the_child

But still with the spoons… Some days I wipe out early and sleep long. As happened yesterday. It’s tied to how much I’ve done that day, and fairly specifically to how much driving I’ve done. For example, yesterday I had lunch with a friend on the southwest end of Portland (far from Nuevo Rancho Lake), then yesterday evening I drove the_child up to northeast part of town (also reasonably far from Nuevo Rancho Lake) for a long, late session with her eighth grade project mentor. By the time I got home around 7:45 I was staggeringly tired, and I was lights out at 8:15.

I’m not sure if the driving is the specific factor that exhausts me, or if it is just a proxy for my overall level of activity. Days when I stay home and lay low, I can stay up til 10:00 or so, sleep six or seven hours, and be fine. This is pretty close to my ordinary behavior when I am at baseline health. Days when I am out and about look a lot more like yesterday, with noticeable fatigue, early bedtimes and hard sleep.

And of course, because I feel fine, I rarely remember to take this fatigue into account. It’s not like while I was on chemo, when every spoon spent was painfully obvious. (For more on spoons, see here: [ jlake.com | LiveJournal ].) So I barrel through the days as if I’m healthy, then have a wipe out lottery in the evenings.

Still, a vast improvement. Still, annoying.

And on an unrelated note, last night I dreamt I was at a big potluck picnic with, among other people, daviddlevine. At one point I approached a cold case someone had set up filled with desserts. (It suspiciously resembled the dessert case at the Sellwood location of Papa Haydn’s.) Except that one of the items on display was a sort of box made of head cheese with pickled jalapeno inclusions among the organ meats. Small items of patisserie were in various compartments of the head cheese box. I could not even begin to imagine the point of that presentation, and was fairly grossed out about it.

Ah, my dreaming mind, such a lovely landscape it is.

I wanted “If you can read this, I have cancer again.” on the back of my head, where it would be covered up as my hair grew in once more. That way, the tattoo will be a marker if I have to do a third round of chemotherapy and lose my hair again. Otherwise it will be a crypto-tattoo, hidden by the hair that is a marker of my health and a signal of my self-image.

I’d been being a wimp about the pain, but in talking to my therapist a few days ago, I realized it was important to me to flip the bird to cancer in a big way. Instead I cheated, apply some EMLA to my scalp (topical anesthetic cream) and popping a Lorazepam to mellow me out. Also, at the last minute, I added one of each of my wrist symbols to the tattoo — the zodiacal sign for cancer, symbolizing my surgeries; and the biohazard glyph, symbolizing my chemotherapies.

mlerules and her friend E— took me in, as with a Lorazepam on board I wasn’t fit to drive, and besides which, I needed someone to do photo documentation. Here’s how it all went down….

Saran wrap to protect the EMLA on my scalp

The art for the tattoo — Note the symbols matching those on my wrist

Eric S. Quale at work on me

A closer shot of the same thing

Me showing off the finished product, note the tattoos on my left wrist

A close up view of the finished product

As usual, more at the Flickr set.

Photos © 2012, Joseph E. Lake, Jr. and Emily Siskin

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. and Emily Siskin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

the_child

Thankfully, this is Sunday and I am not heavily committed. Some work time on Sunspin, several errands, some homework time with the_child, but it’s all reasonably flexible.

Still, I’m wondering why. I finally got my sleep time dialed down to something within shouting distance of normal for me. I assume this is one of those ‘bubbles’, like I get after surgery, where for a day or so I revert to an earlier, weaker state. Grr. Wants our momentum, we does, preciousss.

mlerules

I am still debating whether to get the tattoo on the back of my skull. I don’t have any philosophical objection to what I’ve been considering, I’m just trying to decide how big a pain wimp I am. You’d think after all the surgeries, I’d be accustomed to this.

Anyway, some photos…

The Sea Tramp Tattoo shop its own self.

Me filling out the “I’m not drunk” release form.

Tattoo artist Eric Quale gearing up.

Me getting the ink.

The new ink, specifically the rightmost biohazard and zodiacal cancer icons.

As usual, more at the Flickr set.

