauplaise's contact information. Please do share this email as widely as you are able. Thank you.

Brooke Beck- brooke.bbeck@gmail.com
Dr. Dauplaise- iamlivingthedream@gmail.com

Hello all,

I am sorry for the constant requests, but I MUST ask.

I am looking for an ENT who would be willing to come to Haiti ASAP. The case is below.

David, 47 year old male teacher, pastor and father of one 3 year old daughter.
David presented to clinic 4 months ago with a grossly swollen head and eyes and with serosanguineous fluid coming from both ears. Pt with a fever of 102 and HR of 160.

Pt was hospitalized for one month. His scalp was drained and he received IV antibiotics ( unknown what medication was used) for the month. David continued to have scant drainage from his R ear over the next 3 months. He then returned to the clinic with a low grade fever and swelling of the R temporal area at the beginning of January. David was started on IM Ceftriaxone 2 grams for one month. He had his head drained and washed out with Gentamicin one time. David just finished his month of injections and is now taking Bactrim BID.

David's head is swelling again and he complains of an increase in drainage from his R ear.

I have a CT from this month, I can't get it to attach at this time but find a way to get it to anyone interested.

If any of you know of an ENT that would be willing to take this case, please let me know. Derrick Dauplaise MD who is part of this e-mail chain saw and assisted in treating the Pt. If you have more questions and would like to speak over the phone you can contact him.

Thank you very much for considering this case

--
Brooke Beck RN,BSN
Medical Coordinator
Partners In Development
Haiti Cell- 509-3-471-4223
509-3-427-2409
US Cell- 541-326-9639
www.pidonline.org

Sunday night

2011-01-30T21:34:00.004-05:00

Everything is okay.

I just skyped with my son and grandson! Two lovely young men. My daughter appears to be thriving in Haiti, finding work to do that matters.

The new pooch, Ella, continues to shine at Dog Obedience School and was able to find canine friends to play with in the snow at the local school yard both yesterday morning (on a walk with me) and this afternoon (on a walk with David).

David and I went to a very lousy concert on Friday night. Well meaning, but overwhelmingly awful.

Work is stressful. We're supposed to get more snow on Tuesday and Wednesday. I'm supposed to go to NYC on Thursday to attend a one-day seminar.

People are rising up in Egypt, following Tunisia, and touching off things in Jordan, and Yemen, and Lebanon. An older Israeli woman interviewed on TV said "we're afraid, we're all afraid." A young Israeli woman said "why shouldn't the poor in Egypt have jobs and enough food and their rights."

A cyclone heads for Queensland, already flooded, in Australia.

The world turns. Things change. Uprisings. Fists. Men wave flags on tanks. Soldiers mix into the crowd, shout slogans. Women in veils march in the streets. Fierce.

Hope lays out there in the world like the ground holding the memory of grass lays frozen beneath the thick snow cover, so deep you think it could last forever. It can't. Spring will out.

Peace. Peace. peace.

Saturday morning

2011-01-22T09:58:00.003-05:00

Finally - a few birds landed on the new squirrel-proof Roller-feeder. David figured out how to increase the height of the pole it hangs from; that probably helped. And 30 inches of snow over the past couple weeks probably created the hunger. I think the problem may be the type of seed I used, based on something I read on line today. I might try changing the seed. Also we've had the delight of watching a couple more squirrels try to beat the "squirrel-proof" functionality. Foiled! (Of course, squirrels are creatures deserving of compassion, too. But they need to get their compassion somewhere other than my bird feeder!)

I've been thinking about how we develop our attitudes, well, really our neuroses, and specifically, our fears about doctors and medical care. Of course, disease and injury are scary, so if we associate doctors with disease and injury ...

[WARNING to the particularly squeamish - some of the following could be a little gross!]

At any rate, I am recalling an incident that happened when I was in my early teens, perhaps 14, maybe 15, that shows my attitude/neurosis/fear of doctors was already established. I was in New York, visiting my father, out on Long Island. Several weeks, maybe even a couple of months earlier, I had stepped on a piece of glass - not while in NY but in the backyard of my mother's house in Florida before coming to NY for my visit. I remember doing it. I thought I had gotten the glass out of my foot - from one heel specifically - and forgot about it. Now here I am weeks or even a couple of months later up in NY. My heel on one foot began hurting and I remembered having stepped on the glass those weeks/months earlier in Florida. I didn't mention it to anyone. The discomfort gradually got worse and became really painful if I put any weight on that foot. But still, I didn't tell anyone about it; I remember not wanting to go to a doctor or hospital but not exactly why not.

Finally one evening the whole family - my dad, stepmother, little brother and sister, older brother, and whoever else was there (the house always had visitors/guests) - was going out somewhere and I managed to convince them that I didn't feel up to going, not mentioning my foot. I think I probably claimed to be getting a cold, or having bad period cramps, or something. And they all left.

I went to my dad's bathroom and found a straight-edge razor blade. I got alcohol from my step-mom's bathroom. I washed the bottom of my foot with soap and water. Then I soaked the bottom of my foot in alcohol. Meanwhile I soaked the razor blade in alcohol as well. I then proceeded to slice off the skin and callous that over the weeks/months since stepping on the glas had grown over the injury. Eventually I remember there was just a final thin layer of new pinkish skin. And I sliced through that, too, and out spewed icky green-yellow pus and a tiny piece of glass! I washed out the place with water and then, gritting my teeth, soaked the foot in alcohol. That hurt! Then I bandaged it up, put on a sock, cleaned up the sink in the bathroom where I had done the deed, put back the alcohol and threw the used razor into the garbage. I curled up with a book and waited for my family to return.

They came home. "Feeling better?" someone asked. "Oh, yes," I said. Of course, I was worried about the wound becoming infected but thought since it had obviously already BEEN infected, what the hell. I kept it clean, changing the bandage often till new skin grew over it in just a few days. And never had a problem with it again. And never told anyone about it.

What kind of trauma or other experience had I had as a kid that would lead me at age 14 to "operate" on my own foot rather than tell my parents that I was in pain so they could seek medical help? I don't know; I don't recall. I remember being very afraid of getting shots from my childhood pediatrician. That's the only specific childhood "bad" memory related to medical care I have. Perhaps I suppressed something worse?

Anyway, the point is, that when I think of myself over the last year or so, when I was experiencing the symptoms that eventually did drive me to go to my gynecologist and ultimately led to the cancer diagnosis, surgery, chemo , radiation and more chemo - and I beat myself up for taking so long to get up the courage to go to the doctor, then I recall my 14 year old self, performing a kind of "surgery" on my own infected foot rather than seek help, and I know that whatever unconscious fears I have about doctors are deep-seated and won't be overcome overnight. I feel sad for the 14 year old girl who cut open her own foot and watched pus pour out, and then bathed the open wound in alcohol. Poor girl.

What complex beings each of us is! Who can stand in judgment of any other person, when even judging ourselves may break our heart?

Peace, peace, peace. Compassion for our memories, may they strengthen us for the future.

Thursday morning

2011-01-20T06:17:00.004-05:00

I saw Dr. R yesterday morning. Good visit. She said that I looked "glowingly healthy". Not sure about that; the glow might just have been from slogging through the latest dump of snow, sleet, icy rain and slush on the hike up from the street where the bus leaves me to the Cancer Center. It was cold out. At any rate, I'll take it! I asked her how long I needed to "worry" - really just a generic request for a longer term hand holding. She said for 5 years we need to be watched closely and even after that there is always a chance of recurrence. Of course, I already knew that. What was good about having her say it is that it reminds me not to take anything for granted. Of course, none of us should, ever. And if we have faced something like cancer or any serious disease or other health condition, we have it brought home to us. But I have been amazed, less than 1 year post treatment, how easily one slips back into daily routines, into frustrations with the minor hassles and glitches of daily living, with putting things off and getting back in the "I'll deal with that, I'll think about that, there will be time for that -- later." We - I - don't know how much "later" there is, so I had better be doing with my life exactly what I want to be doing with it right now.

Of course, practically speaking, that's difficult. As you reach your 60's, the world seems to be telling you to get ready to deal with retirement; will you have enough to live on for the next 15, 20, 30 years? You think, well, if there were really a chance I might only live 5 more years, I would do things differently. But you don't know; you can't know.

Anyway, a good visit with Dr. R. We set my CT scan - tax day, April 15 (well, used to be tax day; this year I hear we have until April 18 to pay taxes for some odd reason having to do with some sort of federal holiday falling on 4/15). I guess while I'll be nervous about that scan, once it is over, assuming it is clear, it will be a good milestone - one full year post-treatment, NED (no evidence of disease). One year down, four to go to make the 5 year marker year.

Lovely gangly Ella started Dog Obedience School. She was a good girl and a big hit. There were about 6 dogs. Ella outweighed the next largest by about 50%. We worked on "sit," "down" and "look" (look being getting the dog to look at you and pay attention). The instructors pulled Ella out a couple of times, along with another dog or 2, to use to show the class what they wanted. Ella knows "sit" and "down" pretty well, and they had us not feed the dogs breakfast that morning and bring really yummy special treats (we brought freeze dried chicken and beef liver treats... yum!) Although excited when we got there to see the other dogs, Ella soon focused intently on the treats. She was goofy. At one point when the teacher asked her to "Down"," she first lay down like an expert, and then flopped over on her side and then to her back, waving her legs and kind of grinning at the teacher. The whole class laughed. She is a goof ball. In another week or so we start "Heel" and "stay". Those will definitely be more challenging for Ella.

I spoke to my grandson on the phone the other night. He is so articulate. HE told me his school class - pre-school, he is 4 - is making "dinosaur prints". I miss him.

My daughter is finding her feet in Haiti. Big happenings this past week. She met Paul Farmer, founder of Partners in Health. She was there when Clinton made the speech about the year anniversary of the Haiti earthquake. And now Baby Doc Duvalier has showed up - not a good sign for Haiti, in my personal view. At any rate, she is well.

The new Congress is in session. Reminds me of dog fights.

More snow forecast for tomorrow and really cold temperatures for the weekend.

Peace. Peace. Peace.

Wednesday night, no Thursday morning

2011-01-13T00:51:00.003-05:00

19 inches of snow here since midnight last night. An unusual day, hours of shoveling, cooperation among neighbors. Our new dog, Ella, bouncing through the snow like a horizontal kangaroo.

My daughter is in Haiti, working for S.O.I.L. as its new "Program Manager," based in Port au Prince. She's writing regularly. Today's note mentioned that she had the opportunity to meet Paul Farmer, founder of Partners in Health, an organization long active in Haiti helping to address health care issues in a (unfortunately) unique way (unfortunate because it would be wonderful if more organizations, governments, etc. modeled it) - by not isolating "health" from economic and social issues. At any rate, I'm going to "cut and paste" an email from Corinne with a list of good articles marking the one year anniversary of the earthquake in Haiti. It seems such a personal anniversary to me: I was in such a vulnerable position myself when it occurred, a serious cancer diagnosis, surgery, chemo, and about to start 5 weeks of radiation followed by more chemo. Unsure of my own future. Now here I am - I spent about 4 hours shoveling snow today. I am - thanks to having a job, health insurance, good medical care, great doctors, the support of family and dear friends - NED (no evidence of disease) and actually HEALTHY. One year later. That's me. And in Haiti? Less than 10% of the rubble of destroyed buildings is cleared. Hundreds of thousands living tents - that's a generous description (sticks with tarps stuck on them. Forget "good medical care, great doctors" - how about toilets and potable water!!! How can this situation be permitted to exist? How can the United States, its government, its great philanthropists, its people - including me - not do something, do MORE - to address this? I don't understand.f

At any rate, here's C's email with links to suggested articles.

I write to you from Port-au-Prince on the anniversary of last year's
devastating earthquake in Haiti with a request. I have found there is
an incredible lack of understanding of, and thus, quite often, a lack
of concern for, Haiti.

My request is simply to read one or more of the articles I've linked below.

http://www.iacenter.org/haiti/embargoes.htm

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-quigley/why-the-us-owes-haiti-bil_b_426260.html

http://dyinginhaiti.blogspot.com/2010/11/if-you-dont-read-anything-else-about.html

and, this one I've sent to most of you already.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-quigley/million-plus-remain-homel_b_807251.html

With love and for justice,
C

Peace.

Thursday morning

2010-12-30T07:57:00.003-05:00

I'm taking the day off of work because I still have 3 vacation days left (not counting the 5 that I am allowed to "carry over") and stand to lose them otherwise. That means I have started a 4-day weekend as we have tomorrow off because New Year's day falls on the weekend.

In the end this part of CT received about 8-10 inches of snow here, although more (and in some cases less) in some other parts of CT. NYC - 30 inches. Places in NJ - 32. It shut down airports across the NE. Echoes of England and Moscow. The BBC reported the other night that stranded passengers in Moscow airports protested. Good for them.

On Tuesday, as I was shutting down my computer and getting ready to leave early because of the appointment at 4 pm with Dr. M, his office called. At 1:15 pm. Yes, to again postpone the appointment. The 4th appointment date/time and 3rd postponement. Originally scheduled 11/30. Postponement 1 to 12/20. Postponement 2 to 12/28. Now postponed to 2/22. His office wanted to reschedule for 1/6, but I see Dr. R on 1/18, and the original follow-up plan - as I (at least) understand it - was to see one or the other of them every 6 weeks, not both of them 10 days apart. So I suggested postponing seeing Dr. M until late February. Of course his office had to check with him. That took a day. But he agreed. I told the girl from his office I would bet her a coffee that the 4th appointment date/time gets postponed yet again. Presumably he must believe I am doing okay; if I trust him - and I do (or think I still do at this point) - then I have to believe he would find a way to see me sooner if he felt he needed to see me sooner. I don't think Dr. R will postpone. She'll just be late. That's her M.O.

When you are actually a "cancer patient" (meaning - going through treatment), none of this stuff gets to you. You feel so vulnerable, and so much at mercy of the medical team that is providing your treatment, and at the same time, you also feel so grateful for receiving the treatment, that you take whatever is dished out without complaint (I remember the lovely woman, L, I met in the group chemo room one day who had to wait more than 6 hours to receive a blood transfusion! She and her husband and I had a long talk. I hope and pray she is hanging in there; she was dealing with a recurrence of lymphoma, I think. I ask anyone reading this to join me in sending thoughts and prayers her way). At the same time, when you are an actual "patient," at least it seemed to me as if less were dished out and more care was taken to keep appointments, to be on time, etc. Therefore, perhaps the lesson to take from facing the frustrations of going back to being treated in the "normal" way is to see it as a sign of progress and even "health." I'll have to (try to) keep that in mind when Dr. R is late and Dr. M's office calls to postpone another appointment.

Hoping to take Ella to the dog park today, although I'm not sure what it will be like since it's likely to be covered in snow. I guess the dogs will enjoy that.

Peace.

Sunday morning

2010-12-26T11:44:00.002-05:00

Under a "winter storm warning" and waiting for 10-20 inches of snow, supposedly to start falling around 1:00 p.m. We'll see. These weather people tend to exaggerate.

Yesterday Ella and I went to the park. It was quiet. No creatures stirring, barely even squirrels. The pond is thoroughly iced up, the north side with interesting patterns in the ice, like darker veins.

It's hard when the entire Western World is commercializing Christmas to not be aware of the particularity of the day and then to recall what was going on in my life a year ago. It's hard to look back and recall those days and be realistic about how I was feeling then. I recall my children's visit here last December and my son remarking how healthy I seemed. That's what steroids will do for you during chemo, I guess. At any rate, now I do feel healthy, but creepingly older ... as in joints hurting, old injuries - broken bones in one foot, twisted knee and torn ligament in an ankle - all complaining, especially as the air pressure lowers and a storm approaches

I see Dr. M on Tuesday - assuming he doesn't postpone for the 3rd time. I'm looking forward to the visit, actually.

