Peanuts and Hope

My wife keeps a small unique pottery cup filled with ten or so unshelled peanuts on the kitchen counter next to the kitchen window.  The kitchen window looks over her beautiful garden and is above the sink.

Every morning like random morning clock work, out side her kitchen window, a Scrub Jay shows up.  The Scrub Jay sits atop the bird feeder that is a bit of six feet away of the window.  Hopefully sitting and wishing, the Scrub Jay awaits his/her expectant daily peanut.

My wife opens the window,  places two unshelled peanuts on the outside sill and before closing the window talks to the Scrub.  Sometimes the bird my wife conversation is quite lengthy.

Then, Scrub Jay makes Scrub Jay sound [irritating as that may be], flits over, and grabs a peanut.  Comes back a few minutes later and grabs the next one flitting away for a hidey hole he/she won't remember thirty seconds later.

Sometimes the Jay shows up and my wife is off on some errand that generally will ultimately take care of me or someone else in our family  and the Jay gets no peanut.

But.  The Jay shows up everyday hopefully waiting for a peanut. 

Hope

The Hell with Zytiga lets talk INK

OK, like I mentioned I’ve gotten my new Tatt.  I thank all of you who emailed and voted but I had to redesign.  For more than three decades I’ve known my totem is the crow.  Minutes before I had the ink applied to my fore arm by Doug Auld I redesigned and he embellished as the artist that he is.  I added a crow. Doug added the art.

So what’s the big deal about a tattoo to someone fighting the Effing Evil Empire?  Permanent ink on your body is powerful.  How many of you are wishing you didn’t have a heart and Judith or Georges dog Jethro tattooed to your bicep.  Powerful stuff marking your body is.

If you are a radiation patient such as me you have lots of tattoos.  Certainly not works of art but they mark you as a cancer patient.  Ink your body and it defines you in that time and gives you strength in that time.  I recently was inked for strength.

Anyone that has read this blog knows I call our disease the Evil Empire and when I’m really angry I go beyond PG13 and say Fucking Evil Empire.  Someone more PC than I came up with Effing Evil Empire for my cancer and all others.  Nerd mathematical me thought “Oh wow that’s E³”  I know I know...Nerd

Then, as I'm a firm believer in symbolism I decided to incorporate E³ and my totem onto my right arm where they [medical], as my wife calls it, “shit” they pump into my right arm.

I will tell you this now.  Whatever God you believe in…do it.  If you believe in a little fuzzy bunny…do it.  Whatever.  I know that the minute I had this Tatt put on, one I’d been thinking about for months, it rocked me.  I can feel it. I was mentally empowered. The Tatt will help me visualize how to defeat this cowardly disease.

The point.  Grab onto what you believe.  Doesn’t have to be a Tatt.  Doesn’t have to be a Bible.  It could be a cool rock you picked up at the river [I have one of those too], a piece of shell from the beach JUST grab and believe.

Just grab and believe.

Talk to you later.

I Need Your Vote Now

Tattoos.  I have more than one.  Admittedly eight of them are for radiation targeting and are but mere pin points but I still count them as tattoos.  One of them though, the one on my left shoulder blade, was done by a true artist. 

My “tat” is iconic in the Celtic world.  You can see a pic of it if you really need to in one of my previous posts.  Back in November of 2011 I think.  Though that tat is years old I can feel it at all times.  Not as pain but as something “being there”, something maybe powerful and this got me to thinking.

In the days of yore Native Americans painted symbols on their bodies seeking strength and courage.  What self respecting alien isn’t inked all over in an effort to, well who knows what an alien is thinking.  The fact is humans and movie aliens have been painting symbols on their bodies in effort of seeking protection, power and portable Pictionary games for eons.

I have labeled my disease the “Evil Empire”.  Naming it something that makes sense out of a nonsensical disease helps me with my visualization as I try to exorcise the Evil Empire from my body.  A polite friend of mine coined the email friendly phrase “Effing Evil Empire”.

Thinking about new “ink” that would help me combat this disease it dawned on me Effing Evil Empire could be written [yes I’m a nerd] E³. For you forgetful of Algebra that's E cubed.

So just like all who have gone before me, their body tattoo’s lending them courage, strength or in the case of aliens protection from asteroids I’ve decided to ink E³ onto my body in some strategic place.  Probably near where they insert the IVs and take blood.

So now comes the rub… take a look at the examples below and vote for the one that conveys how evil this disease is.  The one that looks like armor against this cowardly disease.  The one that, well, just might scare the crap out of the Effing Evil Empire. 

I’ll send a pic of the one that won after I get it inked into my arm.

Next, Zytiga and Monsters under the bed.

Talk to you later

Gray But Back

I sit and stare at a blank piece of paper. 

It has not been a good day.  Oh sure, physical I was no worse, mentally I am a wreck.   

There are spaces between each line I type that are still blank.  Blank.

I’m confused about my mental place today.  I worked but didn’t go in to work. 

