A hearty congratulations on your wedding
May your wildest dreams be fulfilled
May you flourish emotionally
May you grow intellectually
May the flowers bloom in the garden of your love
May the angels sing sweet music in your heart
May the powers of the universe shower you with love and kindness
Ya Baha’ul’Abha
God Bless.
I found myself being really short tempered for a couple of weeks. It seemed to pass once the Neulasta kicked in. Maybe there was a connection?
The effects of life on the brain and emotions is staggering. I am not sure if those are the right expressions, but it seems you sometimes have little control for what goes on in your head and how it manifests itself. Everyone around you is really careful not to say anything that might upset me. Yet, there it is, the short temper coming out when the phone rings and people say stupid things to you.
One of my pet peeves is the security questions that people like Hydro ask you. What is your name? And now for security reason, we have to verify some information. Your address, postal code and phone number. All three pieces of information are public. Open the phone book. All there. Hardly security questions. I found myself getting more upset than usual at these inane questions. Also at sales people calling from Florida trying to sell me new doors and windows. Insane.
The honeymoon is over. This is a bit like a marriage. At some point you wake in the morning and realise a new normal has set in. Like it or not, this is your new life. Adjust. Get on with it.
I am not in any way, shape, or form, minimizing my plight and the chronic condition I am in. The past two weeks have really brought home the fact that it this is the future. We have to get on with our lives. This means that Janet has to get out more often. People have to be a bit less careful around me. I have to get accustomed to going for naps in the afternoon. I went for a drive this morning to buy bread and stuff for the house. Drove Leslie to her dinner party in the evening. I can do these things, and come home in one piece.
I am not being rushed to hospital for anything. I am as healthy as a cancer patient can be. My immune system appears to be very strong in spite of the cancer. No, it is not easy, but this is the new life. A combination of hospital visits to see Doctors, or get treatments. Then a week of good strong health.
The mother of one of Leslie’s friends died the other day. The mother of one of Janet’s cousins died the other day as well. Somehow, these episodes appeared more dire to me than what I am going through. Seems strange to say this, but all of a sudden, I thought, how terrible. My life went into the background. Theirs seemed so much more important.
I am making plans. Thinking of the future. It’s all good. Not that much energy to carry things out, and a bit scared about that. How can you start a project and do it only every two weeks? But there are options, and most of them can be done online.
Option 1. Become a WordPress expert of some sort. Create themes and plugins that I can sell to others. Maybe set up blog s for people. Others are doing it, and I can to. Certainly fits in nicely with my background. I just need to gain some expertise in WordPress. There are lots of books out there. Also need to become better at markting the blogs. But all that comes with practive and a lot of reading.
Options 2. Become a therapist of sorts to help others with chronic conditions. Take some online courses.
Option 3. A lot of people are pushing me into the art world. Daryl just bought me a wonderful water colour paint set, including paints, brushes, and paper. Included in the package is a free course from her sister who is a painter of some repute. I could become a painter, and incorporate my pictures, and maybe even some calligraphy. The possibilities are endless.
Al I need now is the courage of my convictions to do something. I cannot carry on like this for very much longer. The healthier I get, the more urgent is the need to do something, anything. Word Searches can only help so far.
One more thing, I have not shaved my head yet. It is thinning out, but there is still so much of it, that most people cannot tell I am losing it. For now, the hair stays.
Our friends came over for dinner last Friday night. We brought in food from Riz, always wonderful and tasty. Unfortunately, Daryl who organised the evening came down with stomach flue and could not come. We had a great time. I monopolised Judith all night which was wonderful.
My back had started hurting in the afternoon. This is listed as a possible side effect of getting Neulasta. The pain was not so bad. I went to bed around 9, and the pain was getting worse. I took a couple of Tylenol 1s, just so I could get to sleep. Woke up every four hours to take more Tylenols. The process lasted about 30 hours. This was the most painful back pains and the strangest experience I have gone through.
At the risk of offending some of you, it felt like someone had put firecrackers up my ass. Once lit, my hips would start this uncontrollable surge rising off the chair in spasms. Janet could not stop laughing when she saw it happen. It takes about an hour for the Tylenols to kick in. In the meantime, the lower back pain had started to spread up toward the middle back. This was a bone pain as opposed to a muscle pain. Heating pads did not work. But the Tylenols did.
I woke up on Sunday morning at 4Am, about an hour late for my Tylenols. No pain. I got up and went downstairs, ate something and just reveled in a pain free life. Janet and I discussed this a bit further in the morning and wondered whether this was the Neulasta finally kicking in. I spent Sunday full of energy but tired from teh previous day. Monday confirmed that the Neulasta was finally working. Only took a week.
I spent Monday and Tuesday just doing things. I had energy. I went shopping. I did not nap in the afternoons, except for about 30 minutes around 5PM. Lasted longer in the evenings. Good times.
Wednesday started in such exciting fashion. Blood work followed by the last Art Therapy Session, which I have already covered. I went for Christmas lunch at David’s office. Did not last very long, but it was good to see everyone. Went home after for a well deserved rest.
