December 30, Tropical Garden

The bear has stolen Christmas!  Not to be deterred by the loss of wine (which is now tasteless, sadly, and mixes badly with the medications) the bear has found cassis.  A tear of cassis, mixed with ice, plenty of mineral water, and a slice of lemon, is not only palatable, but in the right glass, it is a truly celebratory drink.  We drank to her health.  We drank to my health.  Friends, we drank to your health too!  Joyfully, it was a cassis Christmas! 

The bear is pleased by the heavy snow that now covers the trees and the meadow.  She is tired.  Her left arm, in particular, is ever troublesome.  But, not to be discouraged by expectations of both cold weather and helplessness in the months to come, our stealthy bear has been searching her den for possibilities.  Inspired by the orchid left for us by my father, she gathered, first her energies, then me, Greg, and Robyn together for a drive to Peterborough.  Like bandits, we entered the city quickly, and left decisively, with no less than 12 more orchid plants!  These flowers are now joined in our sunroom by 6 African violets.  My friends, it was also a tropical Christmas!

“It’s like I have two bodies,” Angela says, “one that is working to get better, the other that is just waiting.”  

The working body aches.  It changes shape.  Her face is swollen.  Her glasses, now resting on her cheeks rather than her nose, fall occasionally.  Her feet burn for some reason.  Her nose bleeds.  We look carefully at the hump on her back, and agree it is bigger.  The creases of her skin are dry, and her skin, somehow, most certainly, is thinner.  Angela says that all of this is the body’s work.  It bends, as it must, with the treatments, and against the disease.

The body that waits ponders, cautiously.  It wonders what will be left when the work is done.  What will it then do?  

She finished her steroids yesterday.  Today, Angela is mostly sleeping. 

Between working to get well, and just waiting, Angela, our bear, steals what she can.  Somehow, when we least expected it, she stole Christmas.  While I tried to celebrate “in the usual way”, she filled the room with flowers.  I am endlessly moved by her magical powers.  Happily, I am stolen too.  We are waiting together.  Together, we are pondering what we will become, and together we expect to stay strong.  We insist.

Friends, let us all steal what we can from the New Year!  We wish you all well.  Let us be in touch.

December 23, Forest View

Rocky, who is capable of more facial expression than I am, has lately been wearing such a look of confusion.  He sees Angela moving so slowly.  Things previously done in a rush, now take utmost care and attention.  “He’s asking ‘why?’” Angela says.  “Why is this happening?  What’s the meaning of all this?”  We look to Rocky to find our own bewilderment.

Angela’s steroid dose is now a quarter of what it initially was.  Perhaps this is why her left arm is more numb in recent days.  She is generally weaker.  Pain now returns more fiercely when her medication “runs out.”   She tries to keep a window between herself and her emotions, and to witness them as though watching weather against the forest outside, but storms are now passing.  There have been more tears.  She has screamed at God.  The steroid medication that had picked her up is now dropping her.

Thankfully, again, we are home.  There is now a sheet of snow on the meadow.  I finished work yesterday for the holidays.   We will be together, Angela and I, with Rocky and our cat, Alice, this weekend, and all of next week.  We will fill our fridge today with proper celebratory foods that will include lots of milk and honey.  Sacred music will scream from our stereo.  The fire will burn.  With the help of my brother, Greg, and his wife, Robyn, who arrive today to be with us for the week as well, I am sure we will have frequent laughs.  Often, as well, we will stare at each other in bewilderment. 

The bear, by outward appearances, seems to be doing very little, a full afternoon spent changing her bed linens, but, day and night, she has a dragon by the tail.  My friends, we are with her in her frustration, her determination, and her fear.  We suffer that she must bare so much of it herself.  When her nose bled suddenly last evening I tended to it with a white towel.  She commented on how like ink the blood was.  Afterward we ate Tarta de Espagnol. and watched a British sit-com.  What can we do?  We re-contemplated our vegetarianism.  Whatever it takes.

Bewildered or afraid, amused or anguished, we will keep you posted.

December 18, Bear's Den

My friends, can we, in our current circumstance, accept that a homecoming could coincide with an anniversary by mere accident?  We prefer trust, rather, that invisible hands are involved, the same mad yet generous hands, no doubt, that brought Angela and I together so many years ago.  Could we let this moment pass then without due ceremony?  My friends, we did our best.

Angela is home.  We met with the surgeon on Thursday after her last of 25 radiation treatments.  We talked with him, only briefly, about surgery.  Sure, not much has improved since we saw him five weeks ago, but, as he emphasized, not much is worse.  He said that he has seen many things in his time.  He has seen these kinds of tumours wait for many weeks after radiation to show signs of response, and then go on to completely remit.  True, only time will tell, but, shutting his eyes and shaking his head, he was quick to dismiss the idea of surgery now.  The hazards, he says, are not worth the potential benefits as long as things are stable and there is still a chance that other treatments will work.  And as for the hole the tumour will hopefully leave in Angela's spine?  Well, we don't know.  The surgeon has seen very big holes fill in with "solid enough" scar tissue to keep the spine stable, while in other cases comparatively smaller holes create "problems".  How often the surgeon, in his experience, has seen this rather than that, we could not gather.  Time will tell.  Angela is prepared to do whatever she has to, so, for now, she will be patient.  Invisible hands are at work.  The surgeon's hands will wait.