Then a new year. One that takes my daughter to Haiti, that brings a Republican majority to Congress, that sees millions of people in this country still without jobs - and even in that position being better off than so many millions upon millions of others across this globe.

Can't we take small steps toward peace, justice, equality and good will in 2011?

Peace.

Thursday afternoon

2010-12-23T16:03:00.001-05:00

Feeling better. Had a good visit with J and V in NYC yesterday - long bus rides, but even that time was relaxing in that I read and listened to podcasts. And got out of work early today. Here it is 4 pm and I'm home. Taking Ella to the vet for a booster shot in about an hour. After that... it's a 3 day weekend.

Peace on earth. Now if possible.

Tuesday night

2010-12-21T22:11:00.005-05:00

This is Ella. I've been feeling how she seems to look in this photo (although actually this is just one of Ella's quirks: she lays her big head with long goofy ears down on anything she can; here, the arm of the couch.)

It's been a rough week or so, mostly because of work. Without going into details, I think there is a growing possibility that I will be laid off in the foreseeable future. I'm trying not to be overly dramatic or paranoid and at the same time face up to what seem to be a growing pile of little factoids. 18 months ago my worry would have been strictly financial - could I find another job that paid enough to live on. Now I have to worry if I can find another job at all, and if I could do so, whether it would offer medical insurance, and if it did, whether my being a cancer survivor would cause the insurance company to refuse to cover a "pre existing condition." I think I am the most "at risk" because I am the only non-lawyer in the group. The people making these decisions (all lawyers themselves, naturally) "naturally" believe that a lawyer is always more "efficient," more "cost effective," bringing more "value" than a non-lawyer. (What do you call 22 lawyers at the bottom of the ocean? A good start. What's the difference between a lady lawyer and a pig? Lipstick. Why do you always need to bury a lawyer at least 15 feet down? Because deep down a lawyer is a decent person. ... etc. etc.) I spent last weekend freaking out, actually having nightmares about work. Then this week fear turned to depression.

I think the fact that my daughter is in Atlanta with the rest of my family (except my aunt and my cousins) - my son, daughter in law, grandson, brother, my kids' aunt and cousins, their dad and his girlfriend - and I can't join them makes me blue. Especially as my daughter heads down to Florida to make a Jan 3 flight to Haiti where she will be for at least several months. And maybe the holidays just bring with them a blanket of blue.

But mostly, it's horrible at work, maneuvering, manipulation, politics, all likely preliminary to outright backstabbing and worse. And then, you manage to take just a step or two back and get a little objectivity and you realize how self-absorbed you are being. If you do get laid off, at least you HAD a job, a job that paid well; at least you HAD insurance when it mattered most - when you had cancer. At least you eat every night, you have clean running water, a roof over your head and heat. And that's just the start of how lucky you are. You have loving family and friends who themselves have the foregoing. And of late, you also have a very very goofy new dog.

So on to happier subjects: tomorrow I'm going to NYC to visit with J and V from California. A real treat, first to be away from work, second to pass through NYC at holiday time with a no shopping agenda, and most of all, to see J and meet V!

Meanwhile, another photo of Ella in her Yoda The Wise pose. Ella - you will only be dragging me around the block for a few more weeks. Basic dog obedience classes begin on January 9th!

Peace. Peace. Peace.

Saturday morning

2010-12-11T10:30:00.002-05:00

Ella and I went to the park this morning. Cold. The pond was covered with ice which was covered with a very, very thin layer of snow. Only a trace of snow on the ground. No ducks. Where do they go? It seems to me that this time last year - of course, I was just getting into the chemo routine - but it seems to me that the ducks were around longer. Perhaps they have just ... moved ... temporarily. I guess I'll find out.

I went to a wake this week, M - a woman I knew through work, a wonderful person. She was the account rep for one of the suppliers we deal with and I negotiate contracts with. She became a kind of role model for me; someone who was always professional, courteous, but not formal or cold. Warm and personable. Always calm. Always listening. She became a friend. Less than a year ago she retired, after 30 years on the job. I knew we'd miss her, but I was happy that she would have more time with her family, kids, grandkids. Then about 4 months ago, I learned through people at her former company that she had been diagnosed with Corticobasal degeneration, a degenerative brain disease that is very rare and quite horrible. It seems to combine the physical degeneration of Parkinson's type conditions with the mental degeneration of Alzheimer's and then speeds up both degenerations to destroy - physically and mentally - its victim over a very short period of time. At any rate, M died this week- age 66 - after a last year more terrible than can even be imagined. May she rest in peace. May M's memory be a blessing for her family and for each of us who were graced with having known her.

My daughter prepares to go to Haiti to work early in January. Meanwhile the Haitian people are in the streets, raising fists and voices. And Cholera slinks through the camps to strike more and more. There is a Yiddish word - shanda - it means shame. But in a sense that we don't seem to have a real word for in English or in the Western sensibility. At any rate, Haiti is a shanda on the West, the industrialized countries of the world, and the U.S. in particular. To permit Haiti to suffer as it does ... a shanda. I again urge each of you to buy a calendar from S.O.I.L., whose work is only a small step forward, but important.

On a lighter note, I installed my roller-feeder bird feeder. So far, no birds have found it, or perhaps they are puzzled but its odd shape or perhaps I didn't fill it correctly. I intend to check later today. However, the good news is that the evil little rodent monster squirrels have found it and been foiled! I didn't see this, but this is David's report: a squirrel scrambled up the pole that holds the feeder, just as it had done successfully with the old feeder. It reached out its grasping little claws to grab the new rollerfeeder, and when it did, the rollerfeeder turned and the squirrel had to make a quick decision -let go of the pole and hang from the roller feeder? Or let go of the roller feeder? It chose the latter and then found itself trying to hold onto the pole with its little claws. Instead it slid down the pole.... rrrrrrrrr.... plop. Ha! Foiled! Since it's dark when I go to work and dark when I get home, I haven't had the pleasure of seeing the squirrels being foiled yet. I'm hoping to enjoy that experience this weekend. Thanks again to my friend H for the tip on roller feeders!

Dr. M, my primary oncologist, called last week to again postpone my next check up. Now scheduled for December 28th. This time the postponement didn't take me aback. I called and made an appointment in January with my opthomologist. I was on the point of having cataract surgery before Cancer came knocking. I think I need to think about it next year, but in the meantime, I'm pretty sure I need a new prescription.

Enough. A wish for peace to each and all, near and far.

Friday morning

2010-12-03T10:45:00.002-05:00

Gosh, more than a week since I last wrote here and that only to say Happy Thanksgiving! I'm writing on Friday morning because I took 1/2 day vacation today; I'll go in to the office in an hour or so.

Today was a milestone. I got my haircut for the first time in more than a year. A year ago the day after Thanksgiving, my friend H took me to her stylist who shaved my head. Today I went back to L, the stylist, and she trimmed my chemo-curls. Kind of short, but this way I should only have to go back every 8 weeks or so.

We adopted Ella and are continuing to enjoy getting to know her. She has a canine sense of humor. She will lay on the floor on her side or back and toss one of her "toys" in the air and try to catch it when it comes down. She has very large paws and, in general, is a BIG girl. The Rescue Group's "ad" on line about her said she weighed about 50 pounds, but I took her to the vet last night - just for a check-in/check-up, and she weighed 69 pounds - a 19 pound difference - and she's not through filling out. She was very thin when she came to us and the vet thinks she should weigh around 72 or 73 pounds! She's very long - from the tip of her brown (not black! I'm used to black noses) nose to the end of her soft curly tan tail. She has what I call a "girly dog" bark - I am used to a deeper bark from Jessie, and Ella kind of squeak-barks. She likes to stand with her paws on the radiator cover and look out the window, hunting squirrels and generally checking things out.

We have been to the park a few times, most recently last weekend. There was ice forming on the pond, not thick or deep, just a silvery skim. Then we had warm days, and now cold again. This weekend my guess is there will be more ice.

Thanks again to my friend H I ordered a new bird feeder to hang in front of our living room windows. The one I hung there earlier this year was discovered by the evil cabal of squirrel thieves that apparently call the trees in our yard home. The dastardly little rodents are able to claw their way up the 1/2 inch square metal pole - how I don't know - and then leap to the edge of the feeder, causing it to rock wildly, hang on and grab seeds. They've eaten most of the last 2 refills. I've given up filling the feeder until the new one comes. It is called a "rollerfeeder" (check it out: rollerfeeder.com) and H says since she installed it, the squirrel thieves in her neck of the neighborhood are completely foiled. She said they got on it a couple times - and when they do, the feeder "spins" so they hang on the bottom or something and anyway, can't reach the seed. After a couple of tries, they gave up She says they sit on the deck below where the feeder hangs (where they could reach it) and stare at it. I assume the gears of their little rodent minds are turning as fast as they're capable of, seeking a solution. Hopefully they won't find it - or evolve higher intelligence - at least in my lifetime. The new feeder hasn't arrived yet - maybe today! I can't wait to ruin the nasty little rodents' day.

Wow - some hostility towards squirrels, right? I bought a "bird feeder," not a "squirrel feeder". Those squirrels seem to have no trouble feeding themselves.

At any rate, that's an update on the personal side.

Wiki Leaks in the news. Long term unemployment at rates never seen, and Congress in its spineless capitalist-loving wisdom, did not renew unemployment benefits. A year since the earthquake in Haiti, almost, and in one month recently 30,000 new cholera cases. I read that they brought in porta-potties (Western style like for Rock Festivals!) which have to be emptied, but there's no technology to do that, so then they have to pay a company much $$ to haul the filled porta-pots away, dump them in a rubbish dump (which just lets the sewage seep back into the ground) and bring them back. Great solution - recycling the waste literally "through" the human community - by collecting it, paying someone to move it and dump it on the ground, so it gets in the water where people drink it, and then get diarrhea (or worse - cholera).

Where have all the flowers gone?

Thursday evening

2010-11-25T17:46:00.001-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving!

Wednesday morning

2010-11-24T09:54:00.002-05:00

Ella and I went to the park this morning. A chilly and fierce wind was blowing; kind of eerie.

My daughter called the other day; she has been offered a job in Haiti with S.O.I.L. She intends to accept and go to Haiti in January. She's informed them about her application to UC Santa Cruz (although she recognizes that if UCSC does accept her for the 6-month program that starts in April, she still has to find a way to get the money to attend). At any rate, it sounds like S.O.I.L. would let her go attend the program and, I guess, come back afterwards. She just posted this link on Facebook which I - taking a clue from the article title - read and decided to share here:

http://dyinginhaiti.blogspot.com/2010/11/if-you-dont-read-anything-else-about.html?spref=fb

As I prepare to roast a free-range turkey for David, his brother and myself, along with sweet potatoes, acorn squash, stuffing, apple cobbler, David's delicious cranberry walnut bread - my thoughts are with those in Haiti, waiting for foreign and local bureaucrats to address their life-and-death struggle with cholera, to provide simple IV fluids that would save 80% of those affected. I know for what I am thankful - I have had a good year, with a good job and health insurance, a great team of oncologists, loving family, supportive friends, and together beat back the beast, Cancer. My children are healthy. My son working, my daughter-in-law providing the center that holds, my grandson growing, thriving. My daughter finding her own path and commitment to repairing the world. My brother well, my cousin C recovered from an almost fatal accident, my aunt feisty as ever, my cousin D hanging in there, her brother D, supporting his lovely big family. All their children well. For what should those dying of an all-too-curable disease in Haiti be thankful for this year?

Ah... peace and justice... The sun shines down on all, but suffering still lays a dark shadow on those who least can bear it. Why? For how long? I can only ask, what can I do?

Saturday morning

2010-11-20T10:16:00.002-05:00

I went back to the park today, first time since I went back alone after Jessie died. Today I had our foster dog, Ella, with me. It was good to be back. It was strange to be there with a dog other than Jessie, but still good to greet the creatures. Today the creatures that appeared were limited to ducks - many of them - squirrels - more of them - and at some point, a big gaggle of Canada geese. Literally dozens of them, pushing the Mallards out of their preferred spot close to the shore of the north (big) side of the pond to hog it for themselves (if a goose can be said to 'hog' something). Ella seemed to enjoy being at the park, especially the squirrels.

Ella is a very different dog than Jessie, not just physically - she is a mix of perhaps German Shepherd dog and definitely Greyhound - but personality wise. She is sweet, and more expressively affectionate than Jessie (a grand sign of emotion from Jessie was to push her nose into your arm and possibly, if you were VERY lucky, to lick your hand one time). Ella is capable of sprawling out on the bed or floor, or curling on the couch and vegging out (if a dog can "veg out'), but she is lively when we go outside. She's learning to walk on a leash, but still tends to dance on it a bit. She's mad for squirrels. I can tell Ella has "sight hound" in her (versus "scent hound"). Of course she sniffs around a little as we walk, but not as much as Jessie or other dogs I've known. Instead she is incredibly focused in watching everything around her. She will stare upwards, at the sky, when a flock of crows go overhead. The other night she stared at the moon, which was nearly full, gleaming in the night sky.

News on other fronts - today is the start of a week's vacation for me. Thanksgiving and the day after are holidays at my job, so I took Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday off as well. No real plans - except to relax, get to know Ella better, perhaps straighten up the house a little. My oncologist, Dr. M's office called and postponed my November 30 appointment to December 20th. That felt weird - gave rise to a feeling of slight insecurity, as if to stay healthy I needed to see him sooner rather than later. But of course, if he is comfortable that I can wait 3 weeks, I can wait three weeks. So I'll see him 12/20 and then Dr. R in late January at which time I'll make the appointment for the next CT scan, likely in April (which will be 1 year since finishing the chemo/radiation/chemo treatments). I still wonder how cancer survivors measure their survivorship - from their diagnosis (in which case I am One Year out) or from the end of their treatment, which would be April for me. From diagnosis seems to make sense because, in fact, I HAVE survived for one year since my diagnosis. In some ways, it seems much longer; in other ways, the year has flown by. As Thanksgiving approaches, I recall last year's holiday, when I had just started chemo, and I think it was the Friday after Thanksgiving that I went and had my hair shaved off. Now my head is full of curls - chemo curls. When people compliment my hair, I tell them they too can have such curls, all it takes is a few months of chemotherapy! Actually I like my curly hair - I am just trying not to become invested or attached to it, since I understand the effects of chemo on hair often are not permanent.

In the world, madness. Cholera in Haiti. Cholera! Unbelievable. My daughter is planning to go back to Haiti next year, again to volunteer with S.O.I.L. (http://www.oursoil.org/). Perhaps some day I'll be able to go with her. She designed their new 2011 calendar for them - available at the foregoing website. It's a great organization and I encourage all to support it (of course, I'm buying a bunch of the calendars and so some of you may get one from me as a holiday present!)

Then there are the mid-term election results. A pox on all their houses. If government's acts (and omissions) didn't cause and increase real world suffering, I would say the next 2 years might be "fun," in the sense of watching a deadly poisonous snake eat itself tail first.

Being in the park today reminded me that life persists, even when the world seems to turn dark, when tree limbs are bare, and grass and leaves brown and decay, and the air is chill, life hunkers down and reserves itself, and waits patiently for its time to come again, to push out and strive. This is the way of nature, and are we not creatures of nature? Can we learn to be patient, to hunker down when we must but still to have hope, reserve our strength and find our own time, and then stir, rise and strive?

Peace and kindness.

Thursday evening

2010-11-11T20:26:00.002-05:00

Another mammogram out of the way. Results fine. Bone scan apparently indicates I have whatever the preliminary to osteoporosis is, so I guess I do need to try to take calcium and vitamin D. At any rate, these are issues that are much easier to deal with than those I faced at this time last year. I realized the other day that I had reached a one year anniversary of the first chemo. I remember how petrified I was. Recalling those feelings in turn recalls all the love, support, compassion and kindness of so many friends and family members that supported me - without each of you I would not have made it through those first dark difficult days, and all the others that followed. I am a lucky human being.