Perhaps my mental space today, that gray what's the point sort of space, is a culmination of not writing my blog.  I frequently feel bad because, as the gray creeps in, it takes away things that made me happy and maybe things that helped others.

So whether it matters or not, I’ll be writing again.

How Would I Live If My Life Was a Reality Show

I'm sitting here at my desk with a lap top glaringly accusing me of work not yet complete.  A thought creeps into my brain as I stare mindlessly at photons excited.  

I've not had good news today from my Onc but that news isn't the driver behind this question. I wonder if that news has made me wonder though.

The question?  I wonder how each of us would live, or had lived,  if we knew someone would make a documentary of our life.

Talk to you later

Salmon Ashes and Inspiration

Recently I was fortunate enough to spend a week at the family cabin located way up in the North Central Cascades of Washington State.

Clear crisp mornings seemed to make the fall spectrum glow.  The first time I slept in this cabin was the night of my sixteenth birthday.  The place and time has formed me, nurtured me, matured me, and basically made me.

It is always an amazing place and it didn’t fail to surprise me this trip.  I met some salmon, every October they visit and one day up at the end of the road right on the border of the wilderness area I met a man who was there to bury his mom.  Like I may not have mentioned odd things happen up here.

Both cases, salmon and burial guy, demonstrated a conviction and determination that made me wonder and created a Déjà vu that I couldn’t place at first.

Take the spawning salmon I watched building their nests.  They were born out front of the cabin and swam downriver to the ocean avoiding damns and predators.  They, the salmon, mucked about in the ocean for a while, got horny and decided to swim back home.

On their four river, one lake, 532 river mile trip they avoided nets, hooks [mostly mine] turbines of about seven dams then taking two left turns and a right made it in front of a cabin in the middle of nowhere to build their nests, screw and die.  Amazing!  That determination.  That conviction.  Déjà vu.

Some days later in the long shadows of fall I drove up to the end of the road where trail-heads lead to some of the most remote land in Washington.  Standing on a Forest Service walking bridge I looked up river to a waterfall and downstream to another.  There I met a man.

He walked limping with a stick and as he came down the hill to the middle of the bridge where I stood he said “I talk a lot.”  He went on to explain that he talks a lot because for a year and a half he was stroke ridden and could not communicate.  Wow, here was a man walking and talking in remote Washington that couldn’t do either for a year and a half.

Without questioning he explained to me that his mom died a week ago and she wanted to be buried up there [don’t freak he had ashes, I hope].  His unwavering determination and conviction was another déjà vu.

On the way back down to the cabin I kept wondering about the déjà vu thing.  Finally it dawned on me.  My déjà vu was what I’ve seen in the Chemo Room, determination and conviction.  

No matter how ill the renter of the Chemo Chair of the day, if you look, if you have the balls to look, deep into the renters eyes you will see under the pain, illness, and misery conviction and determination.

I’ve started looking the world in the eye because I learned those few days in the mountains, coupled with some days renting a Chemo Chair, that determination and conviction add up to inspiration. 

Though on some days it seems I have none of either.  If I look deep into my eyes while looking at myself in a mirror I see determination and conviction and I know what that equation sums to…inspiration.

Talk to you later and good thoughts to those on the East Coast.

Parenthood and The Caregiver

I have a ton of thoughts I want to share, but lately it seems the days have been filtered much the same as a water painter would do in a  wash of grey.  Okay.  Just an excuse for being unmotivated. 

Last night we "spun" up an episode of a T.V. show we watch when our life allows.  Can anyone say On Demand.

The show is about a multi-generational-dysfunctional family.  I think, it is more like a show about any of our families or families that we know.  High energy doesn't mean dysfunctional in my book.  

By the time the show was over there wasn't a dry eye in the house.  I can't stand inane TV but this time the writers got it right.

Let me set it up as quick as I can.  Picture a whirlwind of poopy diapers, elderly drivers, adoption, aspergers, candy machines, misplaced love, unrequited sixteen year old love, trying to manage angst into energy, grandpa's hidden heart condition, man too young for woman, man too old for same woman etc.  In the center of this maelstrom of life is a woman and husband that just found out she has breast cancer.

Why am I writing about this?  Well, it is one episode on T.V. that the producers, writers and actors got right.  Remember.  Somehow they, the writers, captured the "where do I go now" feeling after you first  hear the heart sinking word....Cancer.


God love the caregiver, whether your care giver is the love of your life, a family caregiver, or the insurance idea of care giver I hope they all love you and want the best for you.  

The one's of us with the disease need to remember, just like it is for ourselves, it is the same for those that love us...battling the Effing Evil Empire is a new thing and everyone is scared and it is a team effort.

So back to the episode.The show wife, faced her husband in tears [I was sobbing at this point] and said:

"[character] you have to promise me you can't always tell me everything is going to be all right.  You have to let me be scared [her word] when I need to. Because some days I'm going to be scared and some days I'm not going to feel like things are going to be all right."

On the days you are "scared" remember that your care giver is sleepless the night before wondering if they've done everything they can for you comfort...and they are "scared". 

This disease really really sucks.
 

Talk to you later