Photos © 2012 Emily Siskin, reproduced with permission.

mlerules

In general, at the moment I feel pretty healthy. I’m not quite back to baseline, but I’m very close. That’s with me only about five and half weeks out of the FOLFIRI chemo series. This is a sharp contrast to the months of recovery time from the 2010 FOLFOX chemo series. I still struggle a little bit with fatigue and sleep issues, and my lower GI is even more eccentric than usual, but that’s about it. Given that my next CT scan is in two and half weeks, I’m just enjoying what I have right now, and hoping not to be plunged back into the medical mixmaster right away.

After the ink, and probably lunch out, I’ll be hanging with the_child this afternoon. Late in the day, I may go visit a friend who just got sprung from the hospital, if they’re up to company. And there will be some Sunspin revisions at some point. That’s what’s going on.

If you can read this, you’re invited. Prior JayCon experience not required.

Note that I am announcing this early because people always tell me, “You should have told me sooner!” Except for the people who tell me, “It’s too soon, remind me later.” (Sometimes these are the same people.)

Flying Pie Pizzeria
7804 SE Stark Street
Portland, 97215
(503) 254-2016

http://www.flying-pie.com/

[ Google Maps ]

As is traditional for JayCon, Paul M. Carpentier is specifically not invited.

adelheid_p

It’s a medallion made from a spoon that reads ‘Courage’. A sweet and thoughtful gift, and very apropos. Thank you, adelheid_p.

Photograph © 2012, Joseph E. Lake, Jr.

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

the_child

Except I didn’t. My backbrain really wanted to wait until today, when I’ll be at the Fireside Writers’ Group after work, and in the mode, as it were.

Here’s the thing. I didn’t get where I am today as a writer by ignoring my backbrain. I have no idea why it wanted this extra day off, but it did. Okay. An extra day’s not going to crimp my production schedule much. And really, I was practically vibrating with Writing Avoidance Fu.

This may or may not be related to the odd phenomenon where I feel nervous just before embarking on a substantial project. The first couple of days when I start a new novel, or a major revision (as now) are often picky, fussy moments for me. Which is peculiar, because there’s not that much in life that can make me nervous (outside of cancer stress). I mean, I can stroll onto a stage in front of almost 3,000 people, grab a mic and go without a second thought. Most of the usual social stressors roll right off me — flying on planes, going on first dates, and so forth.

As for writing, I’ve spent the past two decades making it my life. Almost nothing about writing incites nerves in me. Except starting big projects. (Well, and contract negotiations.)

So pre-flight nerves? Or some bit of buggery in the plumbing of my writing mind? Maybe there’s no difference. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Because today, Sunspin

You can imagine my profound relief. It doesn’t really matter if this story is good or not — well of course it does, of course, but not in this context. It matters that I wrote and finished it. I started last Monday, and seven days later on Sunday I was done. With two days off along the way.

I produced it, start to finish, at a respectable rate of output, and I like it.

This is me, back on the horse, and the horse continues.

The manuscript is out to first readers now. I’ll have to find some time to revise sometime in the next few weeks. But tomorrow, or possibly Tuesday, I’m on to Sunspin revisions. (As it happens, the_child has a basketball game tomorrow, which is why I may have to wait til Tuesday to get going.)

This is who I am. A writer, writing. Damn, am I glad to be back.

the_child

kylecassidy

At the same time, my dinner date cancelled due to the flu, which was a mild bummer for me and a much bigger bummer for her. More importantly, yesterday I learned of two recent deaths. An old friend of the family — of my parents’ generation — died of complications from a severe stroke. And a young writer friend of mine died of complications from metastatic breast cancer, leaving behind her infant daughter. In neither case was the death especially surprising in a larger sense, but in both cases it was unexpected by me.

I don’t walk around in a depressive fugue or anything like that, but I find myself a lot more sensitive to mortality issues these days. As I said to another friend recently, talking about personality changes under extreme stress, the biggest change I see in myself over these past 3.75 years of dealing with cancer is that I’ve utterly lost my once boundless optimism. I don’t think I’ve become sour or withdrawn, I just have no faith in my future. I’ve been shot down way too hard too many times in the past few years to feel like flying high any more. Neither of these deaths are about me in any way, and I wasn’t especially close to either of the women who passed away, but I still feel them like a leaden cloak upon my bent shoulders.