Chemo Round 7

Today, 30 June, is the day after completing chemo round 7.  It is also the end of the Australian financial year – so, happy end of Australian financial year!

As usual I am feeling queasiest yesterday and today.  This morning I did not feel immediately like breakfast.  I drank water and orange juice and a while later headed out to a local café for breakfast as diversionary therapy.  Bought a Daily Telegraph newspaper on the way and ordered Eggs Benedict and a cup of English Breakfast tea.  The tea came fast but about twenty minutes later no Eggs Benedict!  So, I asked where they were and they started cooking them.  My order was forgotten.  Meanwhile I read the paper and began the crossword puzzles once breakfast arrived.  Came home an hour or so later having done an anagram puzzle and three of the five crosswords; feeling suitably diverted.

Thus, now its time to write the chemo round 7 blog entry.  Last week was a wonderful family high and so I entered chemo round 7 feeling really good.  As usual, the Monday chemo went smoothly and I felt queasiest on the Wednesday afternoon, when the chemo bottle was removed.

I continue with only mild side effects – John Tully’s prayer of minimising the bad effects and maximising the good effects continues to be answered.  I am grateful for this.  My side effects, in order of nuisance value are:

• queasiness, especially on the chemo third day and day after – had no queasiness for last two or three days before this round of chemo
• a slight rash on my torso that has been around for a couple of months now – no itchiness and have not mentioned it before
• tingling in my fingers from being cold or when I touch cold things – always worst at chemo time
• occasional and infrequent hiccups during a chemo round – taking a Nexium tablet nightly keeps them at bay
•  a mouth ulcer (I think) between latest chemo rounds – cleared up with twice daily mouth rinsing with bi-carb soda that I have been doing since starting chemo
• a pinkish face at times during the chemo time and especially after my shower this morning but colour was back to normal by the time I went out for my diversionary breakfast

Please remember my side effects are minimal.  In fact, on the third day of chemo rounds 6 and 7 I have not taken the Kytril anti nausea tablets.  Dr Lisa suggested that I not take them as I was coping well with the chemo and this would reduce the potential constipation effect from the tablets.  So, that is good but is also probably part of the reason for noticing the queasiness more yesterday and today.  Overall, it is a small price to pay for taking less medicine.

One of my tactics during chemo time is to shower on the Monday and then next on the Thursday and wear the same clothes over those days.  Why?  Because: it is a nuisance to waterproof the connection from the chemo bottle into my port-o-cath.  So, I avoid the problem.  A little underarm deodorant on the third day means I still smell OK.  Wearing the same clothes saves washing.  I make myself look like I have different clothes when I go to get the bottle removed by wearing a different jumper (sweater) or jacket.  Don’t know whether this fools the nurses or not.

Bound thesis

Our daughter picked up official bound copies of her PhD thesis this morning from the printer.  She came home with them and presented us with one.  We are very proud parents and honoured to have our own copy.

A poem a day

As mentioned in my previous blog entry, Terry Barker is sending me a poem nearly every day.  He has given me permission to quote his poems.  You can find out more about Terry at his website www.lastchancethislife.com

Here is a recently sent poem about time and its preciousness:

Kipling’s Advice

I saw a man at the Farmers Market today.

He was sort of drifting between booths.

He looked lonely.

I said, Hi, how’s it going?

He said, Oh, I’m just killing time.

Killing time!

God! What must it be like

To have so much time in your life’s bank

That you can afford to kill it!

How I envied him,

So rich with hours and days and unspent years

While I hoard the few I have left

In the safety deposit box of my soul.

Kipling understood this.

He told us to

Fill each unforgiving minute full

Of sixty seconds worth of distance run.

I think he meant that we must taste

The chocolate and honey of each minute

With lust and gratitude.

Don’t waste a minute, I told the lonely man

At the Farmers Market.

You’re bland as celery.

Wake up!

When you eat a potato chip, say in your mind

I’m eating a potato chip!

It’s delicious! It’s splendid!

Turn up your pilot light!

Don’t let sawdust smother you!

Pounce on your life like a tiger!

Throttle it!

For God’s sake, get nifty!

I wish I could say that he smiled

And took my advice,

But he looked at me askance

And muttered something

And dwindled away between the booths.

Oh well, I thought, maybe next time

But then I got to thinking about what’s for dinner,

And what I was going to do on Monday,

And did she really love me

And the next thing I knew I had left the Market

And I couldn’t remember what I had seen

Or who I talked to

Or what I’d said

I am still eating a packet of Smith’s salt and vinegar crisps nearly every day.  So, I indentify with Terry’s sentiments about chips.

