Update, and thoughts on cancer once I watched Bones

Mom is doing well so far - she's walked up and down the hall, she's fairly mobile, she's hurting some, but not too bad.  She's looking a lot better today than yesterday - it was a real relief to me.  I was worried yesterday, more than I'd be willing to admit at the time.  I know that she's a tough woman (boy, do I know she's a tough woman), but she was looking vulnerable, and I just can't believe that she's got any cracks in her armor, because if I do, I have to admit there's a chance that I might have to live in a world without her in it.  I can't do that.  It's selfish as hell, I admit, but I've managed to convince myself she's immortal - the fact that her mother is still going at 95, and *her* mother passed away in the 90s as well, gave me good reason to believe it. 

So, how does this have anything to do with watching "Bones?"  A couple of weeks ago, one of the characters was diagnosed with bone cancer, one with a fairly high mortality rate (sounds familiar, right?) and had to make a decision on whether to stay and fight it - chemo/radiation/blech - or whether to take the time left to see the world/sleep his way across Europe/live like he was dying.  I'm actually a little relieved that I am not at the point yet where I have to make that choice - since chemo and radiation haven't been effective on my type of cancer, I'm still at the point where I can go ahead and fight my own fight (plant-based diet until I can get the hysterectomy), leaving the option open to withdraw my retirement fund and go wild if Hank wins our race. 

But it's something I've been thinking about.  What is the value of the long, drawn-out fight, when you're likely to lose, vs the value of a fast but exciting exit?  But then again, considering my recent brush with mom's cancer - if she needed chemo or radiation, I'd hope she would take it, just because I would hate to lose her a second sooner than I had to.  But then again, I'd also hate to think of her in pain. 

So, any conclusions?  Just that cancer is a jerk. Same as always.

Another very quick checkin

Mom's still doing well - there was a little bit of a hiccup today, but nothing serious.  She's still sailing through this like the rockstar that she is. 

I, on the other hand, am a bundle of nerves and sore bones.  (I know, whinewhinewhine).  I was thinking initially that "Mom doesn't usually wake up early, I can put in 4 hours of work, then go over to the hospital, no problem!".  Woke up this morning at 5:00 (standard time for me), and my body said "what the hell do you think you're doing?".  I did manage to triage my email and get bombs defused, but there's no way I can do half days and give Mom the attention she deserves, so I'm scaling back work until she's back home.

With all that said... good night, happy people - update you tomorrow, and next week, I'll get the blog back on track.  I had a great idea for Themesong Thursday (medical songs, starting with "You put the lime in the coconut", but I'm just too braindead (although, if you'd like to add to the list in the comments or on Facebook, I'm always up for some interactive themesong lists...)

Home from the hospital, quick checkin

Mom came through the surgery just fine (in fact, it was quicker than they thought it would be).  They think they got everything, but they won't know for certain until next week - but it's looking good.  She's out of recovery and resting (and a little loopy, but then again, she's had a rough day!)  The puppies are a little lost, but I bribed them with a treat and that seemed to have consoled them some.  I'm going to go pass out, though - it's bee a really long day. 

Die Gedanken Sind Frei

I grew up during the 60s and 70s with a hippie mother, so of course, I'm a Pete Seeger fan.  (Mom exposed me to a lot of folk singers, and given the choice between listening to Joan Baez and Pete Seeger, it's Pete all the way.)  I can still remember the feeling of drawing the album carefully out of the sleeve, balanced between my hands so that I wouldn't put a fingerprint on the vinyl, and dropping the needle on the album. 

I loved most of his stuff, although when I was younger, I must admit the funny ones drew me more than the hardcore - it took me a while working for the Corps to really appreciate "Waist deep in the Big Muddy, and the big fool said to push on".  I still know the all the words to "The Pill" and "Queen Anne Front and Mary-Ann Behind".

