Carpe Diem

It looks like the beginning of a hard winter.

J has just commenced her first round of chemotherapy for her stage IV metastatic breast cancer. The side effects (fever, aching and loss of appetite) have already devastated her energy and, to a lesser extent, her spirit, and this is only the first day after the first treatment.

J lost her mother to the same disease at the relatively young age of 55. Her mother suffered through chemo, but unsuccessfully. She refused a second round, as I understand the story, and it is not difficult to see why.

One of the difficult transitions J has been facing is that of letting go of her expectations for life. We all, whether we acknowledge it or not, live a good portion of our lives in anticipation. And another big chunk is devoted to the past, whether rose-colored or not. Cancer of any type, however, or indeed any other life-altering disease, forces a change of perspective.

How one feels right now becomes the focus when pain is so omnipresent. One of the handout booklets from the oncology center cites cancer as somehow improving one's ability to live in the present, because to live in any other expectation is a waste of time and precious energy. I can vouch for this as a computer instructor in a public library. Most of the seniors I teach are very much focused on the present. They want to learn enough to be independent of all those people who are mostly younger than they are, because the young are impatient: they are future-focused.

As we progress towards our second babyhood, we once again become dependent on and appreciative of those around us who are our caregivers. As we grow dependent after a life of independence, we grieve our loss of control, our limitations. But each new day is ours, even if only in some small, inner way that is not necessarily obvious to those who care for us and about us.

And so it is with the will to live one day at a time that one "beats" cancer, even if it eventually wins.

Cud-chewing

You know, one of the neat things about cows is that they have four stomachs. I just came back from a Mexican restaurant here in Greater Cincinnati and let me tell you folks, I can see a great disadvantage in the way we're designed. I ate enough for three. Three enchiladas and a 22-ounce draft... Thin people aren't built for that kind of intake. It was good, and it got me to thinking.

I don't know, not being a farmer, whether cows can overeat or not. They certainly turn digestion into a cottage industry. At some point, they regurgitate the grass, hay and whatever else they've ingested, and that's when you'll find them contentedly grinding that initial load, usually for a considerable time, until with a final gulp or two, they send it on its way to the other three. And we all know how that comes out.

I was teaching a class today of seniors using computers, and the subject of email abuse came up (e.g. forwarding dumb jokes to people and thereby displaying their addresses to everyone else, rather than using the BCC to maintain their privacy). That led to the mention of failure to attach items (like pictures) that you've stated are attached. So I suggested that the simplest way to prevent that is not to address your email until you've written, checked and attached.

Email is the symptom of a culture that has no time to ruminate.

Sure, it's efficient, and sometimes effective, but somehow the bulk of it is just that. Bulk. No time to chew on what we've written: little time to digest what's been read. Hit reply all and you're done. Move along... nothing to see here.

Consider the cows of the field. They eat, they repeat, they digest. Those big eyes follow the farmer as he, their slave, cleans up after them, feeds them, milks them, breeds them, and ships them off to their fate which they most likely don't give much thought to, unless one of them dies in a field, or they lose a calf.

Are cows the philosophers of the phields?

And so, following along these lines, I decided to waste some electrons on some of my own stomach rumblings, if only to compel myself to sit down and consider timeless questions, such as, "Is this the good life, and am I living it?" Or maybe some more trivial pursuits, such as "Why am I still working at 65 when all the successful people are floating around the Bahamas, some of them in boats?" I realize that blogging is injurious to your health. It eats time that you could have spent walking.

It is in the nature of blogs that you start out all a-quiver with creative juices gushing, and after not too long, it melds from a Serious Beginning through a Daily Obligation and finally becomes Orphaned File. Well, fine. Everything has a beginning and to everything there is a season. Or, as my dad used to say, "Your grandfather never criticized anyone, but if he did say something sharp about someone, he'd end with, 'There! I've said it, and I'm glad'".

And so, when this blog has no more cud to chew, I'll have said it. I hope I'll be glad. And I hope you will be too.