Thursday was chemo day. I was a bit apprehensive hoping for an increased white blood cell count. I was confident that it had gone up based on my energy level. Sure enough, the count jumped from 0.9 to 8.4. We arrived at the Chemo Daycare at 8:30, and had to wait till 9:30 to be taken in. Left there all done around 12:20. I am handling the chemo a lot better than previous sessions. Next chemo is set for December 30.
In the meantime I have a tooth that has to be removed surgically. I am seeing the dental surgeon on Tuesday. They will have to decide whether the operation is possible or not, or whether there will be too much bleeding. Avastin makes bleeding a dangerous option.
Chemo tires you out. There is no other word for it. Stayed home all day Friday. Thinking of going out tomorrow afternoon.
Janet is off work till January. We might go to a matinee one day. Looking forward to that. And oh yes, we need a new vacuum cleaner. Our old one is now about 25 years old, hated and despised by all. I asked the salesman what makes a good vacuum cleaner. His answer was suction. So I bought this thing that has had amazing suction. But all good things come to an end.
Life is so exciting, no?
Date: 2007
Location: Soho District, New York City
Graffiti appears in all places and is usually a sign of neglect and dereliction. The area was not derelict, or neglected. The building to either side are newly renovated. I took several shots of this building, setting up a tripod to make sure there was no hand jitter. After the third shot, this couple showed up, the guy basically ordering the girl to sit in the frame so he could take her picture. A very strange situation.
Stuff like this happens all the time. People either do not understand why you are taking a picture, or want to get in on the act. I was pondering a picture when we were traveling in Barcelona. I set up the camera and was deciding whether to take the picture or not. Deciding finally that I could not do justice to the subject with the camera I was using. This was an old film camera. The kind of thing that makes you look more professional than you actually are. I heard this woman behind me suddenly cry out that she wanted to take a picture of the building as well because I was. Too funny.
The final session.
4 people showed up.
We had to do 2 paintings.
The first:
Love
Paint what your holding on to. The first step was to write down what I felt I am holding on to. Not as easy as I thought it would be. Do you just think of the positive things, the negative things. Are you actually holding on to the negative things, or trying to get rid of them? I made a list, deciding that your are hopefully getting rid of the negatives, holding on to the positives.
Love, Relationships, Faith.
Now what? The final answer. The painting above. The relationship as evidenced by nature living together. The nourishing sun, the mighty tree strong of trunk, providing shade for the grass and the flowers that thrive in its shadow. A central strength protecting the more frail. Someone asked about the flowers on the right being different from the ones on the left. I got tired of painting individual blotches and took a wild fancy tot he easy way out. Nothing symbolic there. What about the open space on either side of the trunk. Unless you are talking about a willow tree, there is always white space on either side of a tree trunk. Nothing symbolic there either. The moderator loved this and saw all sorts of deep meanings in it. That felt kind of good.
The second:
Amulet of Light
We were asked to paint one last time and give the painting as a gift to the person on our right. This was the gift given me.
This represents one of those things that heroes in movies hurl at the enemy in the hopes of witnessing total annihilation. It is very pretty and quite cool.
This one was easy for me. I painted a big blue canvas with a green ribbon around it, and a touch of red on the ribbon. This went to my friend of the anxiety attacks. As I said, too easy.
We had a pot luck of sorts. Difficult to have a pot luck between the hours of 10 and 12. One person brought a salad. The rest of us brought sweets, shortbread cookies, brownies, lemon tarts, and my Iranian nuts and Baghlava.
Nothing deep was discussed. It was a light morning.
One person drew a bunch of boxes in various colours representing the pack rat that she is collecting all sorts of stuff. She is gradually learning to let go of things. Cleaning the basement. Throwing things out. What an effort that is.
Another painted a bunch of flowers each representing an emotion. Red rose for love, purple iris for hope, bluebells, and daisies. I did not take notes, so I forget what those represented. The daisy was very bright. The bluebells sweet, fragile, and pretty. Finally, a large bush of thorns. An obvious one. The thorns were paler than the other flowers. A fading past, with the other flowers representing a more optimistic future.
The last person painted something very abstract which I cannot begin to describe. She went on at length about the colours fading into one another, but I was not clear what any of it represented, and no one else appeared to be very clear either. A big was made about the right side versus the left side of the painting. She said she is holding on to herself. Letting go of her anger.
That is about all there is to say.
I have been sent a couple of poems of late and thought it appropriate to share them with you. The first is courtesy of Daryl Aitken, the second from Doug Miller. Invictus Out of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my [...]
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I am late, so very very late So sorry to be so late Truth be told, the therapy sessions are as interesting as ever but have evolved into very personal disclosures. The group has also dwindled to three people, the two ladies who read this blog and me. The tone of the conversation has changed [...]
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Barn on farmland outside Toronto will be demolished to make way for single family homes. Very sad