We were helped, in our humble celebration this weekend, by our good friends Terry, Catherine, and Lou who arrived to our barn shaped home last night as though to Bethlehem.  They brought with them wonderful gifts that included a Christmas cake, sparkling champagne, and, carved out of stone, a dancing polar bear.  While we honour invisible hands, we are mindful as well of how much our life together, Angela's and mine, has been shaped by visible hands too.  Very much in our thoughts this weekend is my father who returned to Winnipeg yesterday morning after a month of trustworthy and careful attention to our home, our animals, and us.  Among other things my father left with us an orchid plant which, wonderfully, comes with the instruction to feed it three ice cubes once per week.  How happy we will be if we can turn ice into life all winter!

This afternoon Rocky and I shared in Angela's fatigue.  Soon after our friends departed this morning we were all asleep, she on the couch, Rocky and I on the floor in front of the fire.  It seems all I managed to do today, before writing this, is sleep, and, at timely intervals, add logs to the fire.  We held on for the celebration, now we rest.  The bear remains tired.  Her paws remain clumsy.  But she is swallowing food better already, and, so importantly, she is back in her den.

I am very happy not to be driving to Kingston tomorrow morning.  We will return to Kingston sometime in January to meet the oncologist and discuss chemotherapy.  Hopefully we won't see the surgeon again before two months.   In the meantime we remain so grateful to all our friends who have sent the warmest thoughts and messages to us in these times.  From near and from far, through invisible hands, we are moved by your thoughts.  We will be in touch.

December 13, Room 314

“I don’t do much, I just am,” Angela said smiling.  “It’s already very, very tiring.”

The bear’s arms have gotten very thin, her body large. 

Last night I caught her looking at her hands.  “It’s odd,” she said, “they look like someone else’s hands, not mine.”   She dropped the dog’s bowl on the weekend.  She dropped her glasses twice. She puts her iphone on a flat surface to type a message.  If she holds it to type, her left arm grows numb. 

I left Angela this morning in room 314 of Confederation Place Hotel, the same room we had arrived to so triumphantly not even a month ago.  

It’s better not to wonder why her arms are no stronger, perhaps weaker, than before.   This morning, like most mornings since we have been together, we had coffee with foamed milk.  

It’s better not to worry about why she still needs as much pain medication now as she did a month ago.  

This morning we spoke, as we usually do, about what we dreamt last night.  We are proud of her perseverance.  When I am dressed for work, as usual, she tells me I look…perfect.  We are awake in the night when pains are still soothed with milk and honey.  We still, nevertheless, enjoy a good pain au chocolat with our café au lait, and, still, each day, there is work to be done.

We knew when Angela started radiation therapy that improvements could be quite delayed.  Now we count on it.  Better not do as I am bound and read too much into Angela’s persistent symptoms, especially since, without question, there is another triumph at hand.  Thursday is her last radiation treatment. On the same day we meet the surgeon.    The end is a new beginning.   We don’t know if we even scored a goal, but we are claiming a victory.  Angela is coming home.   We will be ready for the next step.

Angela, let’s build a fire.  Please, we will put up some lights, turn on some music, and let’s both wear jewelry.  If you’re the bear, I’ll be the knight.  Please Angela, let’s kill that dragon!   I love your thin arms.  Let’s celebrate 15 years, and, above all, let’s plan 15 more!  

And friends, the school term is over.  Let’s all enjoy the holidays.  And let’s, of course, be in touch.

December 8, Canadian Shield

The landscape changes as I drive north.  Still wet and rainy in Springbrook, after about twenty minutes everything turns white.  Rock becomes more prominent.  There are fewer signs of habitation.  I become mindful of wild animals.  I think of ice and polar bears, the symbols of our current circumstance.  It is my weekly flirtation with solitude and desolation.  I’d like to attend completely to the landscape, and make my mind as still and quiet as it is, but as I drive I am haunted, oddly, by the films of Alexander Sokurov.  Completely unentertaining, sleep inducing, but so hypnotic, the images from his film, Mother and Son, have returned to my mind so beautifully and so painfully in recent weeks.  I cannot remember how that film ends.

My office in Bancroft is at the end of a hall in a new, large, well appointed medical clinic.  As I am the only doctor there on Wednesdays the large waiting room is eerily empty, and the whole place is quiet all day.  There are a couple of chairs at the end of the hall as well.  A patient is magically there when I open the door every hour.  I speak with them carefully and with utmost patience.