But what song to say goodbye with?  I've seen a few people going with "Where have all the flowers gone?", but for me... it's got to be "Die Gedanken Sind Frei":

Die gedanken sind frei
My thoughts freely flower
Die gedanken sind frei
My thoughts give me power
No scholar can map them
No hunter can trap them
No man can deny
Die gedanken sind frei

I think as I please
And this gives me pleasure
My conscience decrees
This right I must treasure
My thoughts will not cater
To duke or dictator
No man can deny
Die gedanken sind frei

Tyrants can take me
And throw me in prison
My thoughts will burst forth
Like blossoms in season
Foundations may crumble
And structures may tumble
But free men shall cry
Die gedanken sind frei

Mom's set for surgery

The pre-op consult went well, and she's all set for surgery Wednesday at 11:30.  She'll be at the Providence at 48th and Glisan, and they're anticipating her being in hospital for 5 or 6 days. She'll be recovering for around 6 weeks - she won't be able to lift anything larger than 10 pounds at most (now, how are we going to convince Moose of this?)  Fortunately, the post-op diet is low-fat, high-fiber, so we're golden there. 

I'll go ahead and update everyone here Wednesday night, letting you know that she's doing well, but my posts may be a little short for the next couple of days. 

Commercial Whiplash

I don't know if this ever happens to you, but I hate being wrapped up in a show, intellectually captive, thinking deep thoughts about whatever topic is being discussed, then thrown into a tailspin by a completely inappropriate commercial.

The worst example that I can think of was watching the Daily Show the other night - they had a journalist on from the PBS NewsHour, he and Jon were having a conversation about the nature of news, then all the sudden there's this obnoxious Kroll Show ad (ok, any Kroll show ad is pretty obnoxious, but this one was particularly bad).  Only slightly less strange was listening to an MSNBC panel discussion on income inequality and being tossed to an ad suggesting that I might want to move to the Cayman Islands, due to their permissive tax stance. Or the time that I was watching a particularly gruesome crime drama and was kicked out to a Toys'R'Us ad - I think it was for something pink and Barbie-ish.

And while I'm busy sounding like an old coot - I'm watching the Grammys.  When did it become de rigueur for women to do a virtual strip tease while performing their nominated hits?  First there's Beyonce grinding on a chair, and then Katy Perry shows up doing a pole dance on an upended witch's broomstick. I don't see the nominated guys stripping down to their skivvies and doing a Chippendale's routine (not that I really want to see that, I'm just saying that there should be some kind of parity here.) Heck, even in the Chicago/Robin Thicke set, the men are all dressed to the nines in full on suit and tie, and the female backup singers are in skin tight red pant or skirts and abbreviated black tank top/halter top sort of things.  Plus, I want to know just who had the pictures of the members of Chicago with farm animals?  That's the only way I could think of for them to agree to perform "Blurred Lines".

And now, if you all will excuse me, I'm going to take my battered old body and mind off to bed.

Prayers/Good Thoughts/Mojo Needed

Mom with Beauty and the Beast (and Moose)

 
Mom finds out Monday what the plan is for her cancer surgery (probably be sometime next week, but we don't know for sure.)  Any good thoughts/recommendations for recovery from a hysterectomy/ ideas for how to keep the puppies from jumping on her stomach would be gratefully received. 

She's generally not the kind to ask, and I try not to ask for her because of that, but frankly, I am asking for me at this point.  I know, I'm 48, but... she's my mom. 

Deci Classic - Kaleidoscope

I have this trouble with my eyes.
I can only see myself through someone else's vision of me.
It's never a complete picture, more a Frankenstein creation.
Bits and pieces of a kaleidoscope that fit together.  Occasionally.
With a few edges sharp enough to rip my ego to shreds left over.

My mother's chaste daughter wars with
My lover's chased woman, who is jigsawed with
My friends' cheerful companion, who has apparently never met
My employer's grudging wage-slave.

I bend for him.
I stretch for her.
I form and I mold and I seek out eyes
That make me feel more than I am.
But then, inevitably, I go home alone.
I search the floor of the closet of my soul
For the me that fits
And end up going with the view that needs the least irony.

Themesong Thursday - Angry Woman Edition

So... still working on my bucket-list items, going back to careers that were on my "I want to be x when I grow up."  Writer, research librarian, stand-up comedian, dj... DJ!  I loved being a DJ at Tongue Point, I have put together a music library that doesn't fit on my Ipod at this point, I still love putting together mix-tapes... I'm going to use Thursdays to curate various playlists. 