On another front, a strange development. David and I have been missing Jessie so much, herself specifically, and as a representative of all loyal, loving dog friends who make themselves so "present" in the lives they are called on to share. And without any real intention of taking any action, I began a few days ago looking on line at dogs available for adoption in CT. (That's how I first found Jessie - on line under the heading "Urgent!".) And one little dog face struck me some how. A day or so later I sent an email to the contact for this dog, just asking how old the dog was with no intention of anything further. Turns out this dog - who is now called Ella - has a deep story. She is about a year old, some sort of shepherd-mix, tan, a big girl but not huge. She was rescued by an organization called Connecticut Underhound Railroad (I kid you not) from a shelter in Missouri where she was to be killed within a day or so, or even hours. Someone there contacted this organization in CT (as well as dozens of other rescue organizations around the country). Even though the organization here had never rescued any dog from the midwest (they work with "high kill" shelters in the South), something about this particular dog struck the woman who received the email. And one thing led to another. The woman here committed to the volunteer in Missouri to figuring out how to get the dog from Missouri to Maine (where the woman lives). The woman in Missouri arranged to board the dog somewhere in Missouri in the meantime. It took a month or more for the woman here to arrange transportation to bring the dog to Maine (where the woman lives) and a little longer to find a place in Maine to "foster" the dog - a "doggie day care center." Then the organization posted Ella's picture on line as available for adoption, a few weeks ago, I think. And this week, I saw it.

Now David and I may meet Ella this weekend - if arrangements to bring her from Maine can be worked out - and "foster" her for a week or so to see if she likes us and we like her and even might want to adopt her long term. In a way it seems too soon after losing Jessie. In another way, it feels like something that just is supposed to be happening. Even if we decide this is not the dog for us long term, perhaps we will keep her as a "foster" dog for a while. I have to think, that Jessie would approve of us helping another dog in any way, short or long term.

So very many dogs, treated like disposable toys, discarded for any or no reason than convenience. Of course in a world in which human beings treat other human beings - even children - as disposable, how can I be surprised that some would treat "mere" creatures the same and worse. Perhaps one day dogs will evolve (while we humans are still yelling at each other on MSNBC and Fox News) and learn to speak for themselves and rise up, seek justice. They can only improve this world, and I for one will be happy to hand it over to them, to the loyalty, commitment and love they embody every day. Perhaps if I learn to evolve some more myself, one of them will consider me to be "adoptable."

Peace. Kindness and compassion to all creatures, including little Ella.

Saturday morning

2010-11-06T08:48:00.003-04:00

A picture from my trip:

I'm home after a full week away. I flew to Nashville, TN on Thursday, Oct. 28th and stayed the night, visiting with Aunt M, Cousin C -- who has fully recovered from her terrible car accident back in July - and a visit from Cousin D and Crazy Larry. Then Friday drove to Atlanta. (I was very nervous about driving to and back from Atlanta, but it worked out okay.) I spent Friday evening through Tuesday evening with my son, daughter-in-law and grandson, who turned four while I was there. My brother John joined us some of the time, too. For my grandson's birthday, my son and I drove with him down to Cordele, GA to "Day Out with Thomas" (Thomas the Train, for the uninitiated). It was about a 2-hour drive each way, but my grandson was SO excited and had such a good time. My son's father (my ex), H, met us there, driving up from the GA coast where he now lives, and my grandson loved having Grandpa there, too. And it was lovely to have the 2-hour ride each way to talk with my son (who kindly did the driving!). Then I drove back to Nashville on Wed and flew home on Thursday. Wed night, we cousins plus Crazy Larry had a rip-roaring game of Triple Yahtzee (used to be my mom's favorite). It reminded me of how good it is to "do" things together, rather than TV-watch. By the end, I was ready to come home. Sleeping on couches and strange beds, living out of a suitcase, being a "guest" - it gets harder as one gets older, I think. But all in all, a lovely week (and very nice to be off of work for 7 work days - I took off the Friday after the day I got home, too).

Now I'm home and the apartment is quiet and empty feeling - no Jessie. Poor David was here by himself for the whole week and I know he really felt Jessie's absence. (Another benefit of going out of town for a week was changing my surroundings which helped - or at least postponed - dealing with losing Jessie.) Yesterday after I got back I went to the vet's office and picked up Jessie's "remains". It made me sad just to drive up to the vet's office and go inside. At some point fairly soon I will scatter her ashes in the park. It's not so much that that was Jessie's "favorite" place. I'm not sure she had a favorite place. She loved being out anywhere, really. But we spent so much time there together over the past year, and I expect to keep spending time there, so going there will be a way to continue to be with Jessie. I'm not quite ready to do the scattering yet. But I don't want to wait too long either.

While I was away, the mid-term elections took place. I saw television again for the first time in 2 months - haven't been missing much, from what I could tell, especially as leading up to election day, the TV was full of nasty election ads. It will be interesting to see what happens over the next 2 years. My grandmother - may she rest in peace - who grows wiser every year that I grow older, used to say "Be careful what you ask for - you might get it!" I would offer the Tea Party and Republicans that same advice. Of course, my main feeling is a pox on all their houses.

Monday I have a mammogram and bone density scan. Then I see Dr. M on November 30th. I think December may be a doctor-free 31 days.

Peace and well-being to each conscious being - 2-legged, 4-legged and no-legged (whales! dolphins!) - on earth.

Tuesday night

2010-10-26T20:33:00.002-04:00

I saw Dr. R today and the CT scan results were fine. She referred to me as "healthy". I see her again in late January and as I understand it, we'll schedule another CT scan then to take place 3 months later. That would be April, a year after the end of the chemo. Wow. Time goes by. Better pay attention.

Next up: mammogram in early November and Dr. M at the end of November. Perhaps December will be a medical-appointment free month.

Thanks to all who sent kind words of support as I waited for CT scan results. Dr. R said next time, to call her the day following the scan, and she'll have results. No need to wait almost a week until I see her.

I am sitting here with a lovely image of Jessie dancing before my eyes. She is up there some where - or out there some where, as the case may be in a perfect universe - in doggie heaven. At last she is finally "socialized" appropriately and can now finally play with other dogs, one doggie pleasure she never had in this world. And there my other dear, dear dog friends, Emma and Sabrina, are waiting and greet her, saying, "Hey Jessie. Welcome to the next world. We have a chipmunk waiting with your name on it. Can you beat us to it?" And off they all bound, together, telling doggie tales out of school about life with Laurence Anne.

Peace.

Sunday morning

2010-10-24T09:35:00.003-04:00

I went to the park this morning, for the first time in ... I'm not sure ... years ... without Jessie. It was difficult, but good and I thought it was important as a sort of tribute to Jessie. It brought back deep and visceral memories of Jessie. The date is almost exactly one year after my cancer diagnosis and a little more since Jessie and I had begun walking in the park together on a very regular basis. Because the daylight savings time hasn't changed yet (or changed back, I always forget), it was dark when I arrived, despite being 6:30. I walked our regular path, eastern loop, then western loop. That one Canada goose that appears to have been left behind was on the large side of the pond. On my way back, the little duck family that inhabits the small side of the pond was there. Many birds calling out. But still dark, quiet, still. No one else there. I felt sad but also I felt Jessie's presence somehow.

H so kindly asked me if she and M could make a donation in Jessie's memory. We adopted Jessie from the Meriden Humane Society, in Meriden, CT. I tried to look them up on line, but they are a small place and don't seem to have a website. Their street address and phone number are: Meriden Humane Society, 311 Murdock Ave, Meriden, CT 06450-8310
(203) 238-3650 ‎

Another shelter I regularly donate to is the Atlanta Humane Society where I adopted Emma. Their website is: http://www.atlantahumane.org/donate/donate-to-animals.php

Of course, a donation to any organization that helps find homes for unwanted dogs or generally looks out for the non-human members of creation would be a wonderful memorial for Jessie.

Now to learn to live without that cold nose pushing under my arm, saying "Scratch my ears! Take me out! Feed me! Let's go for a ride in the car! Hurry I want to chase the squirrel I just saw outside!" Little by little, I guess.

Tuesday I see Dr. R for CT scan results. Thursday I fly to Nashville and start 11 days (including weekends) of vacation.

As if there were not enough suffering in the world, cholera in Haiti. A link to a Partners In Health website: http://www.pih.org/blog/entry/cholera-outbreak-on-the-ground-in-st-marc

Peace

Saturday morning

2010-10-23T11:39:00.002-04:00

She's gone. Jessie is gone. I will write more about the circumstances another time. May Jessie's memory be a blessing for each of us who knew her. She was a good creature who lived life according to her own path. She was a good loyal friend. I just realized that I have spent more hours with Jessie over the past years than with any other living being. In particular, over the past year, she was my constant companion and support. One year ago this past Thursday was my surgery and initial cancer diagnosis. I truly believe I wouldn't have made it through the year without Jessie. May she rest in peace and may I be blessed with the thought that she may run through the woods of another place, sniff the air of another world, chase squirrel-like critters and maybe even catch one. Jessie, Jessie, peace be upon you now and always.

Peace.

Wednesday night

2010-10-20T18:46:00.002-04:00

CT scan done. To confess how screwed up we (okay, I should say... "I") get, when the CT scan was done and the technician was putting a band aid on my vein where the contrast dye had been inserted, she was "nice" to me resulting in me thinking, "Oh, she feels sorry for me because she saw something horrible on the scan." Of course, that's unlikely for many reasons. I don't know that the scan "results" were immediately available. I don't know that if they were available, they were available to her, I don't know if they were available to her, that she actually took time to look at them. The whole thing was very fast. But the point is, when she was nice to me, my immediate thought was, "Uh oh ..."

Last couple of days with Jessie up and down, trending down overall. Today she hasn't eaten, at least since this morning. Not good. Maybe tomorrow I will have to go to the vet and get a prescription of steroids and try those. My understanding is that is sort of a last resort, so I want to be sure this isn't another temporary downturn.

I'm glad the CT scan is behind me. Now waiting until 10/26 for the results. Difficult.

Peace, peace to far and near.

Monday morning

2010-10-18T06:56:00.004-04:00

Things change, don't they?

Jessie took a turn for the worse on Friday and I feared the worst. She was very weak, had thrown up. I called and talked to her vet. We decided to take her in. Her vet was booked, but we could wait for the first available. She seemed a little better afterwards and I almost changed my mind about going in. In the end, we went in and waited and eventually saw Dr. R, a very nice young Hispanic vet. She took Jessie to the back, did blood tests, an x-ray, felt her abdomen looking for fluid. The bad news was that the "mass" appears a little bigger and possibly affecting her liver. The good news was no fluid (which I gather would be a bad sign). Also the vet said Jessie "fought" them when having the blood drawn, x-ray made, etc., which the vet said surprised her and was good sign. Jessie got a couple of shots to help with her vomiting and diarrhea and we were told to not feed that that night, then starting the next day, small meals 3-4 times a day of a bland diet - chicken and rice - and to give her Pepcid. So that;s what we've been doing all weekend.

She's definitely feeling worse than a week ago. All day Saturday and Sunday, she would not get up on the couch or bed, generally her favorite resting places. She had to be coaxed to go outside, and sometimes to eat. When she did go out, she didn't want to go far. At 1:30 a.m. last night she went out with David, but just in the yard, ate and he got her to get up on the couch. This morning I just fed her - and she ate with energy - and we walked around the entire block. I think it's a vicious cycle: she feels week so she doesn't want to give the effort to jump up on the couch. Then she gets stiff and sore from being on the floor, which reinforces not wanting to give the effort.... Anyway, when we got back from walking she jumped on the bed, where she is now resting (and David is snoozing - he was up from midnight until 6:00 a.m.)

Poor Jessie. It's hard to know what to do. The vet said on Friday that for what it was worth, she did not believe Jessie was in pain. Discomfort, yes, at times, but not pain. The vet also said that this is all "normal" with this type of sarcoma - bad days and better days and worse days. You would think I would understand this from my own experience, but it's different. I was going through "treatment" that did have cycles to it - ups and downs - but most important, an overall goal and end which was - thank God - not death. This is more like hospice care.

I remember sitting in the hospital with my mother about a month before she passed away, in the evening. I said I would stay with her and sent others home. I sat by her bed and held her hand. She shifted in uneasy sleep. She groaned. She was so thin, a skeleton wrapped in long stringy sinews covered by papery skin. I told her it was okay to let go, to rest. I thought as much as I didn't want her to die, I didn't want her to suffer and she so seemed to be suffering. And I remember thinking, "Let it be now." It would be a good time and a good way to die - in the quiet of the night, with someone who loved you holding you, talking to you, not alone, not with a stranger, not while medical personnel "worked on" you. But she did not die that night but a few weeks later after my brother and I, my kids had all gone home.

Anyway, I'm not suggesting Jessie is a human being, but she is a living creature and a loved soul. And I feel I have responsibility for ensuring she not suffer. And that's hard.

Peace.

Friday morning

2010-10-15T09:07:00.003-04:00

it's the first day of my 4-day weekend. Nothing planned. David and I were going to go to Rhode Island, camp and kayak, but then his employer changed its mind about giving him today off. Then Jessie became ill and going away, even for a night over the weekend, didn't seem a good idea.

Jessie is ... hanging in there. I feel like late yesterday and this morning she was more subdued, perhaps more uncomfortable if not in pain. But she continues to eat her $2.50/can "Grannie's Pot Pie" dog food AND the boneless chicken thighs that I buy at Whole Foods, cook for her and give her pieces of as "treats". Sometimes she doesn't seem to feel like eating; but then a little later, she will eat. As long as she eats...

I met yesterday with my friend R, who is undergoing 12 weeks of chemo for breast cancer, to give her a supply of caps, hats, and scarves from my own chemo-baldness collection. She seems to be doing very well. It is hard to believe how scared she was when we met after her diagnosis and before she started treatment. She is now 7 weeks down, 5 to go. Then some sort of radiation. I had told her, back when she first told me about her diagnosis, that once she started treatment, she would actually feel better, that I thought the hardest thing to bear is the unknown. We make the things we worry about bigger than they can possibly be. Once we know what we actually face, facing it becomes not easy, but easier. R says that helped her. I'm glad. To be truthful, talking with her helps me, makes me find within me the kind of tendrils of strength that empathy, friendship and compassion water and bring forth. It gives me joy to see her facing the future with courage. To the extent that I helped her at all, in any way, I am the one enriched.

Now, less than a week until my CT scan. Following, thankfully, only 48 hours later by a plane ride to Nashville to see Aunt M and Cousin C, and hopefully Cousin D and Crazy L, and maybe even the other Cousin D. And then a drive - which I think I am actually looking forward to, as long as the weather is okay (don't like to drive in heavy rain over Mont Eagle between Tennessee and Georgia; not fun with the 18-wheelers zipping by) - and some lovely days with my growing grandson who will be 4 on October 31, and of course, with his mom and dad and with his uncle, my brother John. Knowing that trip is out there, waiting, gives me a focus past the CT scan. I have no idea why I am anxious, and actually, am not quite sure how anxious I am. I think, if I think about it, I get anxious. So I don't much think about it. It's not like there is anything I can DO about it; what happens, happens. It's out of my control. Why spend the hours I have between this moment right now and the moment I learn the results of the scan, worrying about the results. Worry won't change the results, which actually are likely to be - intellectually at least I recognize this - fine. On the other hand, worry could - would - screw up the time between now and then. So I choose to (try to) not worry.

It is hard sometimes to know when choosing not to worry about something is just avoiding something that needs to be faced. Like when all this started, and I put off going to the doctor longer than I should have. That was not a good "choice," that was avoidance. I guess the crux is the quesiton: is there sonething within your control that you can DO about the thing you are worried about? If I chose not to have the CT scan in the name of "not worrying" about the results, that would be stupid. I hope I'm past that type of choice.

