Chemo Makes You Sick

We're facing that needle two Mondays out of three.
We're trying to kill that cancer that's encroaching on our life.
We're thinking that we'd like another summer.

Tonight, we're sick.

Chemo attacks all fast-dividing cells; it attacks the immune system; it changes one's 'suck it up' theory of handling illness.

Any time Mike runs a fever over 100.5, I am to take him to the Emergency Room so they can assess his various fluids and levels and vitals. So, on Sunday, when the thermometer flashed RED and 102.6, we drove to the hospital. It was 8:30 AM.

By 12:00, all the tests were back and they told us they would admit Mike shortly. As all their numbers were so literal, I thought that 'shortly' meant shortly, so I left Mike (sleeping so well), and ran a few errands. When I returned at 4, I called Admitting; they had no record of my guy. That's because Mike was STILL lying on a gurney in the ER, waiting.

As soon as I raised the question, they found an open room and we rode upstairs.

Lesson: I won't leave anyone unattended in an ER.

So, since Sunday, Mike has been cared for by a team of competent, cheery men and women, who have many duties that they must do many times during their shifts. In and out. In and out. In and out.

The temp. is back to normal, but the other things are still "too low" or "a little bit high." So again, tonight, he's tucked in across town.

The last two days have been deja vu: cuddling in the hospital bed; holding hands and talking about weighty matters; those funky green 'gowns'; automatic machines that fall off line way too often and then BEEP BEEP BEEP. We're both tired. I'll be back tomorrow when he wakes up.

So, for tonight, friends, you can pray for us. The pain behind Mike's ear continues to cause him much distress. They keep attacking it with meds. Please God, THAT has nothing to do with cancer. Maybe it can go away?

Random Thoughts on Flying and Swimming

I went flying Monday in Tweety-bird, my almost pristine Cessna 152. Tweety reminds me a lot of my lovely wife, the Lynne. Considering their respective ages, they both still look good to me. Both have a few dings and scratches here and there, but both are still solid structurally, and are very aerodynamic. Both of them look slick with a fresh coat of wax, or make up, although the Lynne doesn't have a polished nose spinner like Tweety. Push the throttle in on either of them and they will both scoot right along, plenty fast enough for me, anyway.

I took off with no particular place to go, so I decided I would fly up to Winona Lake to make sure it was still there and thawing out for the anticipated "last summer." I climbed to three thousand feet, set the throttle and trim and drifted along at 110 knots at 2300 rpm. I turned off the radio, the GPS, the transponder, then clamped on my headphones so I could hear almost nothing. I scanned the fuel and oil gauges. And relaxed. Occasionally, I made a minor course correction, but Tweety knows the way. She knew we were goofing off. So on we flew, until the lake appeared over the nose. We inspected the lake, confirmed it was thawing out, and rolled into a 60 degree bank to head home.

The weather was down to about 5 miles with a 2500 foot ceiling, so I tucked down underneath it. The air was smooth, so I decided to go lower. I leveled out at a thousand feet above the ground and went sight-seeing the rest of the way home, watching the farms come and go. The occasional cow or deer wandering in a field below. And there was the reservoir thawing out, waiting for the weekend boaters that will arrive with children, picnics, campfires and camping tents. It does not get better than this in an airplane. Your own leisurely, airborne stroll over the countryside. Your own personally guided personal tour. Such luxury!

Ten miles out I turned the radio and transponder back on, called Grissom Approach, then called Kokomo and reported in. Six minutes later, the main gear chirped on the runway and I was home. As is the family tradition, I announced to no one that "I had cheated death once more." I taxied to the hanger, wiped down Tweety, and put her away.

I owe all this to my Dad, who taught me many things, but most of all how to fly. Really fly. It is such a privilege. So few do it. I miss that man. He has always been my hero.
After I landed, I went to the YMCA to get my mile in the pool. I had three hours of chemotherapy that morning. I kept anticipating the arrival of nausea, but it never showed at the pool.

Believe it or not there is fast and slow water. Ask any swimmer. Some days you get in the pool and you swim like a shark. Strong, straight, and relentless. And some days someone tied a concrete block to your butt, while you swim in glue.

Monday was a shark day. The water glided off my shoulders, each stroke was pulling, and I wasn't even breathing hard. I was gliding in fast water. This, too, is a joy few people experience. I am no athlete, but if you ever see me swim, you would think I am. Most people say I make it look easy. It is what my wife says. She loves to watch me swim. And that is what did me in that day.

I go to great lengths to try to present a positive role model for the countless people who are watching me in these last months. I am nothing special. I am just sick. I can't do anything about it. I am going to die and that's it. I am not "fighting it." That is so silly. Nobody fights this disease. "Fighting it" is what people hope you are doing, so that when they get it, they can "fight it, too," and get well. I have news for you, gang. There is not a lick of truth to any of it. Not for me, anyway. I just keep trying to put one foot in front of the other, until eventually I can't do it any more. And then I will die. It is simple, really.

