New Year

We call this "chicken TV", It's our chickens looking in the window - watching us...

As this year comes to a close, I've been in this cancer fight for six months, and it has dominated my actions, thoughts and activities. I have parred my life down to the basics of healing, family and as much teaching as I can do. My art making and work in the community has for the most part been put aside, and my frenetic, workaholic pace of living has been turned into a restful, more meditative approach to each day. The days of me having ten projects going at once are over. This simplification of my actions and my approach to life has been a very positive thing, one that I will largely continue if I make it through this.

I am learning a lot about myself, and am becoming a better person through it. However, I wouldn't recommend this particular path for a self help process... it's no fun.

Six months with no meat, dairy, beer, French bread, cheese, potatoes, BBQ, ice cream, sugar, Pad Thai, coffee, Chinese food, peanuts, cookies, pie, hot dogs, all Albanian food esp lamb, did I mention BBQ and beer? ...you get the idea... so here I am, 50 pounds lighter, wondering if I'll ever get any of these basic life essentials back! If I do, they will be enjoyed in moderation, and fully appreciated, each bite slowly savored...

Yesterday, I had a small cheat. An old friend came over and I made him coffee and put out a dish of Monika's gingerbread cookies. After watching him while we talked, I decided that I NEEDED to try a cookie, so I made a small cup (one inch deep) of coffee and milk, and took a small cookie. Over the next hour as we talked, I smelled the coffee, occasionally dipping the cookie and then putting a tiny piece on my tongue, leaving it there until it dissolved. I could almost taste every ingredient as a separate, subtle element; the ginger, sugar, butter. The intensity of the flavor was sublime, and I loved every second of it, even though in the end, I had most of the coffee left... the cookie however was gone. Last year I would have eaten 8 cookies at a sitting, so fast that I would have barely noticed the flavor.

The radiation and chemo are starting to cause more symptoms as I get into the final two weeks. My focus is to make it to January 15, and then I get to be free of treatments till mid February when I get scanned.

I once again would like to thank all of you who are helping me through this, your love, support and kindness mean more to Monika and I than we could possibly express, and I wonder if we could be managing this trial without you. THANK YOU.

Happy New Year. I hope this new year brings good to all of us.

xo D