But who knows? We face new challenges all the time, throughout life, don't we? Who can say what causes courage to rise up and support us, not just once, but over and over? I think courage may not so much be a permanent character trait as a renewable one. Each time a new test comes up and confronts us, we are tested again. Maybe having courage is like unfolding a solar panel in our soul. Whenever a challenge blazes down on us, the panel may light up, so long as in the meantime clouds haven't closed in, throwing down their shadows and making it hard for courage to shine through. Maybe finding courage is about keeping that place in our soul open and available, trying to grow it. But there's no guarantees. We just do the best we can, don't we?

Hurrah for the Chilean miners! Hurrah for Chile and its commitment to rescue them. I hope the world media cannibalizes itself except to the extent their interest permits these miners and their families to earn something that supports them and enables them never to have to go down to the bowels of the earth in the service of corporate profits again. I have to wonder if the US would have done the same for trapped miners here. In fact, I have to wonder whether mines in the US are so unsafe that trapped miners would not have been able to survive long enough to be rescued. Bah! A pox on all capitalist greed!

Peace. May all people everywhere know peace and rest today with the same sense of joy and homecoming as 33 Chilean miners are doing.

Monday evening

2010-10-11T20:05:00.003-04:00

Jessie and I went to the park yesterday morning. I borrowed David's car - I thought it might be hard for Jessie to get in/out of my truck's "backseat" - and we only walked the south (shorter) loop, but we went to the park. The Mallards are there. While we were on the loop, I heard Canada geese honking their arrival. Sure enough, when we came back to the pond, there were 5 Canada geese couples standing in a row at the pond's edge. Jessie seemed to enjoy herself, and it was really wonderful to be back there with her. Jessie had a good day today, too.

* * *

Man, something horrible just happened to this Blog as I was writing it. I lost about 3 paragraphs. I'm too tired to try to re-compose it. I'll write more later, or tomorrow.

Peace.

Friday night

2010-10-08T21:18:00.002-04:00

We're still here - Jessie and me. Jessie is doing well, I think. She definitely likes the canned dog food that the guy at the pet food store said was the "tastiest" brand they sell, something called Grannie's Pot Pie. Looks pretty good. She's still going for walks - if anything, seems a little less stiff. She sleeps a lot, but maybe I'm just hyperaware of how much "reclining" she always has done. I stopped giving her the pills for Lyme disease and she stopped throwing up. Hmmm. Cause and effect? Given the sarcoma growing on her spleen, treating her for Lyme with pills that make her sick to her stomach doesn't seem really to the point.

Anyway, to all who continue to send kind messages, wishes, and prayers out to Jessie (and me), thank you. Jessie thanks you, too, and... what? What? Oh, Jessie says to tell you "Thanks for the prayers, but could you please pray for more chicken."

As of tomorrow, it is I think 5 weeks since David and I cut off cable TV. Since my TV is a small, decrepit and quite pitiful analog model, no cable means no TV whatsoever. Of course, I suppose I could get some sort of digital converter box, but we haven't and don't intend to. At some point in the future I would like to get a very small flat screen digital TV so that we could watch broadcast TV, especially PBS. But not yet. We're still in the detox phase. I did sign up for Netflix, the cheapest offering - 1 movie at a time. This results in about 1.5 movies a week, which is about right for us. A friend at work lent me some time ago a "book on CD" of a Harry Potter novel. It has some unbelievable number of CDs - like 17? I began listening to it on the drive up to Maine when I went to Wooden Boat School for my lofting class, and again on the drive home. That got me through about 6 or 7 CDs. So David and I have been listening to it on some evenings. It's wonderful. It makes me think I will look into getting other books to listen to.

At any rate, no TV is a really good thing. It makes the evenings seem much longer. Occasionally there is a kind of "twitchy" feeling, a kind of withdrawal - more emotional than physical but still real - where I find myself thinking "there is something I should be doing" kind of thoughts - and ironically the "thing I should be doing" is wasting time with the TV on, and thinking "what a waste, there's nothing on TV."

Perhaps Jessie will feel well enough one day this weekend for us to go to the park together. I haven't been since the Sunday she became ill, which will be 2 weeks day after tomorrow. I can't bear to go alone. I accept that at some point I will have to do so because I need the park. Well, that's my wish, my prayer - that Jessie will feel well enough that I think it is okay to ask her to clamber into the car and go to the park at least one more time.

Autumn arrives. The trees are turning loose their leaves, some yellow, orange, red. Many brown. Nights are cool, hinting at bringing a chill. My favorite time of year. One year ago next week, I was going in for the first surgical procedure that didn't happen because of "bleeding,' that led my gynecologist to recommend the hysterectomy that led to the diagnosis of cancer. One year ago next Wednesday,

The seasons turn.

Peace.

Monday night

2010-10-04T18:34:00.002-04:00

So far, so good. Jessie seems to be doing well. We made it through the weekend - which I admit, worried me, in part because if there were a problem our vet's office would be closed except Saturday morning, and we'd have been forced to go to an "emergency" vet office. Instead, Jessie's doing okay. She eating. She jumped up on the bed and couch on her own, again, 2 of her favorite "reclining" places. She's gone for walks, including some around the block. She seems somewhat subdued, but not in pain, not suffering, and generally okay. She tracked a cat which hid under a car in our parking log, and went to it and thrust her nose threateningly towards it. David said today she growled at the postman when he delivered the mail, her usual MO. Thanks to all who've sent kind messages, called, etc. Keep Jessie please in your thoughts and even prayers.

Meanwhile, I realized that I haven't had a chance to begin freaking out over the fact that 2 weeks plus a day or two is my next CT scan, followed in a few days by a visit to Dr. R for results. I admit, I am nervous. No particular reason except that I am. I guess that will continue - God willing - for the coming many months/several years. I wonder if you ever really put all anxiety about a recurrence behind you. Probably not, but perhaps the fear and anxiety are dampened with time. At any rate, I am going to assume I'm going to be okay (or try to) and focus on Jessie.

David and I went out to do some browsing at Barnes and Noble yesterday and I ran into Nurse E, my oncology nurse. It was good to see her in that context. We talked Jewish holiday experiences.

Peace. Peace. Near and far.

Saturday morning

2010-10-02T13:54:00.003-04:00

No surgery. The vet who did the ultrasound, and Jessie's vet, both felt the results were ... bad. A bad mass. Aggressive, fast growing. Jessie's vet said she didn't feel good about the surgery. I guess if I had insisted, she would have done it. She felt it was unlikely to lengthen Jessie's life much if at all, could pose other complications. On the other hand, if she had the surgery and it went well, it could make her temporarily more comfortable. A very very hard decision, but because both Jessie's vet and the vet performing the ultrasound, felt Jessie's prognosis is very dire, it didn't seem right to put her through the surgery with no change of changing the ultimate outcome and only a slight chance of extending her life. So we brought her home.

I understand she could live just a few days or a few weeks, a month or so. At some point the sarcoma - Jessie just like me has an aggressive sarcoma, but mine thank God was treatable; if only Jessie's were! - will tear and bleed. The vet says she will become suddenly weak and we should bring her immediately to the vet. We have some pain pills for her. Not sure exactly what will tell us it is time to give her those.

Meanwhile, hospice care. I was worried that she wouldn't eat. We were told to "entice" her with anything we could. I went to the Pet Supplies store and asked for the "tastiest" - not the healthiest, who cares, we're past that - tastiest food they had. I brought home 3 cans. We began with a flavor called 'Grannie's Pot Pie." Today we're on "Thanksgiving Dinner." She's eating. She got up on the bed on her own. This morning she slept there while David was sleeping. She's been out for several walks, including one around the block, and seems stronger. Interesting in sniffing things.

I don't think she's up to going to the park. I'll see. Maybe tomorrow if we don't go too far. I can't believe we've been to our park together for the last time. Does not seem possible. And now I look back and think how precious all the past months have been, all the times Jessie and I went to the park together. It was good for her. It was life-changing for me. I am very grateful.

And so it goes.

Peace.

Friday morning

2010-10-01T09:14:00.003-04:00

I visited Jessie this morning. She looked so much better; wagging her tail, moving around, hating the "cone" around her neck that keeps her from getting to the IV in one of her front legs. The result of 18 hours of receiving fluids. I met with the vet. They are going to do an ultrasound which should clarify whether the "mass" involves her liver or other organs. If it does, then likely no surgery. This way we don't put Jessie through the surgery if it really won't help her. The vet will call after the ultrasound.

I was just so happy to see Jessie feeling better. We were in one of the examining rooms. She was antsy, and didn't really want to settle down and just "visit", so I decided to let them take her back to the back. When we left the room, she pulled straight for the door to the outside - she wanted to go HOME. I felt sad to make her go back, but happy that in the short run, she obviously is feeling so much better.

I'm trying not to think about the possible bad outcomes, not yet. I am stubbornly clinging to hope. Jessie is better, stronger, and if she has a chance, I think she will fight to get well. The "what if" she doesn't is for later. Now is for "what if" she pulls through and gets spleenlessly well. Sounds good to me.

Peace.

Thursday evening

2010-09-30T21:13:00.002-04:00

It's not Lyme disease. At least, Jessie may also have Lyme disease, but that's not the only or main thing wrong. When David got her to take her medicine today, and she threw up a couple hours later, still not eating much of anything at all, I called and got an appointment. I had to stay at work - today was end of quarter and one of our biggest days (I worked 12 hours yesterday and again today) . David took Jessie in. He called me later to say he'd left her there for them to give her fluids. They found "a mass" in her abdomen. Anyway, later the vet called me. They can't tell if it is malignant or benign without operating to remove her spleen and then a biopsy. The vet said there is more than a remote chance that it could be benign, and if it is, Jessie should be fine without her spleen. They are going to do a couple more tests in the morning - including more chest x-rays - to see if more tumors/masses are visible in other places in her body. If they are, then the surgery is probably not warranted because likely it is cancer and has already spread. If they don't find anything else, then Jessie will likely have the surgery in the morning. I have no idea how long it takes to find out results, except my guess is that even if they don't have formal "biopsy" results back right away, the surgeon will have some idea whether it "looks" good or bad.

I feel so bad for Jessie. I'm going to go visit her in the morning - because if she does have the surgery, the vet said there are risks and sometimes things happen, and I want to be sure to have been with her.

It feels ... extravagant to spend money for surgery on ... a dog ... and if the vet said or says tomorrow that the chances are overwhelming that it is cancer and her future is bleak, then I would say why make her go through more trauma of surgery. But if she has a chance- just a decent, fighting chance - to be well, healthy, I feel she deserves that chance. The first 3 years of her life were hard. She's just begun to really thrive. It's not enough. I want to give her that shot. Unless there is really no shot and it would just be harder on her.

Pray for sweet Jessie. Pray for all creatures who suffer- 2 legged, 4 legged, finned, winged - whether in hunger, in thirst, in pain, in disease, in old age, in loneliness, in poverty, in war, in fear.

Peace. Peace. Peace be upon us all, now and always.

Wednesday night

2010-09-29T21:30:00.002-04:00

Jessie is only a smidgeon better; she had a little more energy today. With David's help, she got on the bed and rested there through the afternoon (she had been too weak/sore to even get on the bed or couch, 2 of her favorites reclining spots). She isn't eating, though. She did eat the "treat" with her medicine in it this morning, and one other "cookie". Tonight she ate another "treat" with pills in it, and a few scrambled eggs. Within an hour, she threw up - the eggs and I think the treat/pills, too. This isn't good news. However, she did walk around the block with David earlier today, and again tonight with me. Not much, but better than last night when all she would do was go out into the front yard. I guess we have to give it another day, but if she won't eat ...

Please keep Jessie in your thoughts.

Peace.

Tuesday afternoon

2010-09-28T18:13:00.002-04:00

Lyme disease. At least that's what the vet thinks it likely is. Jessie tested positive for it (apparently a large number of dogs test positive for Lyme disease but are asymptomatic, at least for a long time.) The vet said that Lyme explained all of Jessie's symptoms. We came home with a vial of pills; the vet gave Jessie her first dose of 2 pills while we were there. Now it is 2 pills twice a day until they are used up. The vet thinks if it is Lyme disease (and only that) causing Jessie's symptoms, Jessie should feel better in just a day or two. And the pills will "cure" the Lyme (although she could get it again and we probably should have her vaccinated against Lyme, but only after she is completely well - about 2 months).

A big relief. I hope that it is Lyme and only Lyme. Not that I want Jessie to have Lyme disease, but it beats the alternatives - which could include all kinds of horrible things like ... cancer etc. But first things first - we need to get her past the Lyme and see if she gets back to her old pesky self.

Jessie perked up a little at the vet. Even ate a few treats given by the vet. But now, back home, she clearly still doesn't feel well. Nothing sadder than a sick dog... except - God forbid - a sick child.

Peace.

Tuesday morning

2010-09-28T06:33:00.002-04:00

Jessie is sick. I don't know what it is. She's been a little finicky about her food for a couple of weeks. We thought it was the by-product of us spoiling her a little, giving her a "treat" from our dinner now and then. She had developed a habit of not eating her food if we were having a meal, and then after we finished, going and eating. But she was eating albeit less enthusiastically (in the past, she's been a wolfer). We went hiking on Sunday, a fairly rigorous hike. It pushed me (of course I'm out of shape) and it seemed to push Jessie, too. When we got home, she flopped down and stayed there. I expected that and so wasn't worried. She did eat her dinner and went for her normal nightly walk. Then in the middle of the night, she woke me with the sound of ... throwing up (sorry to be graphic). That was early yesterday morning. Since then she is lethargic, hasn't eaten. She has drunk water. She has gone outside to go to the bathroom, but is obviously not herself. I had called the vet for her annual check up which is next week, but I don't want to wait. I will call them when they open this morning and see if they can see her. Poor Jessie. Seeing her like this brings up so many feelings in me, which I try to push aside. This isn't about me. This is about Jessie.

I'm going to try to post a recent photo of her.

Pray for Jessie.

Peace.

Sunday morning

2010-09-26T08:51:00.005-04:00

Good walk in the park with Jessie this morning. With the shortening days, arriving at 6:00 a.m. meant we were able to see the sun rise. Again it seemed a quiet morning, creature-wise. The most unusual creature spotting of the day was at the end of our walk, when to prolong it some, I took us back around the pond on the opposite side. There are two interesting trees - some kind of curly leaf willow - that must have once stood very close to the edge of the pond, both of which have fallen over or been toppled by wind. And there they lie, and seem to be thriving horizontally. Odd. Anyway, we passed them, keeping an eye on the pond in case the heron appeared. I heard voices and thought perhaps other walkers were approaching us from the other side of the pond. Instead we came upon a young couple laying down on colorful beach towels. A little further long, we came across another young couple on another brightly colored beach towel. At 6:45 a.m.? I wondered if they had spent the night in the park. At any rate, other than the Mallards, squirrels and one lone Canada goose (who seems to have been left behind) - these 2 couples were the only wildlife we encountered this morning.

Yesterday I attended the "Celebrating Survivorship" program at the hospital, celebrating survivors of gynecological cancers. There were perhaps 75 or 85 people there, mostly women, but obviously some spouses and other family members. Dr. R gave a brief introductory talk. Dr. M didn't talk, but was mentioned by numerous women who "shared" their stories at various points during the program. It evoked a wide range of mixed feelings in me. First arriving and getting a hug from Dr. R caused me to tear up. At the same time, it did seem that the majority of women there have put cancer further behind them than I have at this point. (This was the 7th year of this program.) It was inspiring to see so many women doing well, but also reminded me that I am still very close to the experiences of diagnosis, surgery, chemo and radiation. I ran into Dr. M at the end of the program and again, I have to say, that seeing him is a very positive experience for me. He exudes a belief in my being "cured" - not to say that he doesn't want to see me regularly, etc., but he seems so confident.