My Friends

This is the fourth and final blog entry of my journey between chemotherapies 6 and 7.  So much happened within our family that I decided to have three blog entries along the way.  This blog entry brings you up to date with wider family members and friends with whom I spent time in the last ten days.

I had been thinking of visiting my cousin Louise and her husband Adrian in Newcastle.  Well, blow me down, but Alison had decided to visit her friends who now live in Newcastle.  So, Sunday, 19 June, I hitched a ride with Alison to Newcastle.  I went to Louise’s home and we visited Adrian in hospital and then out to lunch and back to Louise’s.  Why did I want to go?  They had enjoyed a European trip to London, cruised (like us) from Amsterdam to Budapest and finished their holiday in Prague.  They returned to Sydney and intended to stay a day or two with their son and his family before returning to Newcastle.  But Adrian felt unwell and was soon at Blacktown Hospital, which after extensive testing, discovered that he had contracted a virus resulting in brainstem encephalitis.  Two weeks later he was transferred to a hospital in Newcastle and Louise could return home.  Good to see Adrian well on the road to recovery.

Monday I enjoyed lunch with fellow accountant, Peter Grullemans, who works with our accountant Andrew Blencowe.  We talked widely about our life experiences, childhoods and beliefs.  I enjoyed watching his family 8mm films that had been transferred to video.  As a teenager, his Dad had started making family movies and I watched black and white stories of a wedding of a relative and visits to resorts in Indonesia in the 1930s.  By 1955 he had moved to colour and filmed stories of his wife preparing for the Peter’s birth, going to the nursing home to have Peter and returning home, and a visit to the pool with baby Peter.  It was white people that were at the resorts in Indonesia and the pool in Singapore, reflecting the colonial era.  Finally, there was film of travelling on Sydney Harbour.  Peter also has his father’s stamp album, in which his Dad put stamps as a teenager.  It was fascinating to see swastika stamps from Germany in the 1930s, Australia and New Zealand shown as British colonies and European country names that no longer seem to exist.

Wednesday I enjoyed lunch with Daljit Singh.  Daljit and I have known each other since the mid-late 1980s when we met through his firm and my accounting firm’s cooperation in educating professional year candidates.  Daljit came to Glebe and we went to Naggy’s Cafe for a very pleasant lunch where we caught up on each other’s doings, talked about our families and various social and political issues.

Thursday, the Hey-Cunninghams, consisting of Michael, Josh, Kate, Barbara and I invaded Phil and Katharine’s Glebe home for lunch.  Katharine and Phil have had us over for lunch on several occasions and have been wonderfully supportive.  Kindly, this time, they invited five of us.  Phil and Katharine had visited with us at Josh and Kate’s in Edinburgh in 2008 and then stayed with us in the mid north of Scotland.  Michael and Phil recently met at Wilpena Pound when Phil did a coach tour that included flying over Lake Eyre, which for the third year in a row has a great deal of water flowing into it.  We had plenty to talk about for a couple of hours.

Friday, I attended an Australian Institute of Company Directors lunchtime briefing for facilitators.  I work with both the National and NSW Offices who have been wonderfully supportive.  Catching up with Maureen, Maggie, Rachel, Maryanne, Stefanie, Gabrielle, Rhian and Anne Marie was special.  John Colvin, the CEO, sat at my table and I found out that he is president of Can Assist, which was set up to support cancer sufferers.  His family has been deeply affected by cancer and has become involved in helping cancer sufferers and their families – the Jean Colvin Hospital, now Cancer Centre, was opened in 1961 at Darling Point in memory of his mother.  It is amazing how many people know people close to them who have or had cancer.  So, my journey of discovery continues.

You can see that the last eleven days have been full of family and friends and have been very uplifting.  I continue to receive emails of encouragement.  My friend Terry Barker, Sunshine Coast, British Columbia, Canada is sending me a poem nearly every day, many of which have been written the day before.  We have received an email from our friends Pam and Allan McEvoy.  They have received a one-year work visa, which will allow them to go to Uganda as self-funded missionaries to establish a resource centre – a dream they have been working toward for over two years.

Thank you, my family and friends, for your continuing love and support that go with me in to chemo round 7!

Some bonus family news

Pete and Camilla have chosen a venue for their wedding reception.  Josh started three months of work today, Monday 27 June and Kate starts a permanent job on Monday 4 July.