I'm feeling particularly pissed at cancer this week - not just Hank, I'm angry at Mom's cancer, and my group-mates' cancers, and Edward Carter's cancer (he's this puppy that I've been following on Facebook - don't judge me!)  At any rate...  playlist for kicking cancer to the curb. 

First off... let's start out with the Ray-lettes (ok, so it's mostly Ray Charles, but I think the Raylettes are the heart of the song)

Hit The Road, Jake

Next we slide into country - I love this song (Brandy Clark - the ending line of the chorus is something like "The only thing keeping you alive is I don't look good in orange and I hate stripes")

I Hate Stripes

And of course, if you're talking about throwing off a man, you've got to have some Eartha...

My Discarded Men

And a little Martina

When God Fearing Women Get The Blues

Ok, so Aaron Tippin is not precisely like the others here, but the sentiment definitely fits...

Kiss This

Six angry women are better than just one...

An Odd Version of He Had It Coming

Although when that one is Pat Benatar...

You'd Better Run

Or two, if they're the Wilson Sisters

If Looks Could Kill

In a slightly more pensive mode

"Regretting what I said"

And wrapping up with Queen Bey...

Irreplaceable

There - should be something for everyone.  Have a great evening, all...

Hank (the Squeaky one) has had a reprieve

The pups get a monthly "BarkBox" and this month's shipment included some hickory smoked beef dog bones.  I've been living in the middle of World War XIII ever since - Moose will go over to steal Daisy's bone, which is unprotected because she's over stealing Dancer's bone, because Dancer was foolish enough to take a break to get a drink of water.  There has been smack talk, covert attacks, overt attacks, a couple of death threats - it's been ugly.  I'm off to bed, but I don't know that anyone is going to join me tonight.  I think they're afraid to leave their bones untended. 

Good night, all...

Tuesday Musings

Tuesdays are a mixed blessing for me - my cancer support group meets on Tuesdays.  It's a great group.  The people are a wide range of personalities and diagnoses - you can always find either an answer or a question you can answer (or just a pick-me-up - there are some people in the group that just make me happy to see. You know, the kind of people who you meet and feel like you've known all your life.)

However, Tuesdays force me to let the wall down and think about my condition - I get most of my insights on Tuesdays.I think I've realized what it is that has been bothering me the most about my particular cancer.  For some people, cancer is a bomb that explodes and completely rearranges their lives - they deal with the fallout and their lives then begin to settle back down into the new pattern. It's not always a good pattern (god knows, there are a lot of not good patterns available after a diagnoses), but there's a pathway - you have a certain protocol that you follow (surgery, chemo, radiation, palliative care, whichever is appropriate) and there may be setbacks or surprises along the way, but at least you're on the path.  I feel like ever since last April, I've been living with a live grenade shoved inside me.  I don't know when it's going to blow, and until it either blows or fizzles, I'm stuck waiting, desperately trying to find the pin to insert back into the trigger mechanism.  I don't really belong to the surgical oncology department (at least not until I lose the weight), I don't belong to the medical or radiological oncology departments because they can't do anything for me, I'm just waiting, holding my breath - and after 8 months, I'm starting to feel my muscles cramp up from holding this thing. 

Everyone else around me seems to be suffering from anticipation fatigue as well, especially at work.  How do you treat someone who is halfway out the door, but yet can't tell you when she's actually going to be gone?  I'm still contributing right now (thank god for telework), but at any point I could go boom, or I could be cured and be back at my desk. How do you write up performance objectives for that?  

Cancer is a jerk

Mom and I are both past masters at denial.  Our method of dealing with bad news is to slap a brick wall up on that section of our memory, and move on as fast as we can.  Cancer, however, is a jerk.  A jerk with a sledgehammer.  We'll be going along, smooth sailing, for days at a time when something or someone suddenly reminds us that we've got cancer and suddenly, we've got to deal with feelings again.  Not our favorite thing in the world.

It was actually easier for me to deal with when it was just my cancer.  But now it's coming after my mother, and I don't know how to deal with it.  All I know to do is keep going, try to maintain an aura of calm, keep a positive attitude.  But inside, back behind that brick wall, I'm a screaming little girl, angry at the universe for hurting my mother.