That's important because I realized something recently, which I expressed to my girlfriends V, S and M, when we had dinner last week. I realized that during the first 2-3 months after my treatment ended, I felt ... great. It was such a relief to complete treatment. It was an even greater relief to find myself feeling better and better every day - instead of worse and worse as had been the case during the accumulated side effects of the various treatments. Then at some point - not exactly sure when, but more or less some time during August - it seemed as if as my life really began to be "normal" again, I found anxiety lifting its ugly face within me.

What was I anxious about ? I asked myself, when I became aware I was. I guess that's obvious - that cancer could reoccur. And not only come back, but come back worse. It was as if during the first several months after treatment, I had no expectations beyond day-to-day living. Just being alive was wonderful. I was just grateful to put treatment behind me and live. All too soon I found myself becoming invested in making "plans," in thinking about "the future." "Today" was not enough, I wanted more. And so the fear of "what if" was born: What if cancer comes back? What if I only have a year to live? 5 years to live? What if? (And, you know, the first time you go through cancer, what you're afraid of is more-or-less the unknown. Because you've never had cancer or gone through chemo. But now, this "what if" is a grown up "what if" that has a better idea of what's involved. In some ways, an informed "what if" is less scary than fear of the unknown; but in other ways, it carries the weight of the concrete, the dread of reality.)

I need to remember what I wrote in"What I've Learned (So Far) From Cancer" - which I remind myself WAS addressed to me. I don't know if cancer will come back. But am I really going to spend every day in the meantime being anxious about that unknown? Even a perfect morning like today's, when the sunrise spread like a blush across the sky overhead? When Jessie sat patiently, likely hoping for a careless chipmunk's passing, as I moved slowly through my T'ai Chi form's pattern? When I heard birds calling nearby, and noticed how the flowers in the beds of the perennial garden all leaned as one, together, tilting to the east? Should I spend these precious moments being afraid?

This is all I have. This moment. I will not be afraid. At least I will try. I will live and I will be stubbornly hopeful.

Peace.

Sunday evening

2010-09-19T18:03:00.002-04:00

To the park with Jessie this morning. I woke up early, so early in fact that we had to wait a bit before we went so that we would not arrive in the dark (the park is supposedly open dawn to dusk). We saw the sun rise. Silver mist still lay shining on the meadow. Creatures were not stirring. I did my T'ai Chi form.

I made it through the Yom Kippur fast, aided I think by sleeping yesterday morning unbelievably late (for me): 11:30 a.m. Well, I did get up for a while - from 7:00 until around 8:00, reading. Then lay down on the couch and woke up at 11:30. I made it to synagogue at 12:00 noon. Services went until 3:00 p.m. and started again at 5:00 p.m. I came home and took another nap and went back at 6:00 p.m. Services concluded about 7:45 p.m. It is amazing what 26 hours without food or water does to those of us who are used to having both food and water at hand at any hour and all hours. Sobering liturgy, to paraphrase: On Rosh Ha Shannah it is written and on Yom Kippur it is sealed: who will live and who will die, who will die at his appointed time and who before his appointed time, who will grow wealthy, who will grow poor, who will die by fire, who by water, who will become lowered and who will be raised up. A year ago I went into Yom Kippur aware I had a medical "issue" - within weeks, I was in surgery, received the cancer diagnosis, etc. Now, here I am, NED - no evidence of disease. I think what Yom Kippur does for me is remind me not to take anything for granted.

I am wondering how cancer "survivors" count their "survival" - from their diagnosis? or from the end of their treatment? If from diagnosis, I am coming up soon on one year.

Next Saturday there is a morning program at the hospital where I had my surgery and cancer treatment for gynecological cancer survivors and their family. I have signed up. I heard Dr. R will be there. David likely won't go with me as he'll just be coming home from work, but that's okay. I have ambivalent feelings about it but think I will likely attend.

Meanwhile, on the home front - I am making plans for a trip to Atlanta, hopefully for my grandson's 4th birthday (Halloween). And as of yesterday, we have not had a working television for a week. We cut off cable and because we don't have a digital-ready TV, no TV whatsoever. An interesting week. We have watched movies. It seems like we have a lot more time.

21,000 people in Connecticut have already or are on the point of running out of 99 weeks of unemployement. The "poverty" level for a family of 4 is $22,000. $10,500 for an individual. Where would that individual live? What would that family of 4 eat?

I don't understand human beings, not forgetting that I am one, too.

Peace.

Thursday night

2010-09-16T20:54:00.002-04:00

Just taking a quick moment to say things have settled down at work. I got through it. Thanks for those who sent messages of support. It's scary how a couple of days like that at work can bring home to you how much of your time (life) you give over to your "job" and how deeply things that happen there can affect you, not just on the surface (as in financially), but emotionally. I try to keep things in perspective; it is a JOB, not my life. And as I get older - and post-cancer (if just newly so) - I realize that I am more and more ready to let things go, to see it as a "job." The troubling thing is knowing that with a history of cancer, I am one of those people with a "pre-condition" that might never get medical insurance again if I left my current job. That changes things. Still, I had a talk with this woman at work today about the whole issue of letting go of things you can't control (this was a discussion about things in her life, not mine, but the lesson remains).

Tomorrow night is erev Yom Kippur - the eve of Yom Kippur. The Day of Atonement. The day that God is said to "seal" the fate of every living thing for the year to come - in the Book of Life OR ... not. On Rosh Ha Shannah (New Year, last Thursday-Friday) it was "written," and on Yom Kippur, it is "sealed." Not sure where I am intellectually on this, but after more than 25 years of observance, the rituals and traditions of this holiday season are part of my emotional makeup now. The fast begins at sundown tomorrow and ends at sundown Saturday. Not just no food, but no water. It is almost always difficult for me, physically. I don't think I'll ever be able to say - and probably shouldn't - that I "look forward" to it. But perhaps I have come to dread it a little less each year. Not sure. I guess I've come to believe that I will do the best I can. And I will try to let go of the rest.

Can't we all just do the best we can? Could we believe that others also are - usually if not always - just trying to do the best they can? Could we cut a little slack for someone we're usually hard on? I'm going to try. Could it hurt that much to do that? For anyone I've offended in the past year, I ask your forgiveness. And for anyone who offended me, I forgive you.

How wonderful would it be for the world to start anew with a clean slate?

Peace. Peace. Peace.

Tuesday night

2010-09-14T22:09:00.003-04:00

You know how some days are just ... off ... like slightly off kilter, off balanced? Just a bad day. That was today. Not cancer-wise. Just generally. Waking up late. Rain threatening. Work bad. Stabbed in the back and disrespected. Not a good feeling after 10 years. Ended up getting an innocent person drawn into a mess. Ick. I'm glad I'm old. I don't want to work 30 more years. I wish I could walk away today. Become a bookseller at Barnes & Noble. But there, cancer does rear its head. Now I have a "pre existing condition," and likely I'll never get insurance again. The Republicans will capture the House and Senate, overturn Obama's pitiful healthcare law, and I'll be living under a freeway overpass somewhere. Do I sound sorry enough for myself? Yes, a self-pitying wretch am I.

Keeping things in perspective, the 14 year old nephew of a colleague at work is battling cancer again. Back in his bones. He's been battling since he was 8 or 9. Back to Sloan Kettering this week. I am full of self-pity because of a bad day. And this young man? The ways of the world are hard and mysterious. I reel.

Okay, I am clinging to this shred of a more hopeful outlook: I received beautiful pictures of my grandson yesterday from my son. I'm going to post one here and go have a short glass of Jack Daniels.

Peace. Peace to my wrinkled angry heart. Peace across the whole wild world. Peace. Justice. Joy. Health. To one and all. Strong bones. Strong hearts. Peace.

Thursday morning

2010-09-09T08:26:00.002-04:00

La Shannah Tova - Happy New Year. Today is Rosh Ha Shannah, the Jewish New Year. A day a of renewal, new beginnings. It is said to be the birthday of the world. I am taking the morning off of work to go to services at synagogue, but will not go until a little later. So Jessie and I went to the park.

It was a particularly beautiful morning in the park. Heavy dew on the grass, the hint of autumn coolness in the air. A lovely sunrise. There were many joggers. More than usual, even on a weekday, but we were a little late in arriving; it was 6:15 before we got there this morning. Possibly because of the joggers, the wildlife seemed subdued, hidden. There was a single Canada goose near the pond. Sitting in the morning sun by itself, stretching out its neck from time to time. I wondered if it were a juvenile, left behind. Or an older goose, not able to keep up? The ways of the world.

I am reading a book of essays by E.B. White that I bought at the Wooden Boat School's store. Who knew the author of Stuart Little lived in Maine. He had lived in NYC and written Talk of the Town for the New Yorker, when he and his wife (also a writer or editor for the New Yorker) and small son moved to Maine very near where the Wooden Boat School is. Eventually the son, Joel White, became a very well known boat designer and builder, running the Brooklin Boat Yard. Joel White was also on the board of directors of Mystic Seaport at some point. He (Joel) passed away from cancer about 6 or 7 years ago. Anyway, E.B. White's book of essays are drawn from columns he wrote for Harpers after he moved to Maine. They are wonderful, in so many ways. Acerbic. Funny. Delightfully spare prose. I'm trying to read slowly, to savor his words.

There is a pastor in Gainesville, FL who has advertised his plans to burn the Qaran on Saturday, which is September 11th. He has some crackpot idea that doing so is some sort of protest of terrorism. Of course, crackpot or not, he has obtained more free publicity for his 50 member cult-like church than he could have hoped for in his wildest dreams. Just about the entire world has told him, asked him, suggested to him, threatened him or begged him not to do this. Army generals tell him doing this will endanger US troops. Bloomburg in NY - needing to be consistent (Hobbes: consistency is the hob-gobblin of small minds), feels the need to say that this pastor "has the right" to burn the Qaran, but shouldn't, a neat 180 degree position from Bloomburg's views on building a mosque/community center in the vicinity of the World Trade Center location. The Gainesville Fire Department says there are local ordinances against burning ANY book, at pains to try to explain that this is because the INK in books is somehow toxic when burned. They assure the public they are "making preparations" to prevent any violation of this law. Obama called the guy a nut and said what he is doing is anti-American. (Anti-American? Since when is decency an "American" concept?) The pastor has received death threats, including some that sound very serious.

What is it about we human beings? Do we really have to have multi-billionaires on the one hand and impoverished millions on the other hand? Do some men really have to believe that women should walk around covered from head to toe in black? Does one pastor in Florida really believe burning a book he admits he has never read does anything positive whatsoever? If he does it, will some other man really feel the need to kill him? Or blow up other men (and likely women and children) in protest?

Where is Rodney King when we need his eloquence? Can't we all just get along?

They reported on the news last night that 2 asteroids passed between the Earth and the moon yesterday. That is a distance of 250,000 miles. They said it was the equivalent of threading a needle. One asteroid was big enough to have caused incredible destruction should it have missed the eye of that "needle." The scariest part was that scientists didn't know about these asteroids' proposed path until Sunday! Is that what we human beings need? A poke in the "eye"?

Let's wake up. Let's be kind. Let's wage peace.

Monday afternoon (Labor Day)

2010-09-06T17:36:00.002-04:00

Just a quick note - Jessie and I went to the park this morning. A beautiful morning. Two feet or more of fog lay - gray, misty and mysterious - across the surface of the pond and the meadow between the pond and the rose garden. We walked both loops and as we came back toward the larger part of the pond, there was the heron standing in the water next to the larger island in the center of the pond. (I couldn't stop myself from thinking of the ick-factor as far as the "water" she stood in, but she's a heron so I guess it doesn't bother her.) Anyway, a lovely morning.

Later David and I took Jessie to Barkhamstead to walk where we could let her off leash. She led the way. We went up quite a hill, and scrambled over and then down rocks. A good hike. It was good to see Jessie being a dog-like dog.

I've been watching videos on line of Christopher Hitchens talking about his escophogal cancer.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2010-09-04T09:32:00.002-04:00

Birds in the air.

Jessie and I went to the park this morning; downgraded "hurricane" Earl had passed by Connecticut in the night and at 6:00 a.m. the dew point was busy dropping. The sunrise was beautiful, the sky clear. Probably in my mind, but it seemed as if the park itself, its garments of grasses, trees, shrubs and flowers, and its creatures all sighed with relief. We walked the eastern (shorter) loop. A couple was sitting on bench in the perennial garden near the rock garden where we often stop and I sometimes practice T'ai Chi. I thought, do I want to do my T'ai Chi where they can see me? Then reality dawned: this couple did not have an interest in a 60 year old woman and aging dog unless perhaps I stripped naked and paraded in front of them. So we went to the rock garden. Jessie lolled. And I did T'ai Chi.

Something I think doing T'ai Chi on my own has taught me is that whenever we do an activity under the authority, guidance and watchful eye of a "teacher," we don't really make it our own until we do just that. Do the activity on our own. I personally think it would benefit us in our T'ai Chi class if our instructor would have each of us do the form individually (e.g., in front of the rest of the class), not necessarily for critique but so that each of us experienced the form individually. I think if she had us do that, the others in the class would be sooner to go off on their own, apart from the class, and try it. As far as I know, only J (and possibly D) have done so besides me.

Back to birds in the air. After we walked both the shorter eastern and longer western loops, it was so lovely out, I decided to walk around the pond itself. I didn't expect to see any of the wildlife that has been in hiding lately - the foxes, the muskrat, the heron - but still thought it would be a nice walk for Jessie. As we walked along the northern edge of the pond, suddenly movement over the pond caught my eye - about 20 feet away from us, the great blue heron had leaped into the air. I could see the feathery fringes along her head. She was so close. Her neck in an S shape, legs out behind her. Yellowish beak. Two birds overhead in two days. Wow!

A good morning and good beginning to a 3-day weekend.

Peace.

Friday evening

2010-09-03T19:40:00.002-04:00

Jessie and I got to the park this morning. I had planned to take the day off to have a long(er) holiday weekend, but ended up needing to go in 1/2 day. So I went in late - at least for me, 9:00 a.m. - planning to leave early -- at least for me - 2:30 p.m. So we got to go to the park. Not much going on there, creature wise. The Canada geese seem to have disappeared. I'm sure they're visible somewhere, but not in our park. Wonder if the heat has driven them northerly. The Mallards were out. Jess and I were crossing the little bridge that divides the larger northern part of the pond from the smaller southern part when a female Mallard flew right over us. I mean right over us as in 4-6 feet over us. She was just taking a short cut from the small side to the larger side of the pond (rather than paddling over all the way under the bridge). Even though we arrived fairly early - a little before 6:00 a.m. - there were already other people there. Must be the weekday routine, which seems very different. I guess I am among the strange human beings who think getting up at 5:30 on a weekend is a good and pleasant thing.

Anyway, that was my morning.

I spoke to my friend today who was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. She had her first chemo treatment and sounded good and strong. 11 weeks of once a week, followed by more weeks (I forget now how many) of treatment every 3 weeks.

I feel good, stronger all the time ... and guilty. So many other people are still going (or just starting down that dark path) through chemo, radiation, surgery, all three, and often with much more critical diagnoses. On a TV commercial I heard that some horrible number (of course any number is horrible) of children - 40? I can't remember - are diagnosed with cancer every HOUR. Can that be possible? That's horrible. Even one child with cancer is unacceptable.

What a world we live in.

Peace. Peace. Kindness. Health.

