Back from Vacation

It was a beautiful vacation in Los Cabos, Mexico.

The resort was gorgeous. We swam and relaxed. Just lovely.

The beach and ocean were breath takingly beautiful.

I did a whole lot of this, just being lazy.

Glad to have had the time away. Glad to be home.

Falling Words

And the words slip from me,
joy and passion and happiness.

Do you want to feel with me?
Do you need to share with me?

And the touches of reality
are lost in the spaces between
the falling words...

The only things I feel anymore
are the heartbeats too erratic
and a breath that comes labored.

Ache upon ache, only to be split apart,
only to be rent.

I know that time will be
the tale worth telling
but by what measurement will it be?

Share with me
Feel with me
Free me from this

And I slip away
quietly.

On Mom...

I haven't felt much like writing. And mom being a writer too she is probably disappointed in me for that. Times of struggle are times to write, to express the emotions that are swirling, to sort out the chaos of your mind with pencil and paper. But this cancer scared the holy crap out of me as it snuck back into our lives. Mom is healthy, she eats better than me, she gets more exercise than me, she is young, she is at peace living on her mountain volunteering her time for half a dozen committees that do community service... she should not be sick.

But she is.

But the first round of chemo has been pumped into her body. She had to stay in the hospital for it for seven days as her platelets were to low to surgically put the pump in her chest that would have allowed her to stay at home and have the chemo administered that way. Nearly every day I call and talk to her. She is back home on her mountain again resting, eating well, healing, letting the chemotherapy do what it is supposed to do. In a couple weeks she will have another round, eventually 5-6 rounds of chemo. He blood numbers say it is doing what it is supposed to, but no real results will come for quite a while. The waiting is difficult. But life and healing can take time.

Thank you to all who wished me well here and via email. Your support really does mean so very much to me. And for my mom I will try and write more the next few weeks about living more than this as Mom is more about living than this pesky cancer any day.

Love and peace to you all as you all give me back the same.

LJ

Of Waldenstrom's macro-globulinemia

Waldenstrom's macro-globulinemia has come back ten years after being pushed from my mother's body. She is young (now 58) and healthy and happy. And it has come back and taken her health with a vengence. Do you think it has a memory, it is a living thing seeking revenge for us trying to kill it ten years ago? She is in the hospital. The cancer is stopping her bones from making blood and so every moment when blood cells do what cells do in your body do and they die they are not being replaced with new cells. And the cancer is trying so very hard to kill her. The chemo will try very hard to kill the cancer. Again.

I can barely breath for the worry of it. It is so ominous, so horrendous to even consider. My mother is strong. My mother is a warrior. My mother is fighting this with a calm and peace that it amazing. She will take the poisonous chemo into her body and allow it to attack the cancer. I will try to offer her calm and peace and all my love as she does battle with this killer.

I can not comprehend a life without my mother in it. She is a force that is central to everything. And yet this returning cancer is wrapping its tentacles around our lives in the most insidious way. I will love her every moment with all my heart, for a moment is sometimes all we have. A thousand moments you take for granted or a single moment that you treasure and hold onto with all your might. They are gift afforded us by hope and sometime hindsight. I love my mother, she knows this. My mother loves me, I know this. The cancer has no power even as it does it worst for it can never kill our love.

New Boyfriend

Thank you all for your kind thoughts about my silly back injury. Glad to report it is all better. Work has been crazy busy, mostly because I work for a crazy boss who chews up and spits out the woman we find willing to do the front office position. They do a lot of typing and work directly for him and he is hard to please. Another one has been fired and still not sure what exactly was wrong. So I have to wade through another mile high stack of resumes and try to find the perfect fit that won't go running, crying her eyes out after three days. He just wants exactly what he wants when he wants it, which is a boss' perogative. Just finding the right person who can give it to him is a challenge.

On a personal note I think I have found a guy to throw off my husband for. Yes, Hubby is great, loves me, takes great care of me, is caring and warm, affectionate and fun. But come on... he isn't yellow and balding, and who could resist that?

Oh, Homer... let's go have a Duff and a donut....

Mmmmmm... donut.

Dumb Injury

So I couldn't decide where to post this post. I mean, I am in pain so I thought perhaps Despair, Devastation & Dysfunction but that seems a bit to melodramatic for this bit of stupidness. So I thought to come to you for my sympathy. I have hurt my back. At 8:07 this morning (and I know the time only because my boss had asked me the time at 8:06 and this happened one minute later) I sneezed. Just an ordinary sneeze... achhhooo... bless you.... ohhhh crap. The pain raditated from that spot just above the bottom and felt like a fire was burning. And I began to cuss, and cuss some more.

The phone rang, I had to take the call. I am sure the person on the other end was wondering if I was having an erotic sexual experience as I gasped and my breathing grew labored. But alas nothing enjoyable about this stupid sneezing back aching injury. Just pain and more pain. And it isn't even like you can expect any real sympathy as in the telling people they just start laughing.

So I will keep taking asprin, and when I get home turn on the heating pad. But in the mean time... owwwwww.

Hey you... stop laughing.

Cliché Incorporated

Written as a response to a prompt to be as cliche'd as possible.

