use real butter

Lately I’ve felt as if I want to punch my surgeon. No, not Dr. McHottie, but my regular surgeon. I have all sorts of issues right now because of lymphedema in my left arm since my surgeon removed all of the lymph nodes in my arm pit. One of the nodes had cancer. When you first get a diagnosis and they tell you, “this needs to be removed” you just think, “yeah, do it.” You don’t think much about the potential side-effects down the road because you just want there to be a down the road. Of course, I don’t blame my surgeon for any of this - I’m quite grateful to him for my life, really. And he’s a good guy. It’s just that I have a desire to punch something that I can’t strike out at.

My past year has really brought home to me the relativity of our experiences. When Mom complained about having a head cold to me over the phone in the midst of my chemo treatment, I just pursed my lips and kept my mouth shut. I got a ton of emails from “friends” who didn’t really keep in touch with me asking, “So are you all better now?” It doesn’t quite work that way. I have scars and burns and tattoos on my body. The smell of certain liquid soaps brings me back to the sick feeling of my treatments. When I began to correspond with dear Barbara about her cancer, she mentioned a numbness in her feet that she still has three years after her chemo. I have that same problem with my feet, and it has only been 5 months.

I never sought out cancer support groups locally because I didn’t need that. I didn’t feel that I wanted to be a part of it, and I still don’t. Oddly, I have my own group that I discovered through blogging. People who had or have cancer whose blogs have intersected mine somehow and I felt comfortable enough to reach out to them - because it wasn’t a cancer patient I was looking for, but the friend in that person who happens to have been touched (nay, punched in the gut) by cancer. I hold my breath and continue to hope that folks like Cindy and Amy remain cancer-free. When one friend told me that she is terminal, I read that email and somehow the word drew a blank in my mind. It wasn’t chemo brain, but the jarring shock of a reality that could just as easily be mine. I can’t separate the reactions of sadness and fear - sadness for my friend, fear for my own self. These diseases are only a tiny thread of what we have in common and yet it is the thing that sends shivers reverberating down our collective spines.

Bee recently posted about Bri’s condition and my eyes scanned the words “hospice care” over again while I silently choked down the wave of tears that rose from my chest. [I just typed and deleted long tirade about people who think cancer happens for a “reason” other than the biological one. That is an utterly fucked up sentiment.] I have never met Bri, but we’ve corresponded - she is a fellow food blogger and breast cancer patient (I hate the word victim and I think the word survivor also sucks shit). I’ve written about Bri before. Even after she learned of the return of her stage IV cancer, she wrote upbeat and hilarious encouragement to me as I finished my own treatments. My issues pale in comparison to Bri’s. I carried Bri and others in my mind, in my heart whenever I met with my oncologist, with my surgeon. We are anecdotal and yet the collective WE becomes data. But we are so much more than just a statistic. I wanted to believe that Bri would overcome this hurdle because I want to believe that any of us could overcome it if that time comes.



Bee had asked what do you tell a friend in the darkest moment of their life?

We always hope deep in our hearts that things will turn around, but you would be a fool to ignore the reality. I have written a good-bye letter to a dying friend before. I have also whispered good-byes over my sister’s coffin because I never had the chance to do so in person. What I would have given to have a few last minutes with her. What do you say to someone who is dying? I know what I will write to Bri, although I will not stop hoping. I also know what I would want to hear if I were the one dying - and it is different now than what I would have wanted to hear before I had cancer. I suppose the most important thing for me would be to know that my friends and family are there. No drama, no histrionics, no religion… as I’ve learned, good intentions are no excuse for rude behavior. What I desire for myself and for others is to find peace in whatever way works for that individual.

Peace, dearest Bri.

We’re going with a short post tonight. This is the first weekend we’ve been home in a while and there were house things to take care of. It all started innocently enough this morning when I turned to Jeremy and said, “I’d like to take 20 minutes and sort the clothes in the closet so we can cull out any things to donate.” Four hours later the closets were completely reorganized, culled, cleaned. We rearranged the furniture in the office and I converted the perch to my sewing and knitting space (for the winter, at least). I went through the bathroom and boxed all of my cancer treatment meds, got rid of expired meds, organized the drawers and cabinets… And I packed our ski bin. This despite the 68°F weather outside. Jeremy resealed the driveway in the afternoon while I filed away important documents in between letting Kaweah back in and back out onto the deck.

Listening to NPR as I rushed about the house putting things away, I heard mention of Senator Ted Stevens’ trial and that wrap-around deck. When I let Kaweah out to potty, I looked about the side of the house and thought, “yeah, I’d like a wrap-around deck.”

I didn’t plan our menu this week with respect to the weather. I normally do, but didn’t have the time. So on a rather warm day, we ate Chinese hot pot for dinner this evening.

bowl of goodies

I’m trying to clear out the freezer, see. I like to stock up for the winter, but last winter I got waylaid by my diagnosis and things have been languishing and I haven’t been good about sorting through it all. I found half a flank steak the other day and thought hot pot would be a good way to use it up. I also found a ham bone and a frozen fish head. This is actually the second or third time my parents have left a fish head in my freezer since I have left home. It means they love me. Mmm, I’ll have to blog my dad’s bouillabaisse recipe this winter - and it starts with a fish head. It is amazing.

Okay kids, that’s it. I’ve neglected too many things (like emailing my buds) because of NaBloWriMo, so tonight I’m cutting it short. I’ll answer comments soon.

dang!

It looks like Manisha and Kitt have beaten me to it. That is what happens when food bloggers get together and eat food. They shoot the food, shoot each other shooting the food, then post about: the food and shooting the food and shooting each other shooting the food. I’ve learned to become quite comfortable taking pictures of my meals in restaurants, but I must admit it was rather entertaining when all three of us did so after the plates arrived. My peripheral vision is quite good - we got plenty of stares from other patrons. I wanted to quip, “We’re not mentally unstable, we’re just food bloggers.”

manisha in action

kitt frames up dessert

I met up with these two fine ladies for a NaBloWriMo canvas handoff-turned-lunch in Boulder at Teh Kitchen (note to my mom: that isn’t a typo) today. We confirmed about one another what all bloggers know: that there is so much more to the person behind the blog. Readers may feel they know a blogger very well - it is after all a predominantly one-sided relationship. The truth is that most of my blogging buds are somewhat guarded. While there are wonderful readers and fellow bloggers, there are also wackjobs, trolls, stalkers, and plain old wankers.

on my way to lunch: the driver of this volvo is a complete asshole

Some things you can only learn about an individual through personal interaction. The dynamics and spontaneity of a one-hour conversation cannot be had by email or blog comments. The cadence of speech, the way one smiles while talking, the laughter - it solidifies the image of that person in my mind.

kitt gave each of us a present

Lunch itself was almost as delightful as the company. We had a wonderful time discussing blogs, food, gardening, crazy people, bloggers we love… Nice to finally match the faces to the blogs. It’s a shame that our lunch was just over an hour, but I had medical appointments and an ass ton of errands to run.

my favorite meal of the day

one small spoonful of the sticky toffee pudding and i was on a sugar high all afternoon

My favorite nugget from the conversation was Manisha telling us that Indian food prepared properly does not photograph well. She didn’t say it quite like that… She cracks me up. Well, my brain isn’t functioning anymore. Actually, it stopped functioning two hours ago, but look at what I managed to squeeze out of it! I’ll leave you with a colorful sunset from yesterday. Nice and balmy weather we’re having. Damn it. Where the hell is my snow?

to the west