Writer’s Note – I’ve been on an extended hiatus for about three months.  So, I first want to say “Thank You” to all of you who continue to stop by and check out my blog.  This blog and several to follow have been accumulating in my head for quite a while.


July 15, 2014 – A very happy, happy birthday today to the love of my life!  Words cannot even begin to express how much I love my wife.  She is absolutely everything to me: my partner, my lover, my best friend, my true confidant…I think the list goes on and on.

Happy Birthday!

It’s because of my all-consuming love for Vicki that my journey alternates between expectation and wonder and total dread.  We have been through so much joy, happiness, sorrow, sadness, and frustration that I continue to feel guilty for being sick.  Vicki continues to tell me, in that positive way that she does, that I am not “sick” and I’m alive and healthy.  It’s one of truly wonderful things about her and our relationship: she’s always looking at the glass as half full, and I, unfortunately, continue to look at the glass as half empty.  Although I will admit that her influence on me has made me much more positive and stronger as a person.

So what’s a cancer-ridden old fart like me to do?  I know I should continue to feel blessed that my cancer is “under control” and I can live my life without many serious interruptions.  But as much as I try to put it out of my mind, I just don’t want to face that day.  The day when my diagnosis catches up to me.  It’s not fair
to Vicki or the kids or the rest of my family.  It just stinks!

In the meantime, I will continue to adore the love of my life and feel truly blessed that
we’re making this journey together.  There would be no other way for me to survive it.

Vicki, I love you so much!  Just thought you might want to hear it…again.

Father’s Day came and went with not much excitement for me, which seems a little strange.  I woke up that morning with expectations of a fun, relaxing day.  A day that was “mine.”  Unfortunately, I never quite got into a “Father’s Day groove.”  I certainly got paid enough attention – and gifts! – but I just felt more and more hollow as the day went on.  Maybe I expected too much from a day that has become bittersweet around our household.  Vicki and her sister, Alisa, miss their dad tremendously, and his death – as I mentioned in a prior post – left a significant hole in our lives.  For me, knowing that my dad can’t really celebrate “Dad’s Day” because of my mom’s continuing downward spiral with dementia also makes this day both frustrating and sad.  I can’t even begin to understand the emotional turmoil my dad faces when he wakes up each morning.  This day, for him, has become just like every other.

I even felt sad that my children did not give me personalized Father’s Day cards.  Along with my presents – and another carrot cake! – I got a nice card, signed by everyone in the family.  I began to feel jealous that for Mother’s Day Vicki got cards from the kids.  Cards with heartfelt messages about what a great mom she is.  (And she is!)  Do they not care about me?  Have I not been a good father?  Gee, do they understand that I have cancer?  I got myself tied up in knots more and more as the afternoon became early evening.  Finally, I was tired of mentally berating myself, and I just went to bed.

Having this sword hanging over my head has, at times, been more than I can bear (almost).  I have seriously thought that Vicki and the kids would be better off without me.  That my prolonged existence, while an obvious good thing, simply means that my “turn for the worse” has been delayed and will eventually come sometime in the near future.  Maybe it would be better to have it end, now, so that everyone can grieve and then move on with their lives.

It’s an incredible emotional roller coaster that I am on, and I need to acknowledge – to myself – that there will be good days and bad days.  Perhaps having Father’s Day come right before my next scan made me a little too introspective.  I do not feel sick, and I don’t anticipate a “bad report” next week.  It’s the uncertainty, however, that continues to reek havoc with my psyche.

As always, thanks for listening…

Am I blue?  I kind of look a little orange.

The latest on my melanoma…Continuing to sound like a broken record, but there’s nothing new to report at this time.  My health situation has not changed – although I’m getting fatter and lazier by the day.  The initial summer heat and humidity have put the clamps on my outdoor activities.  It will take time – like it did last summer – to get used to the heat, again.  On June 18th, I have a full PET scan to ensure that the cancer has (a) not moved to other parts of my body and (b) the remaining tumors in my right lung have not gotten any larger.  It’s always a time of tremendous stress because there are so many unknowns, and, frankly, I don’t want any new problems cropping up.  We’ll get the results back the following day, June 19th, so I’ll communicate that to anyone who is still interested.  I know I will likely never be “cured,” but I’d like some reassurances that this “beast” inside of me has gone away, once and for all.

Writer’s Note – I’ve been on hiatus for about three weeks.  Why?  I don’t know.  I’ve just been busy, or lazy, with other things.  This post, along with a couple of others, was written (but not published) at an earlier date.

As we ended the month of May (also known as My Birthday Month), Zach came home from a national quiz bowl tournament in Chicago – where he individually placed 31st out of 1,200 plus competitors!  (Wow!)  His flight arrived late the evening of June 1st, and our time as a family suddenly took a turn for the worse.  Around 2:30 Monday morning, Zach started to throw up.  It lasted for five or more hours, then he spent the remainder of Monday and much of Tuesday sleeping and eating very little.  At first we thought it was food poisoning, but no one else in his travel group got sick.

Tuesday evening came, and Vicki decided to go to bed a little early.  She had been in bed no more than thirty minutes when she began to get violently ill.  Vicki ended up sleeping downstairs, near the first floor bathroom, an old bucket situated next to the bed.  Around 1:00 AM on Wednesday, I began to toss and turn.  I couldn’t tell if I was feeling sick or just having problems sleeping.  At 2:30 AM, however, I knew the answer.  It came pouring out of me – again and again and again.  As I told someone later in the week, I don’t think I’ve puked that much since college.  Vomiting is just a disgusting act, and the feeling of helplessness – and dread – as you begin to retch, again, uncontrollably is something I don’t ever want to feel…ever, again!

Around 4:30 Wednesday morning, I was joined in my helplessness by the sound of someone else – upstairs – throwing up in the other bathroom.  It was Emily.  She, too, had succumbed to what we later labelled “Zach flu” – although she seemed to recover a little faster than the rest of us.  We ended up spending the next 72 hours of the ultimate in “down time.”  I don’t think I’ve missed that much work or done so very little over two plus days in a long long time.

While it wasn’t the “family time” vacation that we typically enjoy every summer, it was the most time the four of us had spent together since last summer’s trip to Canada.  (Note: Since we won’t have a “real” vacation this summer, I guess we had to improvise – ha, ha.)

Okay, so what’s with the rocks and sod strewn all over the place?  As you can see in the picture above, prior to getting sick, my Tuesday evening got off to a “wonderful” start when both Zach and Vicki informed me (via text) that the garden stones and Zoysia sod I ordered over the weekend had arrived – all over the end of our driveway!  To make matters worse, I was driving home from my six month check up with the dermatologist. (Who had removed a slight basal cell carcinoma from my back and otherwise hacked me up pretty good.)  I was not pleased in the least.

So, I took out my frustration on the sod, loading it into the wheelbarrow and lugging it to the front yard.  It was hot, muggy, and messy.  And, after an hour or so of laying down new sod, my exhaustion probably contributed to me getting sick as quickly as I did later that night.  All in all, it was a wonderful, wonderful Tuesday!  (Obvious extreme sarcasm in that last statement.)

On June 18th, I have a full PET scan to ensure that the cancer has (a) not moved to other parts of my body and (b) the remaining tumors in my right lung have not gotten any larger.  It’s always a time of tremendous stress because there are so many unknowns, and, frankly, I don’t want any new problems cropping up.  We’ll get the results back the following day, June 19th, so I’ll communicate that to anyone who is still interested.  I know I will likely never be “cured,” but I’d like some reassurances that this “beast” inside of me has gone away, once and for all.