Her surgical consult is next Monday, and with any luck, she'll be having her hysterectomy and then be cancer-free next week.  But I can tell that this is going to be one loooooong week ahead for us.

Sunday was unexpectedly busy

So this is going to be a short post - but I'm trying my best to maintain a post a day.  Weight was back up a couple of pounds - I'm back in the bounce mode apparently - so I didn't quite make the 60 pounds in 4 months, but I will try again tomorrow.

We went to sacrament meeting this morning - I like my new ward, but the hymns leave a lot to be desired.  For one thing, the choir leader keeps bouncing around and coming up with obscure hymns that no one knows the tune of, and as a whole, we're not the best sight readers of music.  That, and when I can hear wrong notes being hit on the organ, it's not quality keyboarding. 

We spent most of the afternoon working on casseroles for one of the members of my group who is having a bit of a rough time of it.  She's late stage, and dealing with low blood counts due to the chemo, and dealing with a toddler at the same time.  I don't know how she keeps it together - I would be a quivering, crying mess.  Or else possibly just cursing the entire world and everything in it - could go either way.  But she's holding it together. 

I also watched the Seahawks/49ers game - normally, I don't watch football.  I get too into the game, start yelling and scaring the puppies (and my husband), tend to throw pillows when the opposing team scores - it's not pretty, is what I am saying here.  But post-season games I get a  pass on - I even have a small Superbowl party every year, but that's mostly because we want to get together and laugh at the commercials.  Generally, by the time the Superbowl rolls around, my teams are well out of it.  But this year, I've actually got a couple of dogs in the fight - a) the Seahawks - they're pretty much the closest thing I've got to a hometown team; and b) whoever is playing the Broncos.  Until my beloved Steelers actually manage to put together a winning team, that will have to do. 

We also had a couple of batches of visitors.  I think having the Greek Chorus of the girls has made Moose's Teutonic territorial tendencies even worse, if that's possible.  Even if he knows the person, heck, even if they live here (e.g. Daniel), he still has to announce their arrival with a zeal that no town crier can hope to match.  Anyone got a clue as to how to train him to stop?  I know that yelling "cut it out!" isn't going to help - he just figures that I'm joining in the chorus as well.  We've tried a time out (having them wait in the back yard until the guests leave), but that just switches the barking to whining until he gets let back in.

Ok, so much for the short post... I'm off to bed.  Have a lovely night, anyone who is reading. 

Thoughts on a new Driver's License

First off - Ladies, take out your driver's licenses or ID card.  You know how they make us put our weight on there?  How many of you are actually within 10 pounds of your listed weight?  Renewing my card this time was the first time in my life that I was actually under the weight listed.  It was a really odd feeling, going down by 80 pounds (yes, of course I was nowhere near listing my actual weight before.) 

The renewal part that made me laugh was talking with the lovely lady at the DMV.  First off, there was the discussion about hair color.  Oddly enough, they didn't have an option for reddish-brownish-blonde with streaks of purple and occasional gray.  Next came the weight discussion.  I did give her my actual weight (it was 429 at the time), but she kindly bumped it down to 420.  Not sure exactly why - let's face it, over 200, it really doesn't matter - but I thought it was kind of her to make the effort.  And I'm getting closer - 426 today.  If I can manage to lose 1 more pound tonight, I'll be right at 15 pounds per month since I started the whole plant-based thing back on September 19th.  Not turbo-speedy, but I think I can make 399 before my birthday. 

Re-doing my license reminded me of a poem I wrote back when I first started driving - back when my car (the Bondage Bunny Mobile - yes, there's a story there, no, I'm not putting it down on the internet without a guaranty of full immunity) represented freedom and exploration and possibly the beginning of adulthood. So...

