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.
No comments:
Post a Comment