The last couple of days I did not have any queasiness.  Today, the first day of chemo round 7 I returned home the earliest yet, at 3.30 pm.  I feel queasier than normal but am alright.

My Family

Our daughter’s request for a degustation dinner to be the official celebration of her 30th birthday became the perfect culmination of a wonderful family week.  While her birthday was June 1, she wanted the dinner to be with all the family members, which meant holding it after Josh and Kate returned.  So, 7.30 pm, Saturday 25 June at Restaurant Atelier, 22 Glebe Point Road was chosen.

The evening began with red corvette cocktails prepared at Club 55.  Shortly after 7.00 pm we made our way to Atelier.

We had the private room, which was up the stairs above the kitchen.  We can attest that not all kitchens are full of angst, anger and swearing as portrayed on some reality TV shows.  All we heard was the clanking of pots and pans as the chef and three staff worked hard below.

Meanwhile Bernadette and Tom looked after us for our seven course meal with matching wines plus a cheese plate that we enjoyed from 7.30 pm till midnight.  We were surprised at how much time passed by so quickly.  The degustation meal became the perfect way to celebrate this 30th birthday and us being together as a family.

You can share our wonderful evening through these photos and comments.

Red corvette cocktails at Club 55 and arrival at Atelier:

Tom, our main waiter comes from Montpellier, France – the very city that our daughter travels to later this year to attend a conference!  Next, Bernadette is attempting to explain one of our courses.

Course 1 was kingfish ceviche with tomato sorbet and tomatoes with some of us having caviar, complemented by Cote de Rhone white wine.  Course 2 was marron fish tail from Western Australia with shellfish mousse, jelly cube and baby broad beans accompanied by an Alsace Riesling.

Enjoying our dinner.

Course 3 consisted of scallop on mushroom and Thai basil with duck consume poured over it and accompanied by a rosé.  Course 4 was poached John Dory with king mushroom and a tempura leaf accompanied by a cold red French Beaujolais (apologies for the partly eaten fourth course but I forgot to take a photo earlier).

Enjoying these courses.

Course 5 was duck breast and duck confit with mushrooms and carrot purée with some of us having truffles accompanied by a cabernet sauvignon merlot from Morning Peninsula (the only Australian wine of the evening, all the others being French).

Time for some short speeches before dessert.  We spoke about how wonderful it was to celebrate together.  I congratulated our daughter for the wonderful person she is and what she has accomplished and how special to me it was to have my family’s love and support in my time of need.  She spoke of her appreciation for our family and how she enjoyed our celebrations.  Our daughter-in-law thanked us for being such an inclusive family and welcoming the ‘in-laws’ as family members.  Yes, it was mushy and a few tears were shed but I think it is so good to let each other know how much we mean to each other. 

As a family, we have focussed on celebrating the good things along the way and probably done this even more in recent years.  Barbara and I believe these build good memories that help carry us all through tougher times.  People talk of vicious cycles.  I like to talk of virtuous cycles that build up, create hope and lead to wonderful outcomes.  I believe celebrating special times helps create and support virtuous cycles.  You’ll notice that I tend to talk of the positive things happening.  We, like all families, have difficult times but I think it is generally more constructive not to be too public about them.  The exception is my own situation, such as my cancer.  That concerns me and gives me a freedom to discuss in the way I want.

Desserts came in courses 6 and 7.  Course 6 was salty chocolate with goat yoghurt and chocolate jelly accompanied by a dessert red wine that was sweet like a port.  Course 7 was a soufflé of chocolate and mandarin with a mandarin sorbet and mandarin milkshake – half poured into the soufflé and the other half drunk through a chocolate straw that you then ate, accompanied by a sweet white wine from Balzac.

We finished our dinner with some of us enjoying a selection of four cheeses: French old goat, a French aged cheddar, a French and an Australian blue – superb cheeses, followed by coffees and chocolate.  At midnight we parted ways with most of us returning to Club 55.

So ended a wonderful night of family celebration!  Why the title of My Family?  I love my family and I love the British sitcom My Family.

Chemo Round 6

I write this blog entry in a more sombre mood.  I have found this round of chemotherapy the hardest since the first round, not that it was really different from rounds 2 to 5.  The problem has been my mental attitude.  I have not felt as optimistic and positive as usual.  When I think of why this might be so, I think our two-day drive on Sunday and Monday from the Sunshine Coast to home was part of it.  I drove for almost three hours on the Sunday through very heavy rain from south of Ballina to Bowraville.  I drove again on the Monday morning but at least there was not much rain.  So, I think this tired me.

