It’s been quite some time since I’ve been active here, and I sure have missed you guys. Life got a little bit strange for me about eighteen months ago, and it’s taken me till now to get up the gumption to get a post out.
I have a long saga regarding these missing months, but I think I’ll condense it to the basics. I’ll probably be sharing more in the future, but this shall suffice for now.
I have joined The Club That Nobody Wants to Be In.
Yup. The big C. And yeah, it’s been hard. But we soldier on, as one does. There sure are a lot of us dealing with this stuff. It’s not as exclusive a club as one would wish it to be, but on the plus side, the support I’ve been finding from friends and strangers alike has been beyond positive. Adversity does indeed bring us together. All the cliches are true.
My particular situation was a double whammy. First, malignant melanoma – “This is the one that can kill you”, as the diagnosing doctor soberly said – and then, as a totally unexpected bad bonus, the discovery of a rather large brain tumour. That one came as an utter shock, though in retrospect the symptoms were certainly there, and had been worsening for some years, though I had never even contemplated “brain tumour” as a reason for my worsening eyesight and hearing, and some increasingly strange strength and mobility glitches.
In the past year I have had three unpleasant surgeries, including a craniotomy to attempt brain tumour removal, and several facial surgeries for removal of the skin cancer, and subsequent facial reconstruction from my right eye all the way to the corner of my mouth. (I had a marvelous plastic surgeon – I look good – better than any of us expected.) I also have had six intense weeks of radiation therapy to the tumour site at the back of my brain, my “lifetime dose”, which, if I’m one of the fortunate ones, should knock back regrowth of my cranial interloper, at least for some years. It will continue to be a journey.
I feel okay. Not great, but definitely okay. I will likely never feel really great in the “before” sense – brain surgery and then radiation is a pretty big deal and one sure feels it – but I am still standing. Still walking, albeit with a walking stick some days, still talking as coherently as I ever did, albeit with some speech lags when I get too tired, still enjoying cognitive capabilities pretty well what they were pre-surgery, and – big hurrah! – I can still see. I’ve lost about a quarter of my visual range, but things as of my last ophthalmology assessment show no significant changes, so I’m good with that.
I can still read, and books have played a crucial part in keeping me comforted and dare I say “grounded” during these surreal times.
So here’s to the brand new year, and the books we’ll all read in it, and the companionship of others and all of the good things that go along with that.
I have no idea how often I’ll be posting. Everything seems possible this first week of January. I see my friend Simon is once again tackling ACOB – A Century of Books – and I am mulling over joining him. I’ve completed this ambitious project once before, and partially completed two others, and it is a lot of fun.
For the past year and a half it’s been old favourites and “comfort reads” all the way. Nothing too dramatic, or edgy, or tragic. Real life has provided all of those elements, and books have been, and will continue to be, a respite from that.
I do hope to get a handle on my tendency to just ramble on and on once I do get settled at the keyboard. That’s a worthy challenge all by itself. I might set myself a word limit on future book posts, to force brevity. We shall see.
Cheers, book friends! You are all bright stars in sometimes-dark skies. Thank you for the companionship, and for sharing your words, and may this happily continue in 2024 and beyond.
Barb
(Credit for the comic goes to Tom Gauld.)
Leaves & Pages 