I am truly horrified and embarrassed to discover exactly how long it's been since I last posted an entry here!! I DO APOLOGIZE!!

I suppose I have some excuse in that I found myself ever more tired/worn out toward the end of the radiation treatments.  I also had some actual blistering toward the end, mostly because there was no warning pink or red to get us slathering the lotion onto.  Suddenly, it was just raw and oozy!!  I was given some medicated cream for that to prevent infection, and we just doubled down on the number of times we "creamed me up!"  Now, about a month from the last radiation, there's nothing raw, though a couple of small areas are still tender/irritable.  Mostly, the main symptom is itchiness, which is a good sign of healing that I can tackle with the same cream I'm now using - off the Walgreens' shelf Jasper brand Vitamin E, which I consider virtually magic!  I'm using it on other spots that need healing, too, besides where I've been irradiated!

As I mentioned, my last radiation was just a month ago, specifically November 10th! Since the appointment wasn't over until 3, and the sun sets up here in the northland around 4, Ginny and I stayed overnight one more night, and went back again about three weeks later for appointments relating to getting me started on the pill treatment, which is in place of infusion chemotherapy, and is, in fact, not strictly considered "chemo" at all, despite the fact that it's clearly some sort of "chemical" treatment. Two pills per day, sort of evenly spaced, and with virtually no side effects yet at the lowest dose, to be increased over three month, as I can tolerate it, which I'm expecting to be pretty well. Tiredness will certainly be an effect, but ... time will tell if there are any other "downsides."

While we were there (for two nights due to timing of appointments and weather considerations), I ended up FINALLY, in celebration, using the hymnal I'd brought for the purpose, about two months before, I played some hymns, almost at random.  Then a new friend, who turns out to be from nearby Pembroke, the next town southeast of us, and is clearly going to continue to be a fine friend to have for lots of reasons, came down to the Great Room, where the kitchen is, to refill her water bottle!  She heard the music and came over to check it out, especially because it was hymns she was hearing!  I asked what was her favorite hymn, and she replied immediately, "Amazing Grace;" so we sang all SIX verses with enthusiasm!  Then she asked if I knew "Morning Has Broken," which just "happened" to be folded into the hymnal, as a single sheet from the 3-ring hymnal binder at home (wondered where it had gotten to!), and I told her that it was the hymn I'd had everyone sing at Ken's and my wedding in June of '99! Andrea and I have since then been keeping in frequent text connection about all sorts of things. Another gift of Sarah's House!!

The same day, and almost the same time, I returned from my radiation marathon, my dear sister, Elizabeth arrived to spend nearly three wonderful weeks with us.  She spoiled both Ken and me in so many and various ways! For one thing, we both ate well and food we each thoroughly enjoyed.  Also, she continued to help me "get organized," which has gotten me on the way to continuing the project!  Finishing ... in this life ... may not be a reasonable goal! Poor Tom!! ;-)

While she was with us, one of her goals was to make sure we had a proper Thanksgiving dinner, and we DID!!  However, before that, she also made sure that we were able to enjoy the visit my son Tom was able to spend with us just before Thanksgiving.  He seemed to enjoy also that he could have some R&R time of his own, since he actually stayed nights at our "3-season guest house in Meddybemps!!" He also did a few helpful things there and MANY more for us, and especially Ken, at our Charlotte home! What I loved most was that every evening he gifted us with guitar music!!  One night, we even sang through a large number of the songs from the collection Kate had given me of most of the Many folk songs she and I sang together mostly back in the late 50s & 60s! I was in seventh heaven!! 

With Elizabeth, and then Tom also, here, I never seemed to have the time and energy left over at the end of the day to write in this journal.  Since Elizabeth left, just over a week ago, (just before my two days in Brewer, plus travel time) things have been zooming along so much that I've really been quite breathless ... and thus needing a good deal of horizontal time to recuperate from so much activity. Today hasn't been without busy-ness, but I finally seem to have managed to have time and oomph to get this far, at least.

However, I'd better finish up with news of Ken's situation, which is ... not as speedy as we'd hoped or expected. His initial bladder surgery was early in October (about 5 months after the bladder cancer was discovered, while we were still in Brunswick!!), and he was told to expect another appointment for a "clean up" scraping of the inside of the bladder to make sure they got out all visible signs of The Enemy! Time passed, and the reply he got, when he called to inquire about the delay, was that he was "in the queue!" Just after Elizabeth left, he got the long-awaited call with an appointment of JANUARY 17TH!!  Good grief!! Kenny was/is NOT a happy camper, and particularly so because it's pretty logical to assume that the cancer hasn't "gone to sleep" while the surgical calendar grinds on, and the prognosis of possible treatment, following the second surgery, included several not very pleasant things, the most dire possibility being that he would eventually have to face having to have his bladder removed, which he is TOTALLY unwilling to do!!

His first response to this information to me was that he Wouldn't move to the Meddybemps house until well after the surgery, and the future was clearer ... and hopefully more positive. I didn't really take him seriously, thinking he was just expressing his frustration, but finally I became aware that I was wasting my time planning and slowly moving things to the other house.  Although it's a bit frustrating to have to move things back that we will need in the weeks ahead, I am absolutely THRILLED not to have to figure out how to celebrate Christmas in a new, smaller, and strange house. (eg. Where in the world could we put the tree, even a small one?!)  Tomorrow I hope to collect the window candles and get them shining out to Smith Ridge Road, something I usually have ready to light on the first day of Advent! This evening, I surprised Kenny, when he returned from a pretty completely frustrating meeting at the fire station, by having gotten the Christmas cards we've received up on the display string that stays in place year-round, saving time each year!;-)  Of course, I've not sent out a single card yet, but Kenny promptly sends out a card to virtually everyone who send us one, even if some are mostly my friends from high school or my old Brunswick days.  He's MUCH more efficient than I!!  It is REALLY NICE not to have to keep leaving him once a week!!

I think that pretty well brings you up-to-date.  We have at least one or two group Christmas parties (a total of at least four) beginning yesterday and continuing on into the week before Christmas.  Since I'm not singing in (and thus rehearsing for) the annual Lessons and Carols at the Dennysville church, nor will I be playing for the Christmas Eve service, the pre-Christmas season is, thankfully, less hectic than in the past.  I'm actually enjoying that aspect, although I do miss the music singing and playing. I make up for it in other ways, especially with all the wonderful things that are now available online.  That's one of the few truly GOOD things to come out of this dreadful Covid horror!

I continue to feel so fully blessed, with even the difficult things teaching me lessons that I might never have learned otherwise, especially since they are lessons I have probably been rather resistant to learning.  Sigh!  There's a cartoon I have posted around a couple of places in my "space" of Ellie, from For Better or Worse, looking distraught, and saying "God put me on the earth to accomplish certain things. At the rate I'm going, I'll live forever."  I feel much the same about the things that God seems to want me to learn, and I actually agree, even as I so often fail. Still, I can see at least some of the growth and change I've prayed for and that I believe God is leading me through and to.  Never mind grammar! That participle will just have to dangle! May it jingle and be merry! as I hope your Christmas spirits will, too!  

I suspect it will be after mid-January before I have much of substance to report. Meanwhile, I continue to feel blessed by your thoughts, prayers, connecting, and friendship.  Do have a blessed and merry Christmas season! I love you all!