On that Monday afternoon in the pool, I discovered that no one can see you cry in the pool. Not while you are swimming, anyway. The thought of losing the Lynne is simply unbearable to me.

Mike out.

Thoughts on Perfection

Most of us, particularly men, define ourselves by what we do for a living. Anytime two men are introduced, after the exchange of names, the first question one man will ask the other is "What do you do?" I am not sure why this is, although I have some theories. What is important is that most people take some degree of pride in what they do. Most of us want to be known as good at our work. Most people treasure complements on a job well done. Most people try to improve their work skills and take pleasure and pride in being increasingly skillful. Hopefully over time and opportunity to practice, we advance from being competent to skillful. Some few advance to being artists.

Most of us realize that we are not the best at what we do for a living. I practiced law for 33 years and I can assure you of at least two things: (1) I was a long way from being the best lawyer and (2) despite constantly striving to improve my skills. Once in awhile I would be interviewed by a potential client who had read one of those "how to pick a lawyer" books. The inevitable, amusing question I was asked was "Are you the best?" My stock response was "I am better than most, but not as good as a few." This honest, smart-mouth response seemed to satisfy most of my interviewers.

Several years ago I decided that I wanted to learn to build furniture and to play the guitar. I have no idea why. These two activities simply appealed to me. I am a person who has to alway have a project to work on that involves using my hands. Being able to use your hands to accomplish a task is a learned skill. It is part of my nature, I guess. I take pleasure in learning to do new things, like building a kayak or boat, rebuilding a car or motorcycle, or how to fly an airplane. All these things require hand skills to be sure.

So I began to teach myself how to build furniture and to take classical guitar lessons. My first furniture projects were pitiful. Even before I finished a piece, I could see many ways to improve it. Each improvement got utilized on to the next project. Over the years and many projects, my skills improved. People now see something I made and usually comment positively on it. Even so, I can always see things that need improving, but to my surprise most people do not seem to notice.

I took classical guitar lessons for 15 years. I practiced daily for one hour and sometimes more. I worked at it. My teacher said I was the best student and had gone the farthest that he ever had. But I played like crap. Trying to play classical guitar is the hardest thing I have ever tried to do and I failed miserably. I just could not do it. While I loved the music and the guitar, I simply could not acquire the technique that playing that instrument requires. However, it turns out that not all was lost, because after I had finished my hour of practice, I began to fool around with old blues and ragtime tunes that I thought were fun.

When I would go to my classical guitar lesson, my teacher would ask me to play some of that "blues sh--" for him. He used to watch me closely and then say "How do you do that?" I didn't know, I could just play it. I am not telling you I am a grat blues musician. I am not. But I liked the music and it is fun to play. If you miss a note playing some old blues thing, chances are nobody is going to notice. Not so with classical guitar.

A few years ago my church installed a coffee shop next to the reception area. The idea was to get people to come to church early, meet people and hang out before the service. My church is very large and there is the possibility that someone might intimidated by the number of people attending. The idea behind the coffee shop was to get people to socialize. It was a good idea, but not many people were used it at first. To fix this problem it was decided that some of the musicians would perform on a small stage in the coffee house 30 minutes before the start of the service. Good coffee, a donut, and live music would go a long way to get people to loosen up. To my surprise and delight, I was asked to pla
I worked up a list of blues and ragtime tunes I could do and even threw in a couple of classical things. I was very nervous about playing on the stage by myself. Nonetheless, I walked out, sat down on a chair on the stage and started to play. After about 3 minutes, I had relaxed and was actually enjoying myself. You do not hear the music I play anymore since it goes back to 1920, but people liked it back then and they still do. I played through my set list and was feeling pretty good. I could tell by the response of the audience that they like the music and several people smiled, clapped or said something positive.

I saved an old Blind Blake tune called "West Coat Rag" for the end. Nobody ever, not now, not in the past or in the future could play that piece like Blind Blake. But I had simplified it a bit and I took a shot at it as my closing tune. I was ripping along through it and feeling pretty confidant when I looked up and there about twenty feet away from me was a line of 7 guitarists watching my every move. I promptly flubbed the next 4 measures, managed to pull it back together and finished the tune, ending my set. I walked off the stage upset with my performance.

I learned that it is one thing to play for an audience, but it entirely different to play for an audience of guitarists. These guys know about playing the instrument. You cannot fake it in front of them. They know. You cannot hide. Mistakes are obvious to them.

Last week my wife and I were having lunch in a local restaurant. It was obvious to my wife my mind was on something besides her, so she asked what I was thinking I told her that I was trying to devise a way to cut two 2" square holes in an armrest for the chair I was building. It seems simple, but it is not.