Tuesday evening

2010-08-31T19:41:00.012-04:00

I'm home and back into the routine of work-life. I saw Dr. M today and he pronounced me "doing fine." My next appointment with him is November 30th! He seems to have very strong belief that I am (truly) "well" and, seeing that belief etched in his expression and tone of voice, gives me confidence. September should be a doctor-free month. Then in October (the 1 year anniversary of my surgery and cancer diagnosis), Dr. R and ... de dum ... first "real" CT scan (real in the sense of not immediately following 4 months of chemo/radiation/chemo).

My vacation was good. The Lofting class was a challenge but good. The instructor was really excellent. I learned a lot. I was able to go sailing one afternoon in a very small little boat - a lot of fun. Camping was good. The weather was warmer than either of the past 2 summers, and had been dry, which kept the swarms of mosquitoes to a minimum. I saw a toad, a bat. I heard about porpoises in the cove where the sailing class sailed daily, and seals, but did not see them with my own eyes. It was particularly good to disconnect from almost all "connections" - no TV, no radio (except NPR for literally 3 min four times a day when I drove from the camp site to the place where breakfast and dinner was served), no internet. I brought my work mobile phone and talked to David very briefly every day; that was the totality of my "contact" with the non-Wooden Boat School, non-Maine world. One cool morning with silvery dew still thick on the long grass of the meadows around the camp site, I wandered down near the water of the cove and did T'ai Chi in the wet cool long grass. It was a good vacation (and I stopped at LL Bean and found a pair of blue jeans that fit! Another important accomplishment as any middle aged woman who has tried to find jeans that fit will attest.)

I will try to post a few photos. One of the "shop" where my class took place (we were in the "loft" upstairs). A couple of the actual "lofting" - the 4-1/2 foot by 16 foot whitewashed plywood board on which we drew the full-size lines of the 3 dimensions of the boat we "lofted" - a Whitehall pulling (rowing) boat. And one of me sailing that someone in my class took. Let's see if I can get the pictures here

The shop. The "loft" is up the stairs seen in the foreground.

Now, evidence of actual "lofting" (I drew some of these lines!): the "profile" view of the Whitehall (e.g., looking from the side), showing a detail of the "stem" (part of boat running down the bow/front at the center):

One more of actual "lofting" (these are pencil lines on white background; not sure if they will show up here at all):

Finally, me sailing the Nutshell Pram on a sunny warm Maine afternoon just before sunset. Mmmm. Good.

Vacation is good. Everyone should have vacation. I suppose first everyone should have a job. A job that pays a living wage. And then - everyone should have vacation.

Peace. Peace. To far and near.

Saturday afternoon

2010-08-21T13:42:00.004-04:00

I'm on vacation. Well, it's Saturday and "vacation" doesn't start until Monday, but no more work for 9 days! Hurrah!

First things first. Today I actually saw the heron and got a couple of photos of her. Don't know how they'll show up on this blog but won't know until we try. So here goes:

As soon as I had taken these photos, my camera crashed - well, just that awful message that says WARNING YOUR BATTERY IS KAPUT. Or whatever. Anyway, the heron exists!

I'm getting ready to leave early tomorrow morning to drive to Maine to Wooden Boat School to attend a boat building class, "Lofting." I'm nervous. Naturally. Part of my nervousness is just anticipation, actually pleasurable. This will be my third year at WBS. First year, a sailing class. Last year, the "build your own daysailer" class. Now Lofting. Partly I'm anxious because Lofting is esoteric and notoriously difficult. But I'm not taking the class to "do" anything with it, so I can't really fail at it. Still I remember last year, as the only woman in the class (which likely will be true again this year) that I felt intimidated by the background knowledge that all the men had - how to use this tool and that tool, maybe not for the specific purpose of that class, but in general - where I hadn't even seen many of the tools before, let alone used them. This year the tools are less intimdating - pencil compass, dividers, straight edge, measuring tape, combination square, framing square, hammer, pencils, colored pencils, notebook.

As the days have passed and the time to drive up to Maine has neared I found some level of anxiety increasing that doesn't seem to have to do with the foregoing. And I think it is tied to the fact that last year, when I went to WBS for the class, I was experiencing the "problem" that ultimately led to the discovery of my cancer, surgery, chemo, radiation, etc. Oddly I had had the problem occasionally before I went to Maine last year, and during the entire week I was up there - nothing - I was fine. And then when I came back, the condition worsened, almost suddenly, and that's what sent me to the doctor for the first tests, and other procedures that led to ... well .. we all know what. And so somehow I think there is some association in my thinking, emotions, memories - of going to Maine and coming back and getting cancer.

Of course I know, intellectually, there is no association except temporally and circumstantially. But the brain is in charge of the emotions like a cowboy rides a bucking bronco - occasionally, for short times and with difficulty. So maybe it helps to identify what might be the source of this low-level background anxiety I've been feeling about the trip this year. Because on top of it is great pleasurable anticipation. I love it at WBS. I loved camping last year. I like meeting the people, being challenged in the class.

Another thing that perhaps lies below the surface is the fact that 2 days after I get back I have another "check up," this time with Dr. M. Should be not a big deal. But I have not reached - do we ever truly reach - the point where I can be nonchalant about "surviving" cancer.

I don't know if I'll be able to post from Maine. I don't plan to take my computer, but I think there is a computer available to check email and so on. I will take photos and write notes and post when I get back.

In the meantime, may all the world know the joy and peace of "vacation" - in health and in peace.

Peace. Now. Please.

Saturday morning

2010-08-14T08:23:00.002-04:00

Okay, that's the way it goes. For the last several weeks I've been taking my little digital camera to the park on the weekends and snapping a few photos, always hoping, waiting, hoping to see the heron and get a picture (in fact, it was Crazy L down in N'ville who suggested I try to get a photo of her). So this morning, when the weather up here finally breaks through the hazy heat and cools to the point of having a soupcon of autumn's crispness, I think to myself "Why drag out that little camera again? I haven't seen the heron and then I spend my walk thinking about having the camera ready in case I do see her, or one of the foxes. No, this morning I will just walk."

So first thing, we arrive, get out of the car and walk over to the pond. And there she is, on our near side of the pond, on the shore, our heron standing tall and green/grey/blue among the squatty ducklings. And there we are. No camera. And that's the way it goes.

No foxes this morning. Last weekend one fox ran across the road that circles the park, about 15 yards in front of us. Later a jogger called out as she ran past us, "Be careful! There are 3 foxes out there!" Three? I've only seen two Be careful? Does she think they will attack us? Perhaps she thought that Jessie might go after them, and she is very interested in them and if she were off leash, indeed, she might give chase. But in a fight between my Labrador Recliner and a wild-but-suburban fox, I would actually give the fox the edge. Ergo, she's right - be careful.

A couple of months ago, I think I pooh-poohed Dr. R's statement that I would "notice a difference" in "about 4 months." It has been 4 months since my last chemo treatment and I do really now notice a difference. My fatigue seems almost back to normal, meaning as usual for a 60 year old not in great shape woman. But basically I feel good. I get so many compliments on my "haircut" - ha, no "cut" this - from so many quarters. And I do like having my hair so short. Still haven't used a comb or brush - not since November of last year! (To think a year ago I was considering getting my hair cut "short" (which ended up being about 3 times as long as it is now) and was all anxious about it. At any rate, now the only question for me is finding someone to cut it periodically to keep it short). The main lingering and annoying side effect of the chemo is the neuropathy in my feet - still feel like the balls and pads of toes on both feet are wearing cotton padding, half-numb, semi-swollen feeling, weird. Worse in the heat. For a while it seemed to be improving (affected more of each foot after the final chemo and gradually improved until only affecting the balls and toes--but it's stayed that way for a while).

Last week I finally was able to get together with a friend with whom I've wanted to have lunch for many many months. Now only to learn she has been recently diagnosed with breast cancer herself, has had surgery and now faces chemo and radiation, We talked and I hope sharing my experiences was helpful, but afterwards I realized even from 4 months out, I look at my journey through cancer diagnosis, surgery, chemo, radiation and more chemo - from hindsight already. After we had lunch I gave her the address for this blog. Later I read some of the early posts here again for the first time. I was struck by what now seemed like a bright red cord of fear/anxiety woven through the overall fabric of my emotions - humor, bravery (or a good imitation), compassion, and always that undercurrent But I made it through, in large part I know (and knew then, too, I hope) because of family and friends who were just outstanding. Anyway, don't they say that bravery isn't not being afraid, it's going on when you are afraid. Somehow I managed. I think my friend R will manage, too. She is strong. There are people who care about her, I among them.

You know, it's a lesson from cancer for life, I guess, we don't have to figure it all out now, face every fear, deal with every problem today. Today, just today. One step. If it's too much, slow down even more. Share with someone. If there's no one, write it down, get it out. Find a park. A pond. A heron.

Peace.

What I've Learned (So Far) From Cancer

2010-08-09T21:44:00.000-04:00

I started keeping this list of things I was learning from cancer months ago, during the first rounds of chemotherapy late last year. I added to the list as the months and treatments went by. One note: this is written as if I am addressing another person but in fact, this was and is addressed to me. Still, maybe family and friends may learn something from reading it - about me.

Peace.

1. Listen to your body. This is not a suggestion that you become a hypochondriac, but when your body talks to you, don’t stick your fingers in your ears and ignore it. That’s just stupid. it seems obvious that dealing with things sooner rather than later leads to happier results in the world of cancer. You probably think this means you have to be brave. Don’t go there. You don’t have to face everything today. Just listen to your body and take the first next step. There will be time to be scared later. Nevertheless, if/when you find yourself with your fingers in your ears, don’t beat yourself up. Just remove your fingers and try to take that first step. If your fingers seem permanently stuck in your ears, find someone who loves you to help pry them out. Take that person with you when you take that first hard step.

2. You are not alone. Despite your fears and insecurities and sometimes appearances to the contrary, you are not alone in your walk with and through cancer. Perhaps without knowing it, and certainly without requesting it, you have been given citizenship in the country of cancer. (When you receive a cancer diagnosis, ipso facto, you become a cancer survivor because now you are living with cancer.) If you are caring for someone with cancer, you were given a permanent resident’s visa – cancer’s green card. You already know people who have had cancer. Talk to them; they will be glad to talk to you. You will soon find out other people you know have also had cancer, you just didn’t know it. They will seek you out. You are not alone.

3. People can be kind. You may be surprised at the kindness of people who learn you are traveling with and through cancer. Your own friends may surprise you, family, too. Of course you know they care about you, even love you. But are you prepared for their compassion and loyalty? As you negotiate through the corridors of cancer, you may soon find kindness wherever you look – among the medical professionals who don’t treat you as their “job,” among the family members of other cancer patients you meet, among your colleagues and co-workers, even among strangers. You may even find yourself determined to become a kinder person yourself. If someone fails to be kind, they may be afraid. You might try out your new determination to become a kinder person yourself - by giving them the benefit of the doubt.

4. You need nature. Your oncology/radiation team will prescribe all kinds of protocols, treatments, medicines, vitamins, supplements and diet changes. They know what they are talking about. But you still need nature to heal you. As often as possible go to a place in which plants – trees, bushes, flowers, grass, even weeds -- and creatures -- birds, squirrels and other wild things -- are the citizens. Where rocks lay still and water stirs and runs. Listen to wind's song and stay as long as you can. Walk, but also be still. Open your ears and your eyes. Depending on the season, try to actually see the leaves changing color, the ice hardening on a pond’s surface, the flower buds opening, the grass springing up. Try to learn the rhythms of nature to carry with you back to the halls of cancer. It will help you there.

5. Cancer isn’t a competition. Cancer is hard, it’s stressful and it will test you. But it isn’t a contest and you won’t win points for heroism. There will be bad days, and really bad days in the country of cancer. You will feel sad and you will feel mad as hell. You are allowed to cry, to yell, to scream. You will feel sick and tired of being sick and tired. You need to find your own path through your dark hours; someone else’s candle may not light your way. When it is really hard, you may want to pull in, withdraw and close down for a while. Do it. Do it without apology or wasting the time it takes to put on a brave face. But listen to and know your own heart. Know when it becomes too hard for you, too much for you to handle. When it does, and likely it will at some point, reach out for help.

6. Don’t become your cancer. Just because you have cancer, you don’t have to become cancer. Whoever you were the day before - the moment before - you received your cancer diagnosis, you still are. If you were smart, funny, hardworking and passionate, you still are. If you had habits that annoyed other people before you had cancer, you have them still, and they are still annoying. Having cancer doesn’t turn you into a saint. It might help you become a better person, but only in the same way that having to face any adversity might do. And if, before you had cancer, you had dreams, those dreams still belong to you. Your name is on them, no one else’s. Claim your dreams. Live for them. Be your dreams, not your diagnosis.

7. Cancer offers more than one "What If". When your cancer treatment finishes, the first thing you are likely to think is, "What if my cancer comes back?" It's true; it might come back. But that's not the only "what if" you are offered. What if your cancer doesn't come back? What then? Of course, it would be better if we could all dispense with "What If?" entirely and live each day of our lives just in that day, in that moment, letting the future take care of itself. We all know this. Many of us strive for this with more or less success. But to ask What if? is human. Still, a year before your cancer diagnosis, did you lay awake at night, tossing, turning and wondering "What if I get cancer?" It's true, some do. But most do not - we are busy living, dealing with the myriad "what ifs" of daily life, when cancer arrives unannounced and most unwelcome. Now, when your cancer treatment is finally finished, what if your cancer goes back to where it came from and never returns? Could you handle that? Are you ready to keep on living?

Sunday morning

2010-08-01T07:33:00.012-04:00

Today is picture day. I've taken my little digital camera to the park a few times recently and taken photos. I'm going to try to upload a few here. Let's see if I can figure it out. To the left is a photo of the northerly portion of the larger side of the pond, looking south.

Next is a photo of the gaggle of Canada geese now calling the pond home.

The group includes the juveniles who are now almost as large as their parents.

To the right is the rock garden where I often sit on a bench and sometimes practice T'ai Chi (and where Jessie "hunts" for chipmunks who tunnel in the red clay and frolic in the crannies of the rock walls.)

Finally, Jessie and I saw the fox again today - actually I think we saw both foxes, out hunting in separate parts of the park. I think we happened on the second one when it was stalking Mallards grazing in the grass by the pond (I think there are a pair and they have hungry kits in a den somewhere, waiting to be fed.) Because we disturbed the Mallards, they jumped in the water and that caused the fox to turn tail and run. When it ran, I saw it and snapped its picture. I only had a second to take the photo, so it's blurry, the fox's eyes have that weird eye-glow thing that some times happens. But what makes me most sad is that the frame cut off the fox's tail, so you don't see its snow white tip. Well, now that I know the pair is there, I'll try to be better prepared next time.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2010-07-31T08:37:00.002-04:00

We saw the fox this morning twice, or possibly, 2 foxes. The second time we were far enough away that I couldn't say for sure whether it was the same fox we had seen earlier. He/she is rusty red with darker brown or black tips to some of his/her fur, and a white tip to his/her tail. The first time we saw him/her, he was crossing the road that winds around the eastern loop and dashing into the brush. I think he/she saw Jessie and me before we saw him/her. But we were fairly close. The second time was later, toward the end of our walk around that loop, after sitting in the rock garden a bit, and he/she was running next to the line of trees that edges the meadow in the middle of the eastern loop, back toward where he/she had disappeared in the brush earlier. That's why I think it might be another fox - perhaps the mate of the first fox we saw. Anyway, beautiful. The second time/fox we saw for some seconds as it ran down the edge of the meadow. Its stride is liquid, as if it is floating an inch or two above the ground rather than actually bounding forward, up and down on it. It's seems a bigger creature than I expected, but light, delicate. I expect it's the long, long tail that makes it seem "big".

A good morning walk, especially considering I'm engaged in a battle with what I hope is a cold (and not a flu) virus, urging my immune system to get up, get out and get going and do its job, crushing that virus and kicking it out. Meanwhile, cold medicine and orange juice and the couch.