_________________________________________


The ball was in her court and Brenda knew she could talk the talk and walk the walk because this time she had thought outside the box and was pushing the envelope and now she was on a stepping stone to broaden her horizons, yes, she now could see the big picture. At her interview she had gone the extra mile, hadn’t beat around the bush as she had cast her net while going forward with their dog and pony show. Now Brenda had a decisively categorical game plan and at the culmination of this new day her end goal was that they would know she had hit the ground running. This new job was a building block that would dovetail with her strategy to become a head honcho. Not like her preceding job where she had not covered all her bases and had left no fallback position when she had pushed a paradigm shift and in the end she had burned her bridge when she had not kept her boss in loop in what she had thought was a no brainer.

Brenda’s take no prisoners attitude had left a bad taste in their mouths and she had been unable to do damage control and now she knew she had been wrong to put all her eggs in one basket because she had had to pay the piper a pretty penny. But after that debacle she had put her ducks back in a row, moved her goal posts and now she was in the zone, she was moving forward. Her slate was clean and it was time to put her finger in the pie of productivity, work to the program even if that meant she would have to slave for Mr. Big 24/7. She would be proactive, performant and come out shooting with both barrels while she kept her eye on the prize. Brenda opened the door to her future and pressed the flesh at the meet and greet and as she and the current BMOC talked shop she knew she had squared the circle and everything was back on track.

Yes, Brenda knew she had finally and truly found her niche here at Cliché Incorporated.

Hollywood Tourist

I have lived in California since I was twelve. Funny I have never done the Hollywood touristy thing until this past weekend. We were with some friends who had a friend in from out of town and we all ended up going into LA and walking down Hollywood Blvd. Looked at the stars on the sidewalk. It was Saturday so they were setting up the red carpet for the Oscars. That was fun to see in person.

Stopped at the Chinese Theater and did the stand in the star's footprint thing. Look my feet are exactly the same size as a duck's. :) If you ever come to California let me know, we will do something touristy together.... or the ultimate Hollywood thing... We'll do lunch.

Valentine's Day Conversation

This was written from a writing challenge at group where the goal was to write with no he said/she said tags. It was a fun little piece to work out.

______________________________

“Nathan?”
“Yes, my darling Julia.”
“Do you know what day it is?”
“Oh, that’s always a dangerous question. I didn’t forget our anniversary did I?”
“No, that was two months ago.”
“Did I miss your birthday?”
“No, don’t you remember, you quoted me that wonderfully romantic poem you composed. Much better than any flowers or candy could ever be now.”
“Well, than I’m sorry my love, I do not know what day it is. What have I forgotten?”
“It’s Valentine’s Day, Nathan. Our first date all those many, many, many years ago.”
“Oh, Sweet Pea how could I have forgotten that?”
“Do you remember where we went Nathan?”
“Of course, I remember everything about that day. I took you to Seaside Park. You were the prettiest girl there.”
“Oh, you always say the nicest things.”
“Well, you were. You wore that white sundress and flowers in your hair. I was quite smitten you know?”
“Oh, and you … so very handsome. And so nervous. Well, I guess we both were nervous. Blind dates seldom work out quite as well as ours.”
“And you insisted we ride the coaster five times if I remember correctly.”
“No, I believe it was six.”
“You always did love a thrill my sweetness.”
“You’re the biggest thrill in my life Nathan.”
“What would I do without you?”
“Well, probably not much. These golden years are certainly not very exciting. But we do have each other.”
“Yes, and that is all I have needed these years. When you and I made the decision I thought perhaps that I might grow bored, but living without you was not, is not, ever an option. I have never been bored with you.”
“Oh Nathan, I love you. Happy Valentine’s Day.”
“Darling Julia, I love you more and more every moment we are together. Happy Valentine’s Day to you.”
“Nathan, do you remember the time we…..”

___________________

Forevercorp, Inc.
Med-Journal Entry #0088826 –
Date 2/14/2399 – Time 14:39
Adora Sung / Cerebral Mainline Technician
Both subjects na998/male and ju999/female are stable and functioning at peak levels. Routine fluid replacement on na998/male subject was performed at 08:30 with no noticeable adverse reaction from subject. Both subjects continue to interact at optimal levels. At 13:30 ju999/female had a brief displacement of electrical current that if allowed to continue could cause overloading in na998/male’s centerline. Recommend rewiring of ju999/female’s cerebral cortex main line within the next month. Both subjects will need to be rewired simultaneously to avoid any possible contamination with core cerebral circuits.

______________________

Adora Sung looked up to the shelf directly in front of her at the two brains floating in plexi-glass containers of fluorescent green hydro-liquid. The compuscreen to her left continued to reflect their loving conversation and Adora felt suddenly as if she was eavesdropping. Cataloging their forty-three years worth of printouts had been her first job at Forevercorp. She had grown to know all there was to know about Nathan and Julia’s love and yet the tenderness of it still touched her. Reaching up she flicked off the monitor as she pushed the button for the vidphone to call Jerome. She needed to tell him she loved him, after all it was Valentine’s Day.

Ahhhh... lovely vacation

Monday and Tuesday in the mountains in the snow.

Thursday and Friday on the ocean in the sun.

We had a lovely time.

Lazy days, eating too much, doing very little. A perfect four days.