It is interesting to be subject to a slump in feeling when there is no logical reason this should be so.  Indeed, on Tuesday, I asked Dr Lisa about the cancer in my lymph nodes and bowel (which Barbara and I forgot to ask when we learned of the liver improvement).  The cancer in the lymph nodes has reduced about 30% as well.  The situation in the bowel is harder to tell but Dr Lisa thought the signs are positive because of the improvement in the liver and lymph nodes and no bleeding from the bowel since just after the first round of chemo.

Indeed there is cause for optimism as I am about halfway through my treatments – only another six or seven to go!

I am listening to American Christian country music as I write this with kookaburras cackling outside.  The kookaburras have been very vocal this morning.  I think they are celebrating a beautiful sunny day after all the rain we have experienced this week – an interesting juxtaposition of sounds.

Today I am having lunch with friends from my days as secretary of BRI Australia.  I am looking forward to spending time with them as it is a couple of years since I have seen them.  As it is Friday, Barbara is volunteering at the Petersham Opportunity Shop, associated with Petersham Baptist Church.

This picture shows the patchwork glazed vase that our daughter made for Barbara at her pottery class and gave to Barbara last night.  The vase sits on a desk made by my Dad more than 50 years ago together with the two back jugs from Barbara's Uncle Al and the leaves sent to me by a friend, Michelle, when she heard of my situation.  So a special desk is holding special things.

Sunshine

Barbara and I decided to have a quieter time between my chemotherapy treatments and have spent most of the time on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, which is north of Brisbane.

Friday June 3 I enjoyed catching up with Phillip, who was our investment adviser a few years ago.  Then he was single.  Now he is happily married with two young daughters.  So, naturally, our conversation included the wonder and joy of families as well as the challenges.

On the way to the Sunshine Coast

From Saturday to Monday we journeyed to the Sunshine Coast.  Saturday we travelled as far as Grafton in northern NSW.  We stopped at Hungry Head along the way.  Hungry Head is where many family Easter holidays were spent and in more recent times I have gone to write.  I enjoyed an hour or so on the beach while Barbara read her a book in the car.  In Grafton we stayed in the Abbey Motel, next to the cathedral, close to the town centre; enjoyed an evening stroll around the town and then had a slow, tasty Chinese dinner at a restaurant.  Sunday morning we had a buffet breakfast at a hotel on the river – very pleasant view.

Sunday we meandered up to the Gold Coast travelling along the Summerland Highway to Casino stopping for petrol, then down the Bruxner Highway to Lismore for morning coffee, on into Ballina and Lennox Head or lunch.  A short stop in Byron Bay and then we were back on the Pacific Highway.  We arrived for our stay with John and Lynn mid afternoon.  We enjoyed catching up with their family, including a stroll around through the nature reserve and nearby lakes, talking and playing games and the next day travelling with John and Lynn through some quaint old towns in northern NSW – Crabbes Creek, Burringbar, Stokers Siding and Tumblegum where we had a delicious lunch in a restaurant by the Tweed River.  As we were leaving in the mid afternoon, Lynn spotted a koala high in a tree behind their neighbour’s house.  For years when I have visited I have been told of the koalas living nearby.  So, it was wonderful to finally see one, living in the wild, in the nature reserve that runs behind their property.  I think it is pretty special to have koalas as neighbours!

With John on our afternoon walk

Late afternoon sun on lake during our afternoon walk

Dinner at their home

At the restaurant in Tumblegum for lunch

On the Sunshine Coast

The drive from the bottom of the Gold Coast to the bottom of the Sunshine Coast took a little over two hours.  We checked into our Worldmark accommodation at Golden Beach Golden Beach, where all the apartments face east and overlook the Pumicestone_Passage to the northern tip of Bribie Island .  To the northeast we could see Caloundra, a major urban centre on the southern end of the Sunshine Coast.  While we were there I enjoyed receiving daily poems from Terry Barker who lives on the Sunshine Coast in Canada, north of Vancouver.

We relaxed enjoying walking, reading crosswords, playing games, watching Home Improvement (courtesy of my brother lending us the DVDs) series 1 and half of series 2 DVDs, coffee and dinner out, on sunny days sitting at the table on our balcony for breakfasts and lunches enjoying the view – very pleasant and refreshing spending four days alone together.  We have been through a lot in the last few months and this was our first time away on our own.