I am very lucky to have this weekly pilgrimage.  Time is passing, and we need the right rhythm.  Angela and I are mostly waiting.  Our life is very much a Sokurov film.  She is fatigued.  She has now worn this large plastic collar around her neck constantly for over a month.  She remains, painfully yet reassuringly, stable.  Her thoughts are calmer.

Her horoscope has reminded her that there has been, to date, mostly fire and air in her stars, not much earth.  She has had a lot of moving around in her life.  She welcomes the idea of being grounded in Springbrook soon, a place where, indeed, there is very little soil above the bedrock.  We still wait to hear from the surgeon next week, but maybe we can have the holidays at home.  Until then the bear, as we know, has plenty of stones around her now, including a Northern Saint George

We trust our friends are patient with us.  We will be in touch.

December 4, Hilltop

I dreamt last night that I was driving along the shoreline of a lake.  (It should not surprise us that even in my dreams I am driving.)  It was a beautiful but cold day.  I was pleased to come upon a view, looking off a hill, to a beach below. There were people swimming, launching small boats, and otherwise having fun.  Once pleased, I was no sooner horrified to see, amongst the children in the water, great chunks of ice, and to look further out from shore at snow covered glaciers drifting inward.  I was compelled, in my dream, to take a photo.

Angela tries to do a few things each day.  Yesterday, with brave determination, she enjoyed a manicure at a  spa in Stirling.  Later she prepared her cloths for the upcoming week.  She is a picture of contentment and energy in these tasks when suddenly she says, "Yep, I think I have exhausted my 5 minutes of energy."  We were warned that fatigue would be a prominent side effect of radiation therapy, and it is.  The trick, it would seem, is not to fight it, but to work with it.  In her "becoming bear" Angela has found an animal's rhythm, quite in keeping with Rocky's, whose long day stretched in front of the fire is punctuated only by the occasional and brief exploration of the meadow.

We have returned her steroid dose to its original level, because after reducing it, the pain, numbness and weakness in Angela's arms increased noticeably.  Alas, we will try again soon.

At night she enjoys listening to The Sacred Bridge, a beautiful compilation of christian and Jewish music of the middle ages.  Like angels singing from another world, it reliably brings her to tears.  "You cannot not cry," she says...but this I know.   Proust, The Sacred Bridge, and each other, we have the right company for these tearful moments, and we choose the right moments.  We also watched part of a movie last evening, Pirates of the Caribbean.  Johnny and Penelope were good company too!

And so, within a week, we both dream of swimming.  December 15, the day after Angela's last scheduled radiation treatment, marks 15 years that we have been together.  At the outset of our relationship neither of us expected we would be so lucky.  Perhaps we didn't know the extent to which we shared the same dreams.  We also couldn't have counted on the encouragement and understanding of so many very good friends over the years, friends with whom we intend...to keep in touch.

December 1, Galaxy

Time for Angela is now measured by the ferry passing back and forth outside her window.  She says she enjoys watching the clouds, and the way the light changes through the day in its reflection off  the Royal Military College across the bay.  She reassures me that she does not feel lonely.  She claims to be lucky to have this time for thought. 

The radiation technicians are impressed by how well she can "reposition" herself so accurately each day on the treatment table.  They also remark most favorably on her ability to stay still.  Angela says that these feats are only natural for her as they represent the only and most important work she has to do these days.  Her focus, however, does not deter her from noticing how the radiation machine is like a constellation.  She pleases the admiring technicians by saying that with the lights and movements of this machine, lying on the table is like moving through planets and stars.

It is not lost on us that finding the right position at any given moment is no small thing.   In fact for weeks now, sleep, or leisurely contemplation as the case may be, has only been possible by Angela's careful achievement and maintenance of a single position through the proper placement of pillows, limbs, neck and so on.  The radiation technologists are probably unaware of how much practice has gone into repositioning and staying still in Angela's case.  They are nevertheless right, of course, in admiring her. 

For the most part we felt prepared for whatever thoughts or memories present themselves to Angela at this time, as she moves through the planets or watches the ferry come and go from her view.  We anticipated insights. We did not, however, anticipate foreign thoughts.  As it happens Angela has been troubled by occasional "violent" ideas.  Devoid of impulse and clearly "odd" relative to any idea she has had before, these thoughts are puzzling in how unAngela they are.  I reassure her that if the thoughts are not coming from her, it's more likely the steroids sending them than the tumour.   With this in mind we welcomed a reduction in Angela's steroid dose yesterday and are waiting to see what a lower dose means.  Angela, in the meantime, remains patient as ever.  The types of thoughts of which we speak pass Angela by as planets or ferries anyway, and she shows no actual signs of violence at all. 

I too am a ferry these days, still back and forth between hotel and home.  Although there can be stillness within motion, I am looking forward to real stillness this weekend when we expect to have Angela at home and I expect to stay put.  We will keep you posted.