Daisy May, feeling the wind in her hair

Freedom:

I felt his hand on my thigh, my hand caressing the stick shift.
I rammed the shaft into fifth gear and finally achieved freeway.
The sun-roof open, my hair flowing straight up into the wind,
The sunlight gleaming from his smile
And the sound of some testosterone-based
Heavy metal, brain numbing, emotion altering
Paeon to youth and beauty and the American automobile
Screamed in our ears as we bellowed along with it -
Scaring cattle all along a 25-mile stretch of asphalt.
I knew that we were cruising along a path that led to his bedroom
But I felt secure enough to take my time.
For once, I didn't feel that I needed to rush to get there
In case the winds changed.
We climbed along the back road out of the gorge,
Feeling the smooth kick-out of the car as I caressed it through the curves,
And landed at the pinnacle at twilight.
Just in time to stand there, feeling his strong arms around me,
As the sun disappeared below the horizon, and we slipped smoothly into the night.
 

Random Observations

Is it just me, or does the new Grand Central Bowl commercial make it look just like an adult Chucky Cheese?  There's the games, the sub-par food, I think I may have even caught sight of a ball pit (but I'm not swearing to that one). Lord knows, from what I remember of the place back in the 90s, it was definitely a ball pit in one sense of the word.

There were just two commercials back to back - one for August Osage County, one for Devil's Due.  Guess which one Roger wouldn't be caught dead at, and which one I'm avoiding like the plague.

I know, this post is a little commercial centric.  I normally skip through the ads like a gazelle swanning its way through the savannah, but I was actually watching something without the DVR buffer tonight.  In personal news, I'm down to 427 today, so off the plateau and back on track.  I'm not sure why 427 seems so much more significant than 435 - I think it's that once you start on the 20s, you're finally in view of 400.  I'm at least at the point where it seems feasible that I might get into the 300s by my birthday.  Dinner tonight was home-made hash browns with onions, peppers and apple/sage "sausage".  Not the best option, but not horrid.

The Continuing Travails of Hank

The girls are continuing their efforts to wipe Hank out - a large hole has developed on his back, just above the buttock area (I keep telling them to lower their aim, but do they listen to me?)

Daisy in action - please forgive the bad photography

Action shot - blurred due to the frenzied speed of their attack

Not a lot else going on here - I was asleep most of the day trying to knock down a fever, so it's a short post tonight.  Dinner tonight was last night's carrot-tomato-ginger soup used as a pasta sauce over spaghetti, with some lovely wilted greens on the side.  Definitely one we need to make again, although it's frankly better as a sauce than a soup (a little thick for slurping, but just right for pasta.)

Aspirations

(One of my Deci-Classic posts - this was originally a free-form poem written back in 1994, but I think it works better as just an essay.)

There but for the lack of foundation garments went I

When I was eleven, my mother and I moved to Chubbuck, Idaho (a slightly less glamorous suburb of Pocatello).  That was when I realized what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wanted to be a scandalous woman.

I don’t know what you called them in your hometown - brazen hussies, scarlet women, or as my grandmother used to say “women who were not better than they ought to be, “ but you know the kind of woman I mean.  They’re pretty hard to miss. Florescent stretch pants frightened into submission, K-Mart cashmere sweaters straining over double-D chests, and six-inch come-get-me heels grinding out the butts of their Salems (‘Cause smoking menthols was more ladylike. No one ever accused them of not being ladies and left with his family jewels intact.)

We had a prime example of a scandalous woman living in our trailer court  (that’s where scandalous women tend to live – at least while they are waiting for their old men to get out of lockup.  He was framed.) I don’t remember exactly what her name was, Bambi or Trixie or Shelli or Debbie – Let’s face it, when parents hang that kind of a name on you at birth, you don’t grow up to be a rocket scientist. Some women were born to be bad.  She was one of those women. She drove a big-old ’67 Mustang.  Cherry red.  And she used to hire me to baby-sit for her every Friday night while she went down and kicked some ass at the local pool hall.

I used to watch her prepare for the evening, using a half a can of Aqua-Net and a pint of kiss-me-dead red nail polish, and listen to her tales of the men she loved, and the women she hated, and the friends she was going to get together with and go out and paint the town red.  I wasn’t quite sure what this meant. But I knew it sounded like excitement and adventure and life and… Like a huge party that I couldn’t join. Yet.