Sunrise as seen from our balcony

Along Pumicestone Passage with Caloundra in background

Our time started sunny but by Thursday it was cold and cloudy weather for the Sunshine Coast.  Owners of a local café we have found that serves good coffee and great homemade slices said it was like August winter weather.

Friday morning the weather was much improved with large areas of blue sky and sunshine occasionally streaming across our balcony into our apartment.  We enjoyed walking south beside the Pumicestone Passage to lunch at the Power Boat Club then continuing our walk around to and into Bells Creek.  There we spent over half an hour watching the forty odd pelicans – sitting on house boats, sitting in the water, landing in the water, flapping their wings in the water and fluffing them out to dry.  Several small motor dinghies came in to the boat ramp.  We watched them load their boats on to their trailers and bring their fish over to the cleaning area to remove the scales and throw away the innards.  So, too, the pelicans were watching.  About six of them came over along with a number of sea gulls and waited for the fishermen to throw them the scraps from the fish.

Row boat - Pumicestone Passage at inflow of Bells Creek

Pelicans on a houseboat

Pelicans and sea gulls gathering for fish innards

Size wins!

Saturday our son, living in Brisbane, and his partner arrived late morning and stayed with us until we left on Sunday.  My son and I played about 25 games of backgammon.  The four of us worked on, but did not finish a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and we played a few games of yahtzee.  We went out to the close by Thai restaurant for dinner and had coffee out on Sunday morning before we said goodbye.  They talked about their preliminary wedding plans with the date being set in March 2012.  We, the excited parents, wait for the plans to unfold.

Working on jigsaw in our apartment

On the way from the Sunshine Coast

Sunday was a tough drive to Bowraville due to the heavy rain encountered, especially in the latter part of the journey, when I was the driver.  We stayed with our long time friend, Pat.  We enjoyed talking through the evening: I went to bed around 10.00 pm while Barbara and Pat talked on till midnight.

Monday we left at 8.00 am and arrived home at 2.30 pm.   We were glad we left so early.  The news on the car radio mentioned traffic delays at Bulahdelah.  We had previously passed through Bulahdelah in heavy traffic that moved at a reasonable speed.  While driving through Bulahdelah we saw a light truck in front of us run into the car in front, which suffered a crushed back-end due to the truck’s bull bar.  The traffic arises from all the travellers returning to Sydney on the last day of the Queen’s Birthday long weekend.

So, here I am late afternoon finalising this blog entry.  I’ve put out the rubbish and am aiming to go to bed early to be refreshed for chemo round 6 tomorrow!

As usual I have the underlying feeling of queasiness and, I confess, it has bugged me a bit this time.  But I remind myself of how the chemo bad effects are being minimised and the good effects maximised.  I find it important to talk to myself about how well I am as I undergo chemotherapy.  Many people experience great discomfort.  I do not.  So, keeping things in perspective is a very important part of my coping.

Reaching the Third Floor

Our daughter turns 30.  One of her friends at her work said that turning 30 was reaching the third floor!

On her birthday, we celebrated with a wonderful home cooked meal and cake at Club 55.  We will be joined by more family for a special degustation dinner on June 25 at Restaurant Atelier http://www.restaurantatelier.com.au/ in Glebe for the main celebration!

Our main course was calamari, fish, prawn (shrimp) were cooked separately.  Mussels were cooked in white wine.  The mussels were placed in the six bowls, together with the other seafood.  The wine and mussels juice sauce was poured over the top on to which parsley was sprinkled.

The lavish hazelnut and lime meringue with chocolate cream cake was a Master Chef recipe.  Barbara experienced some production hassles but our sons helped her achieve an outstanding result.

The present theme was jewellery including three very different and beautiful necklaces and lovely pearl earrings.

Enjoy the pictures of our joyous celebration of this happy event.

Chemo Round 5

Chemo round 5 – Monday 30 May to Wednesday 1 June began with good news from my doctor and finished celebrating Alison’s 30th birthday (a separate blog entry).

30% liver cancer reduction

Monday Barbara came with me as I saw my oncologist, Dr Lisa Horvath, and received the results of the CT scan taken last Wednesday.

The CT scan shows that on average, the cancer in the liver has reduced about 30% over the last two months.  The three liver function indicators that were bad when first measured two months ago in a blood test and are being measured before each round of chemo; show one indicator returned to normal levels after the first round of chemo, the second is just above normal as of Monday and the third has halved and heading towards becoming normal.