These days mostly I post here for my own purposes, because I find that putting my meandering thoughts and feelings down here in black and white - about my journey past (god willing) cancer and life generally - is good for me, but for those who may still be checking in here from time to time, I want to share something my friend J reminded me of:

Sunday, August 1, is the eighth anniversary of the infamous memo by Bush “Justice” Department officials John Yoo and Jay Bybee condoning torture. J says he will be out in front of the Federal Building on Los Angeles Street in downtown L.A. with his “Torture is Un-American” sign. He suggests if people want to do something and don’t feel like fasting, we might want to call our Congressional representative and senators and say we want to see high government officials prosecuted for their role in approving torture. I agree with J that even if we can’t do anything, it's important to remember this noxious anniversary. At a time when our "Democratic" president appears to be expanding the right of government to wiretap and otherwise monitor private citizens' communications, this anniversary is relevant for all of us.

End of my rant.

Peace (if only).

Monday night

2010-07-26T20:38:00.002-04:00

A lovely last day to my 4-day birthday weekend. Jessie woke me at 5:15 and we were out the door by 5:30, and at the park shortly thereafter. It was a beautiful morning. Cool enough that I took a jean jacket and wore it on our walk. Later in the morning my friend L came over and we loaded my kayak on her car and drove down to the shore. We meandered through Stonington Village and found a funky little place to eat lunch, and then put in the boats at Barn Island. I'm used to going to Barn Island on the weekends, and in the summer the weekends are Power Boat City. There were quite a few cars and trailers parked, but it wasn't a zoo. We put in and paddled back over toward Stonington Harbor. Very stiff breeze, probably 15 - 20 knots, and the current against us on the way out. A few dicey moments, nothing truly dangerous, just challenging. On the way back we stopped at Sandy Point, pulled the boats out, and walked a bit. I didn't realize it is some sort of wildlife refuge. Sea gulls had nested there and were not happy to see us. We saw mother/father gull feeding 2 fishes to 3 juveniles. One very unhappy adolescent sea gull! One of the lucky youngsters was having trouble swallowing his/her fish and spit it out. Zoom, the other raced over toward the well used fishy dinner but the spitter saw him/her coming and re-swallowed the fish. Anyway, it was cool. I looked up the gulls when I got home and I think they were Great Black Back Gulls. Also saw many pink jellies, some cranes, cormorants, one pigeon (not sure what it was doing out on this spit of land in Little Naragansett Bay but didn't seem to be bothering the gulls).

The weather was perfect - mid to low 80's, breezy, low humidity. High fluffy clouds. Beautiful.

I tired - hard paddling against the wind and the current - but good tired. I think I can face a 4-day work week tomorrow.

Peace.

Monday morning

2010-07-26T07:57:00.005-04:00

David and I went kayaking Saturday night down on the shore. We put in around 7:30 p.m. at Mystic, paddled around the Seaport a little while and then headed out under the draw bridge. David suggested we turn and go out under the swinging railroad bridge (which is usually the way we come back). It was a quiet night - not a lot of boats (despite it being a really lovely late afternoon-early evening, hot but beautiful). The estuary was full of small beautiful smokey pink jellyfish. The full moon was just over the horizon as we left, and as we paddled out, rose higher and higher. When we came to the shore where the Osprey nest is placed, there were 2 juvenile ospreys in it (and another one in a tree nearby), calling out in the fading light. We kept paddling, going up a little waterway toward what looked like a dead end, but proved to have an opening so we circled a little island and came out going west back toward Mason's Island. By then it was really dark, moon about 45 degrees above us in the south east, sun fully set in the west, the water smooth and still and dark, like ink. A few boats coming in toward shore, but not many. We came in toward Ender's Island (where I had my weekend "retreat") and could hear a big party at the Mason Island Yacht Club. Odd to hear the "cocktail chatter" from the dark still water. We passed under the bridge that joins Mason and Ender's Islands, and then had the long paddle back around Mason's Island back to the harbor. We passed through really shallow water where the small silver fish were swarming. Our paddling stirred them up and some leaped out of the water, but none landed in my boat. We were quite late getting back. Just as we passed under the Mystic draw bridge, a party of drunken kayakers sitting dangerously in the channel there broke up and raced back to the launch area, passing us. So we had to wait while they hauled 8-10 kayaks out of the water. By the time we had put our boats on the car and gotten on the road, it was midnight. An hour and a little more to get home. The latest I've been up in a long time.

That made Jessie and I late to arrive at the park yesterday - 6:30. Hot hot hot and humid. A quiet walk.

What a difference a day makes. The cold front came through and today the humidity is gone. I think the dew point temperature dropped 20 degrees or more. This morning we got to the park about 5:40, sun barely over the horizon, cool to the point of suggesting fall. I wore a jacket. We didn't see the heron or the muskrat. The Canada geese were lined up on the shore of the large side of the pond. The Mallards spread around. The coolness made it a lovely walk; the air itself felt different and seemed clearer, so that the sky, the trees, everything seemed clearer and crisper. The hard thing to do is to appreciate a morning like this for itself, and not to become invested in it, thinking, ah the dog days of summer have passed on. They haven't. We're supposed to be back in the 90's with humidity mid-week. But for today - the final day of my 4-day weekend - it is beautiful. My friend L and I are going kayaking down on the shore. It should be lovely.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2010-07-24T07:21:00.002-04:00

Thanks to each of you who sent birthday cards, greetings, presents, etc. I had a lovely quiet low-key birthday. Perfect.

Today is supposed to be 96 or 98 degrees and humid, so when I awoke at 5:15 a.m., I dragged myself out of bed and Jessie and I went to the park. We were rewarded by being the first non-local creatures out and about. Already I could feel the humidity building. The pond and the grassy meadow were foggy. It's beautiful to see. Again the Canada geese were missing; didn't see them in the field north of the pond. A few were on the shore of the pond, but not the entire group I've come to know. I bet they'll be back. The Mallards seemed subdued; my guess is due to the rising humidity. We walked both loops and came back and were passing the bigger part of the pond when I realized the heron was back perched on the float in the big side of the pond where I used to see her so often last fall. I now know that "float" is related to a source of water that gets turned on - not sure if a person does it, or it is set on a timer - periodically, either to add water to the pond or at least to aerate the water that's there, stir it up so to speak. (At this point I think it probably has so much Canada goose and Mallard poo in it, you could - although you would probably choose to die before doing so - walk on it). It was lovely to see the heron.

Then a few yards further on I realized there was a creature in the grass about 20 feet in front of us and about 10 feet from the pond itself. It was the muskrat! Out on the shore, taking advantage I guess of the early human-less (almost) hour to dry out and eat a few tender blades of grass and dig a few juicy insects (what do muskrats eat? I'll have to look into it). Anyway, he/she made a beeline for the water, which caught Jessie's eye, and she strained to chase the little critter. But splash! The muskrat was able to dive back in the pond. I thought he/she would swim away, but while Jessie sniffed the air and smelled the ground, I saw the muskrat swim back to the shore right near where we stood. I wondered if he/she was waiting and hoping to be able to come back out on dry land again. We left to give him/her the opportunity. It was fun to see the WHOLE body of the little creature out on land and only a few feet away from us.

I'm so looking forward to having Monday off, too. It somehow makes today feel more relaxing to know that it will be following by 2 more non-working days. If the weather cooperates, David and I may go kayaking tonight in the full moon's light, probably down at the shoreline. Should be wonderful. Once before when we went moonlight paddling there, at a certain point as we paddled out the Mystic River estuary into and through the harbor where the river meets the sound, schools of small fish (alewives?) were stirred up by every stroke of our paddles, leaping and jumping out of the gleaming water, shining all silvery in the moonlight. Some jumped into my kayak. One died there, when it slipped below my seat and I couldn't get it out (until we returned to shore). That was an autumn full moon paddle; wonder what a mid-summer full moon paddle will bring?

Peace.

Friday morning

2010-07-23T08:10:00.005-04:00

Good morning. Happy birthday to me. A nice day so far - up early, to the park with Jessie. A good walk. I noticed as we passed the pond the first time that the Canada geese were gone. I thought maybe the adults' new year's wing feathers had finally come in and the juveniles were able to fly, and they were off to more northerly (and less HOT) climes. Did seem to be a little early. However, later as we completed the eastern loop and came back toward the pond, I heard the unmistakable call of Canada geese. Turns out the flock was grazing in the grassy field north of the pond. A lot of bird calls this morning, perhaps because it was a bit less humid and cooler. I did my T'ai Chi form in the rock garden, while Jessie dozed. We also walked the western loop and then came back to the pond to sit on a bench. Quiet (of course, with the hum of automobiles in the background where they speed down the city street that is the north border of the park). Again Jessie snoozed in the grass at my feet (did I get her up too early this morning? or was she just relaxing?) I was sitting quietly on the bench when the muskrat swam by. This time, not just his/her little head above the water, but the whole body visible, just dog paddling along quietly. Jessie didn't notice him/her, which is good. Then across the pond where the gaggle of geese was grazing, a couple of Canada geese appeared to get into a dispute and one fell in the pond with a big splash. A quiet lovely morning in the park.

I saw Dr. R yesterday for my first 3-month checkup. Everything fine. It was an incredibly busy morning at the Cancer Center. Are more people getting cancer? Or more people with cancer choosing this hospital? Or just one particularly busy day? Standing room only in the waiting rooms. (Reminded me of when I went for chemo #3, I think, around Christmas time (actually, I recall - December 23 it was). There literally were people waiting in line for their chemo, but that was because they had double booked so that the hospital staff could have Christmas day or maybe Christmas day and Christmas eve off of work). I asked Nurse E about my blood counts - had forgotten to ask Dr. R -- and she said they were all fine, white cell count slightly low, but normal, and hemoglobin better than hers. Next appointment is with Dr. M on August 31. I have a CT scan scheduled for end of October - just over 1 year after the original surgery - and then an appointment with Dr R to review the results. That will be a little anxiety-provoking.

I am looking forward to my 4-day weekend. I need to make real plans for taking more time off, decide for sure about a class at the boat school in Maine (they are having a special - 30% off - on some seamanship classes, including a class called Craft of Sail for women only. That is another possibility. I hope to decide in the next few days.)

I'm feeling good. Apart from general anxiety about the state of the world, about my cousin C';s recovery, my aunt M's arthritis, my children's and their spouses' livelihoods and general happiness, my grandson's future, the state of health care in the US, poverty, AIDS, racism,.... okay, I'm obsessive. But basically I am happy and wish everyone in the world had the opportunity to feel good, live in peace, health and well being.

Peace.

Sunday afternoon

2010-07-18T16:23:00.002-04:00

Jessie and I made it to the park this morning by 5:45. I was motivated to get up early today and get there because I overslept yesterday and we didn't arrive at the park until 7:00 a.m. What a difference! It's as if there are actually 3 or even 4 different parks. Night time - which I haven't visited (the park is actually "closed" from sunset to sunrise), dawn (depending on the season, 4:30 to 5:00 until about 6:00 a.m.), morning (7:00 - 9:00 or so) and daytime (everything else). The creatures who live in the park adjust their lifestyles to the visitors who come during those periods. During the daytime, you would see Mallards and Canada geese, squirrels. Robins. House sparrows. Maybe a chipmunk. A hawk flying overhead. Even during the morning, you don't see much more, maybe because it is the favored time of exercisers - runners, people 'walking' dogs (including those that ignore the leash law and let their dogs run--not a particularly creature-friendly activity), bicyclers, old people (yes, even older than I) out for their morning constitutionals. I guess so much activity, which increases from 7:00 to 9:00 or so, dampens the creatures' enthusiasm for hanging out. I used to be a morning person. Now I'm a dawn person. There are a few others, but not many. This morning Jessie and I were the first.

Still, today there weren't a lot of creatures out and about even so early. A very large gaggle of Canada geese, all the adults and all the juveniles, who are 80% as large as their parents. I learned that Canada geese mate for life; when one of the pair dies, the other "mourns" and even has been reported to itself die of no discernible cause. The long rows of swimming geese that I remarked on in this blog before- adult at front, juveniles in a row, adult at back - is exactly how they do it, one of my books confirmed. Father in the front, offspring, mother bringing up the rear. Apparently they are not great nest builders, usually build in the grasses at the pond/water edge.. Occasionally build nests in trees and then have to (literally) push the juveniles out of the nest, hopefully into the water below.

At home my feeder has become a money pit as the birds in the area have learned of it and shared the news and it is now being emptied at least once and sometimes twice a day. I've seen house sparrows (feisty little suckers), male cardinal, house finch (beautiful red feathers), cat bird, mourning doves, white breasted nuthatch, crows. But the regulars are the house sparrows and spit and fuss with one another over who gets what perch.

My cousin C was in a car wreck; another drive ran a redlight or stopsign and t-boned her. She was taken by ambulance to the hospital. She broke her pelvis in a couple places, a couple ribs, nicked her spleen and broke her wrist. At first they thought it was pretty bad, but she fooled them - stubborn old broad (those are MY family's genes!!!), and she's doing okay. She was in the hospital a couple days and now is in rehab for 10-14 days. Those who are inclined to include her in thoughts and prayers, it would be appreciated. My own thought/prayer is to be thankful that it was not much worse, she is going to be okay.

You never know, do you, walking through your life not paying attention (sitting in your car as you have the right of way and drive through an intersection), and wham! Everything changes!

I see Dr. R for my first 3 month check-up on Wednesday. I feel a background noise of anxiety, nothing terrible, nothing even in my consciousness most of the time, but there in the background like emotional white noise. Not sure what I am worried about. I just have a blood test and talk to her. Clearly I am doing well. I guess it is a milestone and I look forward to putting it behind me.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to sign up for another class at the Wooden Boat School - this time Lofting. It's the last week in August. It will be a present to myself - a vacation doing something interesting in a beautiful place. Looking at everything so differently than in July 2009 when I was there last . How the world changes.

Love.
Peace.

Tuesday morning

2010-07-06T07:43:00.003-04:00

Four days in a row at the park. 3 of the 4 Jessie and I took long walks and we stopped in the rock garden where Jessie sat in the shade of the stone wall and hoped for a careless chipmunk to pass by, while I practiced T'ai Chi. It really is a perfect place to do T'ai Chi and I owe a debt to the man I used to see practicing T'ai Chi in this same spot some time ago, which is what gave me the idea to do so. That was before my cancer diagnosis, when I used to bring Jessie to the park on weekend mornings, but later - in fact what I thought at the time was "early" but now seems so late, around 8:00 or 8:30 a.m. This morning (and yesterday to some extent) there were quite a few more people there, some already as we arrived, and others arriving while we were there. That suggests to me that people make coming to the park at around 6:00 a.m. on weekdays a regular thing, but they like to sleep in on weekends. Better for me. My goal is to get up and get to the park by 4:30 a.m., or whatever time the sun is actually really coming up. Even 5:45 is too late at this time of year. The sun is well over the horizon. Of course, we're now into the shortening days period - hard to believe. Certainly the 6 months that the days lengthen seem to take a long time, while the 6 months that the days shorten seem to fly by.

It's supposed to reach 100 degrees today. The third day, I think, that temperatures will have exceeded 90 degrees, so we are officially in a heat wave. And it won't be over today, either. 90+ weather for the rest of the week, too. I am taking today off of work, which is sort of a drag, since it is too hot to want to do anything except find air conditioning and plant oneself.

Already as we arrived at the park this morning, I could feel the heat beneath the day's surface, waiting to jump out. At first we didn't see the Canada geese, and I thought perhaps they had finished their molting, taught the juveniles enough to prepare them for the journey north (to more comfortable temperatures), and had left for their namesake country. But when we completed the east loop, they were there, at the pond with the Mallards. Their plumage does look fresh, and they sat on the bank of the pond with long black necks stretched out. Meanwhile, the Mallards - especially the grey-brown females - looked melted into the dusty shore. And at 6:00 a.m., it was only 70 degrees. Even the surface of the pond looked dusty, stagnant, hot. Makes me want to .... go bowling. When my kids were young and we lived in NYC and had no air conditioner (unlike our spoiled existence now with 1 window air conditioner that cools my 12 x 15 foot living room, barely), when it became unbearably hot I would take the kids to the movies or bowling. I always associate bowling with hot hot days.