My desire to be just like her wasn’t hurt by the fact that my other role-model among the women of the Blue Moon Trailer Court was Bonnie, a sweet young thing just off her honeymoon with Max. She wore dresses with flower prints that came modestly below her knees and she wore her hair long because her husband liked it better that way. She used to bake me chocolate chip cookies with carob-chip substitutes – they’re healthier that way.  And more boring. At the time, I hated boring slightly more than I hated broccoli.

I knew that I was meant for better things – neon lights, rhinestone jewelry, fake satin everything. But, though I tried, I never quite made it to scandalous. I didn’t have the figure to pull it off.  Or the lingerie. Or the subscriptions to True Detective and Playgirl. But every now and then, I still manage to make the girls at the office say “You did what?”  It’s my little tribute to the Bambi/Trixie/Shelli/Debbie that still reigns inside me.

Savaging Hank (or Introducing My Canine Cohort)

One of the coolest Christmas presents I've received is a squeaky toy named "Hank".  I've been getting an unholy amount of amusement watching the girls trade off trying to literally (and yes, I mean that in the correct sense) chew his butt off. 

Dixie, our one-eyed pirate wiener dog, is the most effective weapon of mass destruction.  She has years of squeaky toy savagery behind her, and knows just where to target for maximum carnage, minimal effort. 

Dixie, plotting dark acts and squeaky savagery

Daisy Mae, our princess blonde (the one who reminds me of a southern belle), is desultory about it.  If she happens to be reminded by the sound of a desperate squeak or honk, she'll come over and tug it around a bit, but her heart isn't really into it.

Daisy Mae, getting ready for her Playpet pictorial

Dancer, our blonde tomboy, is perhaps the most enthusiastic - she throws him around with great abandon - but sadly, the least effective.  Lots of sound and fury, very little stuffing, but it's so much fun to watch her play. 

 

 

 

Dancer, committing carnage on a Candy Cane

And Moose?  My boy?  Moose doesn't do toys.  He prefers to supervise from his mother's lap, preferably from under a blanket on his mother's lap. 

Moose cares not for your petty squeaky toy - he will take a rawhide cane, though

Good Morning

I was starting to get a little worried/anxious/depressed about the fact that for the last three weeks, I've been losing the same 5 pounds over and over and... well, you get the idea.  Part of it was the holiday - I stayed vegan, but may have played a little fast and loose with the "low fat" part of it - but even on days when I stuck to the straight and (very) narrow, I still kept bouncing back and forth between 430 and 435.  This morning, however, I finally reached the promised land of the sub-430 (428, to be precise.)

I'm conflicted as hell about this weight loss.  I know it's a necessary thing - I've got to get Hank out of here (for those of you who never read my other blog, Hank is formally known as Henry the VIII, the Tudor tumor.  He's my uterine leiomyosarcoma - I was diagnosed last April with what is currently an inoperable rare cancer.  Unfortunately, it's rare enough that it's an orphan cancer with a really lousy survival rate even if they could do a hysterectomy, which at my BMI is not a possibility.  Fortunately, it's the myxoid variant, which is a slow-growing but aggressive version.  So, I'm in a race to lose the weight so that I can get a hysterectomy before Hank starts spreading - I've lost 139 lbs so far, and have about 100 to go.  End of parenthetical explanation.)  So, yeah - have to do this, am doing it, will continue to do it.

But... there's this Spider Robinson quote - "... in our society, big, lush women and small slight men go through life wrapped around a softball-sized chunk of pain.  Some it destroys, others it makes magnificent."  I've spent my adult life refusing to accept that I am less of a human being than any woman a quarter my size, despite a metabolism that was obviously developed to laugh off famines.  I've worked to make myself essential to my office, so that I don't need to worry about weight discrimination in the workplace.  I've found a good man who loves me for who I am, not what I look like.  Hell, I've even scoped out which restaurants have chairs without arms and learned to deal with arcane airline rules.  Losing weight feels a little like giving in... like turning my back on the fight for fat equality.  Not that I'm trying to get all revolutionary (except when I make the mistake of reading comments on any article that mentions weight in any capacity whatsoever.   The trolls that come out there definitely make me long for a pitchfork) but I do feel like I'm letting the side down, some.