In simple terms, the doctor’s prognosis of 2 to 5 years of life holds.  I am hoping that the rate of shrinking will increase a little so that at the end of 6 months, there is no cancer in the liver!  Lisa said we can be very happy with the progress so far.  She did not talk about the cancer in the lymph nodes or the bowel and we did not ask.

Ebbs and flows

As in the other chemo rounds, my queasiness increased on Wednesday and continued today, Thursday.  Having felt so good, I had forgotten this and so felt a little shocked when I felt queasy on Wednesday.

The chemotherapy is a two-week cycle that is affecting my body similarly each time.  The anti nausea tablet Kytril and the anti nausea liquid that starts the treatment on the first day can cause constipation, which means that the first bowel movement is always hardest.  By the tenth day one or two movements can be runny.  The queasiness follows a similar pattern except a couple of days behind. 

In the time between rounds 4 and 5 I had some mild bleeding from the nose.  Dr Lisa said this was a common chemo side effect in winter.  The cold weather plays on the chemo-weakened membrane.  With warmer temperatures the last few days there has been no bleeding.

So, I am writing this entry feeling queasy.  Please remember, this is a mild reaction to the chemotherapy compared with what I can see in some of the patients that are around me at the hospital every second Monday.

Emotional flows and expressions

At Al’s 30th birthday (next blog entry), people expressed that my blog tends to be factual being descriptions of what is happening and what I am doing.  I have thought on this.  Part of the reason is because I am aware of others with cancer suffering far more and dying and I am not wanting to ‘big note’ myself or sound like I am glorying in my good fortune.

In my last blog entry I mentioned friends receiving a phone call on the Sunday of a neighbour dying from cancer.  Monday I received an email from Gary, a friend from Springwood Baptist days.  His sister, in her fifties, died from a brain tumour on Monday 21 May with the funeral on the Wednesday.  My Canadian friend Terry, who came to Australia in the late 1980s and 1990 to run Think on Your Feet® for Arthur Young and Ernst and Young, sent an email on Tuesday to advise that his wife, Connie’s brother had died of bone cancer in December.  So, on three consecutive days I learn of deaths from cancer.  I am glad these friends let me know their sad news.  I am being reminded all the time about the individual journeys that people have with cancer.  How can I glory too much in my own good situation?

How do I feel?  Overall, I am very happy.  I am surrounded by the love of my family and friends.  I have much to be happy about.  Therefore, when I talk of the times I am spending with people, the places I am going, the events I am celebrating: I am expressing my happiness.  I am finding these times uplifting through the conversations, the shared meals, the events we are celebrating, the places we visit and the things we see.  It was fun seeing the goats and sheep at the Leaning Oak on the Mudgee weekend with Lesley and Stephen.  It was uplifting at the lookout at Hardys Bay lookout that we walked up to with Barbie and Hugh last weekend.  I feel teary with happiness even as I write this.

Contrast this with going in to have my chemo bottle removed, yesterday.  In looking around the chemo patients undergoing their treatment I see this woman around my age softly crying.  Her catheter has been inserted and she is awaiting the chemo treatment to start.  Her husband is sitting with her, not saying a word, obviously feeling so sad for his wife.  How can I but feel sad too as I do now as I write this!  I have burst into tears.  I do not know why she was so sad.  It could have been from the pain of the catheter being inserted.  It could be the uncertainty and anxiety from awaiting the chemo treatment to start.  It could be simply a feeling of desolation as she wonders what her journey will be like.

As I write this I am listening to John Denver who captures emotions so well in his songs.

So, what is my underlying emotion and feeling?  Overall, I am feeling contented and happy.  It seems I simply adjusted to having to live with cancer.  I did not get angry or fearful.  I thought and think of it as moving into a new phase in my life and, as I have said, living it as best I can.  It is a phase that I would prefer not to have.  I am glad I went public as I am still uplifted by all the wonderful emails and various phone calls and visits where you expressed such support for me, Barbara and our family.  Those words still ring in my head and heart and help me keep stable.  Indeed, the response from the recent general update email has provided another boost.  Your love, thoughts and prayers are part of my underlying contentment and happiness.  And close at hand, is the wonderful love and support from Barbara and my children. 

In whatever time I have left, I want to continue in and build on these wonderful relationships through sharing over the internet, by phone and in person at home and in other places.  So, it was so good to have Peter and Jennifer come to lunch today, Thursday.  Tonight I am having dinner at Ben’s place and we are playing Scrabble together.