It is easy to mark off the two squares with a pencil. It is not that hard to cut the holes, either. The trick is that the holes must be perfectly cut so that a square peg from the chair leg comes up through the armrest. Even that is not difficult conceptually or skill-wise. I could teach anyone in five minutes how to cut a 2 inch square hole. The difficulty is with the precision required.
Consider the four pencil lines that make up the outline of the 2 inch square hole. Cut along the lines you say with your razor sharp chisel? All right. Inside the line, outside the line, or should I bisect the line? And remember if you take too much off or are slightly off square, a gap will appear and, even worse, the other hole will not line up and there may be yet another gap. Not so easy is it?

After I explained this to her, it suddenly occurred to me that she was like my audience of guitarists. I said to her, "When I am done with this chair, the first thing you are going to look at is whether there are any gaps around the pegs, right?" "Of course", she said. If I had kept my mouth shut she would never have known.

Perfection is an unyielding standard. Perfection cannot usually be achieved by anyone other that a person who is an artist in a particular field that is on display. If Blind Blake heard me play "West Coast Rag," he would probably laugh and say "Nice try, now let me show you how it's supposed to go." If Tage Frid or Sam Maloof, two of the finest woodworkers in America looked at my chair, I am sure they would find mistakes on it that even I do not see. If Christopher Parkening or Leona Boyd heard me play classical guitar, they would probably run screaming from the room. And justifiably so, believe me.

So what is the point? Hardly any of us will ever achieve perfection in what we do professionally or for fun. Most of us will continue to try to do our best and increase our skill level. We might even get good enough that most people view us as very talented. But the goal should be to produce a perfect product. The next time I play "West Coast Rag" it should be better than the last time. The next time I cut a hole in a board for a peg to go through, the gap ought to be smaller. Perfection shall remain elusive, but you can always get better.

CHEMO: Day Two

All is well. Mike has been suffering with a pain in his mouth. He went to our dentist who sent him to the local periodontists, who said it looked like some sort of abrasion.

As Mike had had a tube snaked down his gullet, the supposed cause was a scrape by that doctor.

Today, Mike's doctor confirm. And he's healing.

Right now, I hear some classical guitar coming from the living room. I have a stack of papers to read.

Good night, friends.

An Adventure with the Boys

All I really wanted for Christmas was to take my grandsons on a special trip.

Way back when I was in kindergarten, our teacher took her students for a train ride. Although we were small, I can still remember climbing into the cabin, finding our seats, and taking a long trip. I believe we rode from Detroit to Toledo. As a 5-year-old, it was a trip to the moon and back.

As the scenery whizzed by, we bounced and giggled at the clackety-clack of wheels on the track.

Several years later, my mom and dad took the whole Hayes family to Omaha on a Super Skyliner Express. I carried my brand new Barbie doll. We both climbed up into the sky seats and rode the rails until it was time for lunch. Then, we got to dine as that train wooooshed past cornfields and small towns.

I had a chocolate sundae in a silver ice cream cup. That cold treat caused the cup to sweat. Hersey's syrup ran down the side. It was yummy. In my mind's mouth, it's STILL yummy.

So, I wanted to take Drew and Noah on a train ride. I found out that AMTRAX has a daily run from San Antonio to Austin and that the morning train has a dining car. THIS would be their trip to remember.

We needed to board downtown at 6:45 AM for the 7 AM departure. By 7:30, the steward was calling for breakfast customers. So, here we are, waiting for our TRAIN WAFFLES and milk.

.We got to Austin about 9:30 and had the rest of the day, until 6:30, to see the sights. Then it was back to the depot and back to San Antonio. The night train made snacks available so pizza and cokes were on our menu.

It was a l -0 - n - g day for boys, Mom, and Gramma. And, hopefully, a trip to remember.

God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen

Let nothing you dismay....

Why was this tune stuck in my head today? Yes, I know. Not Christmas. In fact, currently there is no snow on the ground. Of course, as all Hoosiers know, it's basketball sectional time. AND during basketball sectional time, it always snows. And snows a lot. And then some more. So, even though those weather guys are tempting us to put up our woolies, at least THIS Indiana chickie is keeping the sweaters and mittens close at hand.

No, it's the chorus:

Oh, tidings of comfort and joy
Comfort and joy
Oh, tidings of comfort and joy.

We continue to live within this bubble of community prayer. And in that place, there is comfort. Comfort in what we know about God. Comfort in the words and wishes of so many friends. Comfort in resting in the Father's arms.

And so joy.

Joy, joy, joy.

And, by the way, peace that passes all understanding.

Thought you'd like to know.

NOT sitting around waiting to get sick

Mike's newest creation: a footstool to match the chair.

More inlay work.

Ready for the cushion.

Drop by, ya'all.