I try to imagine the people and the creatures of the Gulf Coast, where this weather is the norm rather than the exception, and now the smell of oil and tar permeates the air. Yesterday I heard 30 seconds of a radio "news" story talking about the fact that it costs about $50,000 to "clean" a bird and some small % of the birds cleaned survive even a year. Sometimes I am ashamed to be a human being. Some time ago I heard about a book called "The World Without Us" and I read about half of it. I need to go back and finish it. It is about how the earth could restore itself if human beings were just to disappear. I don't know the ideology of the author, or his "point," but sometimes I turn back to my memories of that book as a solace when my heart hurts for the planet we treat with such indifference. And that's not even to consider how we treat one another. We should be ashamed of ourselves. I think to myself if I live long enough that my grandson grows into a young man, and he came to me and said, "Abuela, how could you let this happen to the earth? To its creatures? To its plants and grasses and trees? To the fishes and the wide blue ocean? What did YOU do, Abuela, to stop this?" what will be my answer?

Peace.

Saturday morning - You're at the Right Blog!

2010-07-03T07:59:00.005-04:00

No - you didn't land on the wrong blog by mistake! It's still me, Laurence Anne, and INDY - I'm (still) not dead yet.

But I have decided to mark completion of my cancer treatment and being NED (no evidence of disease) - to change the name of this blog but to keep using it to write as and whenever.

I know I'll keep on writing about Jessie and my visits to the park, and probably other non-cancer things, too. I understand that family and friends who began reading this blog when my recovery was still in the future and the burdens of chemo and radiation lay before me or were weighing on me directly, I understand you won't feel the same urgency in continuing to read what I write here now. That is fine. Please know I am so appreciative of your interest and support for me over the past 9 months. And I AM doing well. I AM getting stronger, less fatigued, day by day, week by week.

Of course, you are welcome to keep visiting this blog and reading what I write here. And from time to time, I will certainly keep writing about my citizenship in the country of cancer survivorship - I have a 3-month "checkup" coming in 2-1/2 weeks. The first one since finishing up, and even though I feel wimpy admitting it, I do feel stirring in me, that cold finger of fear as it waves its threat across my bowels. "What if.... What if..." it whispers. "What if everything turns out fine," I answer.

A cool bright sunny morning in the park for Jessie and me today: A bright red flash just above us where a male cardinal dove into the leaves of a tree in the rock garden where we stopped for a bit. I did my T'ai Chi form while Jessie patiently sat in the morning sun, blinking (imagining chipmunks within the reach of her jaws, perhaps?) A bunny hopped onto a dirt path where its brown body blended so well that Jessie missed it. We didn't see the heron, but I think she's on the larger island in the middle of the pond. Many juvenile Canada Geese and Mallards grazing in the dewy grass across the park. It was a cool but bright sunny summer morning - basically perfect. A good beginning to my 4-day holiday weekend (I'm taking off an extra day).

Peace.

p.s. Please check out the link that I added to this blog. It will take you to "Creamy and Crunchy: An Informal History of Peanut Butter, the All-American Food," an up-coming book by my friend, Jon Krampner. Who knew peanut butter may have anti-cancer properties? Mmmm.

Sunday afternoon

2010-06-27T17:13:00.003-04:00

We made it to the park earlier today - 5:30 am - and perhaps that's why, but it was a good wildlife day there. First, we found the heron, in the grass near the larger part of the pond. I sat and just watched her for a while. She was hunkered down, neck pulled in so far I wasn't sure it was her. Then she extended her neck and her head; suddenly she was 3-1/2 or 4 feet tall! And then she flew. She glided across the pond to the small island in the middle of it. Perhaps that's where she's been staying.

We also saw many MANY Canada geese, as all the baby goslings are growing up now and almost as big as their parents. They swim in very straight lines behind one or another parent (the other parent, I think, bringing up the rear), reminding me of the children's book Eloise, where all the little girls walked in a line behind the nuns. Interestingly, the geese were grazing in the grass when we arrived, and 2 adults were clearly posted as sentries, keeping watch, and then herding the youngsters into the water. I learned from a book I read in the past week or so that at the same time that Canada geese nest and raise their young, they also molt, so not only the baby geese can't fly yet, their parents are ground-bound as well.

We also saw a bunny - which appeared to be on the left side of the bell curve in bunny intelligence since it saw Jessie and froze and if I'd let her go, she would have caught it. I also saw the muskrat again, watched him or her swimming in the pond going one direction and passing within a foot or so of two Mallards swimming the other direction. Yesterday morning I think I saw the fox again - or maybe a different one - just a flash in the park, dashing into some brush.

Well, June is almost over - it has been a wonderful doctor-free month for me. My hair is almost 1/2 inch long now - almost! - and I think grayer than before (but is that surprising?). I turn 60 next month, and one thing cancer did for me was make me look forward to every birthday. After I see the doctor next month, I'm going to make some decision about this blog. I have a feeling I'm going to keep on writing, because although it wasn't the motivation for this blog (which was to keep family and friends updated about the cancer diagnosis and treatments), writing here has come to be helpful to me in some other way. I thought about starting another blog, just to keep writing on non-cancer specific topics, especially about my wanderings and wonderings in and about nature, and that's still a possibility. But so is just keeping on keeping on here. I guess I'll figure it out.

One of the gas stations in our neighborhood that was Luk Oil is now BP. I wonder if they're doing any business. Not mine.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2010-06-19T09:43:00.004-04:00

I think, just possibly, I have reached the first corner and begun, just begun, to edge my way around it - in terms of seeing a difference in my fatigue level. Yes, I still get tired, really flat out tired. But I also get up every day before 6:00 a.m., usually around 5:30. And I work 9-10 or more hours 5 days a week. So I try to be kind to myself and say that schedule would be tiring to anyone, let alone an almost-60 year old. My hair is growing, too. It is so liberating not to wear a hat indoors (mostly I still wear a baseball cap outdoors, either because I get cold or because I"m worrying about sunburn).

Jessie woke me up at 5:00 am this morning I refused to get up then and begged for more sleep. I did get up by 5:30 and we were at the park before 6:00 am. It's a beautiful morning and supposed to be a hot day - first in a while - and the park was already "full" of people (by my standards, meaning there were 4 or 5 cars there, a couple of joggers, a few photographers - the Rose Garden has reached and is peaking in its full glory, drawing photographers like honey bees).

We had a nice walk. We began at the pond searching for the heron - optimistically since H said she had seen her/him. But no luck. We did see a gaggle of Canada geese - several pairs of parents with offspring. The gosling Canada geese are almost as big as the adult Mallards. The pond was almost crowded.

The highlight of the walk was a downy woodpecker who landed on a branch of a pine tree about 4 feet from us and sat there for some time. So beautiful. Then he/she flew up into the branches of the pine. I could still see him/her, but not so clearly. Really beautiful.

We stopped in the Rock Garden and I went through my T'ai Chi form. Two chipmunks chased each other down the rock wall (good thing Jessie didn't see them--they are her particular weakness). Jessie sat and blinked in the sunshine. A pair of women photographers strolled through the Perennial Garden above us, murmuring.

The park is just bursting out in summer dress and song. I think today is some sort of ceremony marking the peak of the Rose Garden, not sure.

A good morning.

Peace, peace ... an oil free peace to all living things and the world we live in.

Monday

2010-06-14T11:46:00.002-04:00

H called me last night to say that one day in the prior week, she couldn't remember which one, she was walking in the park at around 6:30 in the morning and she saw "my" heron. The heron was standing on the small pond side of the bridge that goes over the neck of the two parts of the pond, still as a statue. H walked down to the shore to get a closer look and got very close indeed to the heron, who didn't seem at all disturbed by H approaching so near.

Thanks to H, I feel better and will start looking for the heron on and even under the bridge.

Ironically I think I may have seen the heron in flight yesterday afternoon myself, while walking Jessie in my own neighborhood. I saw a lone bird in flight approaching from the northwest, and it seemed big, but not a hawk because of its odd shape and light color. Maybe a seagull, I thought, wondering what a seagull would be doing in our neck of the woods (50 miles from the shore). Then as the bird passed overhead, I realized it was either a great blue heron or possibly a crane, but I think a heron, in fact, I think "my" heron on her way back to the park and our pond. Neck pulled in, long legs drawn out behind. Beautiful. Made my night.

Peace.

Saturday morning

2010-06-12T10:06:00.002-04:00

Jessie and I made it to the park this morning, but we were late. I woke up about 5:40 and we didn't arrive at the park until 6:00 am. It's amazing what a difference 45 minutes or an hour makes, in terms of other what's happening there among the creatures (including the fact that by 6 am there are other human beings and usually dogs). I haven't seen the heron in weeks. I believe she just stopped by on her way further north, and I'll likely see her later, in the fall. The crop of ducklings are growing so fast. On the shore by a bench, I found a slew of downy feathers; someone apparently grew into their real ones.

I've been thinking often lately about how easily "deeper" thoughts, feelings, slip away. Getting a cancer diagnosis is like a child being told by a parent on a visit to an amusement park, "Okay, we're leaving in an hour - what do you want to do for that hour?" You suddenly become aware that your time is limited, precious; you're not just aware of months, of weeks, of days, but even of hours and minutes. You're AWARE, that's the point. You don't take things for granted. You pay attention. Sometimes you pay attention because it is so hard and difficult, painful, and you just want to get through that moment, that hour, that day to a better one where you don't feel sick or hurt with pain. But that's not all of it. In the waves of treatment you go through, there are ups and downs, and even in the ups, you pay attention. You are aware that you are having a good day, that a good day is a precious thing to be grateful, to take advantage of, to live the fullest you are capable of.

And then treatment concludes, and concludes postively, you are told you are "doing very well," that you had "a great scan" and you begin to go back to day to day life. In the beginning, the normalcy of it is frightening. What do you mean, "normal" life? you think, I have cancer - how can anything ever be "normal" again? But it can. It is. It becomes so. And soon you are taken step by step back to normalcy. Still there are lingering signposts of your journey - the shortest haircut anyone can imagine, for example, and your continuing fatigue, and of course, that weird numbness still troubling your feet. But on the whole, a day now - compared to a day during treatment - it's back to normal. And you find yourself not paying attention. Walking in nature without being aware, truly aware. And you think, how does that sweet precious awareness slip away so soon? How can I find it, keep it? Do I have to be suffering, going through chemo or radiation, fearing death as a near neighbor to stay present in my life?

I hope not. Perhaps awareness of losing awareness is a first step.

Peace.

Sunday morning

2010-06-06T08:40:00.002-04:00

The Koman Race for the Cure for 2010 is history. It was a good and moving experience for me. The day started rainy and turned steamy and incredibly humid. I met my friends and, as it turned out, because one of them had a bad ankle (he'd had surgery on it last year and it still isn't right), we ended up walking in the 1.5K rather than 4K walk. Which was fine. It was interesting to participate as a "survivor" of BREAST cancer - and I do now think of my 2003 surgery as having been to address breast cancer - while having just experienced 6 months of dealing with uterine cancer. I did have some sense of silo-ism in the "cancer community" - each type of cancer in its own silo, caring about its own treatments, cures, etc. I understand that breast cancer is a huge problem and deserves its research, treatments and cures - but I would like to see communications and partnerships with ALL people dealing with any types of cancer. (I think I posted before about my 2003 experience, but here it is again: a routine mammogram found microcalcifications, which are highly associated with an aggressive type of breast cancer; I was sent for a biopsy; the biopsy said I had "pre-cancerous" cells; I was sent for surgery, not a mastectomy, but to remove more tissue around the biopsy site) and that was that; my surgeon felt no further treatment - radiation or chemo - was called for. I did have mammograms every 6 months for 18 months, then back to yearly. Fast forward to 2009 - my medical oncologist, Dr R, tells me that there isn't any such thing as "pre-cancer," and that what I had is now viewed as a specific type of cancer itself, a type which does often come back; she was surprised I wasn't being "followed" - although I do get regular mammograms. So, apparently I had breast cancer in 2003, and uterine cancer in 2009. Good news - unrelated, meaning the uterine cancer was not metastasized breast cancer.)

Because of the rain yesterday morning, Jessie and I didn't make it to the park. We went this morning, but again it was humid and uncomfortable, even at 5:50 in the morning. The whole park seemed subdued; the trees almost wilting on their trunks, the Mallards grazing in the overgrown grasses (it looks like the park's landscaping budget must have been cutback; they seem to be letting lawns get wildly out of hand, is actually fine with me), a gaggle of Canada geese sitting in a straight line on the shore of the pond, gazing at it in what looked like humidity-induced stupor. But perhaps all of those impressions were - what do they call it - displacement? My own feelings displaced onto the park's plants and creatures.

I know I still need to write about my experience with my private "retreat" last weekend, but today my thoughts are overwhelmingly in the Gulf. (As I've said to David more than once, I think that at some point in the future, not sure how long, hopefully sooner rather than later, we (meaning humanity) are going to look back at this particular oil spill and the ecological and social disasters it wreaked and it is going to prove to be a turning point, a point where history, reaching back, will say some day 'That's when things began to change.' I hope so; to the extent I believe is something bigger than the world, the universe, I pray so.) I'm posting a link to an article I just read and then I'm "cutting and posting" remarks of Rachel Maddow that are quoted at length in the article, but which I want to see here in my blog, word-for-word. To repeat what the article's author said about it, "Please read it."

Peace. Peace especially to all living things in the Gulf, and to the souls of those that have passed on.

The link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-durang/i-want-my-earth-back_b_600859.html

Rachel Maddow:

...The oil now coating wildlife and the beaches of this beautiful coast stinks. It stinks, it smells bad, it is filthy, it is slimy, it is sticky, it is toxic - even if Mississippi governor Haley Barbour wants to say that it's not... it is irredeemably foul, and it is everywhere.

And when you come upon it in person having only seen it on televsion, at least if you're me, you are overwhelmed by the post-apocalyptic sensory experience of a man-made disaster irretrievably destroying part of our country.

You are disgusted that BP put this ocean and this coast and the communities inland in jeopardy. Disgusted at the billions of dollars in quarterly profits that lined the oil industry's pockets and deepened their wells, and didn't do a thing to prevent this.

You are disgusted that the government let BP and the rest of the oil industry do that. Disgusted that American leaders screamed "drill, baby, drill!" without considering the consequences, all in the name of whoring themselves for a few votes during the few months that gasoline prices were rising.

Disgusted that the booms off this coast meant to protect it mostly aren't doing anything. Disgusted that those booms remain largely unmanned. Disgusted that there isn't much more to do, except maybe put more people here to try to make this totally inadequate technology try to work less horribly than it does.

This is not Hurricane Katrina. This isn't another Katrina, This isn't another anything. This is a whole new thing, happening to us. This is America's Deepwater Horizon disaster, we all own it forever.

And right now, right here in Grand Isle and all along the Gulf Coast, there are really only 3 things that matter: stopping the oil from flowing, protecting the coast and the ocean from the millions of gallons of oil that are already spilled, and making sure that this never, ever happens again.

You can diagnose whether we have a functioning media in this country by whether or not the country understands that this is a vile environmental mega-disaster. You can diagnose whether we have a functioning political system in this country by whether or not the results of this mega-disaster is change.

Big oil has been too rich to care about what it was putting us all at risk for. And we've been too cowardly to change direction and break free from them. If that changes because of our national disgust at this disaster, then America's political system in 2010 works. If it doesn't change, then it doesn't work.