On the other, other hand, I'm feeling a certain amount of pride with every pound that drops.  I'm working for this weight loss (god, do I miss cheese), and it feels like a bit of a "take that" to my gynocological oncologist - I'm pretty certain that she didn't have a clue that I would actually be able to do this.  It was very much a "come back once you cut down the tallest tree in the forest with a herring" kind of feel. So... for that alone, it's worth it.  Anything I can do to disprove the medical establishment is a positive.  (Although, I have to say that the rest of my medical team have been nothing but encouraging.  It's been great to know that I'll walk in and not have their first words be "you know you have to lose weight, don't you?")

Dark Musings on Hank

(You have been warned - do not go past this line if you don't want to know)

People tell me all the time "You look so good!" Superficially, they're right - I'm thinner than I've been in 20 years, I'm starting to regain some mobility, my hair has been getting more beauty salon time than... well, ever. 

But on the inside, I can picture this malignant mass, like a beautiful red apple with a worm buried inside.  I'm slowly crumbling inward, maintaining a serene shell, but rotting from the inside out. 

I've been running a fever most nights - nothing serious, just somewhere between 99.4 and 99.9, but my normal body temperature used to be somewhere around 97 degrees.  I tire so easily - after four hours I'm wilting, by 8 hours I need to lay down.  I can feel my capability slipping away - I forget things (managed to blow a simple suspense two weeks in a row), I forget words, I have to rely on notes more than I ever have.  But mostly, it's emotional.  I'm snappy, I'm irrational, I don't have any patience. 

I don't know how people manage to get through bucket lists with holidays  abroad or skydiving or elaborate "bat-kid" scenarios.  But then again, I've never really been all that into physical achievements.  My bucket list would be more along the lines of make a blog that people actively subscribe to and enjoy, or do an open-night stand-up comedy set that brought the house to hysterical laughter.  Since progeny are out of the question, I want to live on with my words.  That's a form of immortality, isn't it?

Unearthing Memories

(crossposted from http:www.caringbridge.org/visit/decireynolds/journal - last crossposting, I swear)

We spent time a couple of  weekends ago cleaning out the garage (well, I say we - I was in more of a supervisory role.  The guys would unearth things and I'd be the arbiter of whether we are keeping it or sending it off to DI.)  What the heck - we've owned this house for 9 1/2 years, perhaps it's time to unpack the last of the boxes. 

We found a bunch of unfinished craft projects - some that I really should finish.  I quilted some pillow fronts that are a desert scene that I would just need to add a back to, and I found a treasure trove of cross-stitching books and fabric (and thread, but that may not be retrievable at this point). 

Daniel also recovered a planner that I had from 1994, the year before Roger and I met.  (Also the year that I found myself writing free-form poetry a lot.) I dove into memories and got lost for a bit - I miss writing like that.  This journal is a great way to keep friends and family notified, and lets me do a little playing around with words, but it's not really the same. 

Reading my old stuff reminded me of who I used to be - at the time, I still thought of myself as temporary, anticipating that I'd be moving again soon, having a lot of friends, but no real relationships.  Now, I've lived here in Portland long enough to consider it home (heck, I bought a home - definitely a change from the girl who was living in a one-room studio, and only spent long enough there to change clothes and grab a quick sleep.)  Roger and I have been together 18 years and counting (married for 14), and I really can't think of myself without also picturing him anymore. 

Maybe I don't miss the old me as much as I thought I did.  I wouldn't trade my memories for
 anything, but I wouldn't want to go back there either. 

Me Then

Me Now

Restart/Repurposing

So, I've been thinking that I need a place to post that's not as "cancer-centric" as Caring Bridge (or at least not as "update oriented", and then I remembered - I've got a blog!  Ok, so it's a blog that was set up 6 years ago, and that I have only posted to maybe three times (well, five times, but two were ill-advised and have been bamphed with extreme prejudice).

This will be a place to post old writings (warning - I've still got a few poems written back when I was in my teenage goth death poetry stage), any new writings, get a chance to get back in touch with my creative side... basically a brain dump.  I've been changing a lot in this last year, and it will be nice to have a place to remember both who I was and who I am becoming - and leave behind a memory in case Hank manages to win.