kvetching up

 Entry 1          9:13 a.m. I woke after 7 to Jenny's text, an understandable refrain, "I don't want to die."  I wanted to get up and run to comfort her. Alas, my knees didn't.  When I finally got the gumption up to locomote, the dogs were stirring, and Jenny had to take them out for their morning constitutional around the yard.   I am listening to Jenny on the phone with a newly diagnosed PDAC patient, who is a friend of a friend of her sister Moni. Jenny is the old hand, coaching her through the terrible realities that come with the diagnosis with insight, loving patience and compassion.  "I can't believe I have a friend who has the same thing as me," she says to a woman she has never met, with genuine joy in her voice.  This is the Jenny with whom I fell in love.  I can tell from the arc of the conversation, and the increasing laughter that, this woman who has never had chemo yet, is being greatly comforted.  I wis...

 Entry 1.   8:26 a..m. I was awake until 3 or so, wired from the hike.  If I hadn't been, I'd have missed a text from a friend puzzled that my first journal entry since returning seemed truncated.  Like my steps.

Posted this last night, but it didn't show up in the earlier post: I got here to this third camp about 1:15.  Dave, my BIL, arrived quite some time earlier.  We are not just in the middle of nowhere, we are surrounded by mountains and glaciers.  We had to bushwack through miles of trail today to get here. Its a treacherous route, and not for the faint of heart, or the injured.  Injured?  Yes.  I would tell you from experience that hiking with a jacked up knee is risky.  More risky, hiking with 2 jacked up knees.  I only had one until Monday, when I slipped and fell crossing a stream, only to slip and fall again while trying to cross a second time.  The good news is, I had a brace and it's on my now injured left knee. The bad news, I don't have a brace for my other knee, which lacks a miniscus.  To make the injury worse, I got separated that first day from Dave, and hiked 3.2 miles past our campsite, the first mile a 1000 foot climb....

Entry 1 It's Aug 25th. I've been off grid 3 days.  We are at some place called Thunder Canyon or Creek or Basin or whatever. I'd suggest calling it fly, gnat and mosquito hell. It's 331 p.m., and the flies have disappated, although I would wager every square foot had 100, they are down now to 50 or so, and tbe mosquitos are just rolling in, like a black cloud over Thunder Canyon. View from McCallister Camp.

  August 28 6:18 a.m Another night of sleep interrupted by throbbing pain in both knees, an essentially locked left knee, and the biting cold. I am bundled in two pairs of socks, thermal underwear , regular underwear, a t-shirt, hiking pants, a fleece jacket and a beanie , all wrapped in a sleeping bag .  If any part of me got uncovered, it quickly would become incredibly cold, so cold ot would wake me.  My right arm escaped at some point, probably putting my hat back on. My hand was so cold when it woke me, I imagine it could have been blue.  Its in the lower 30s in the night. All told, I probably woke 10-12 times. I am lookong forward to many things today, amonf them a solid night of sleep.  Time to pack. 

  ts Aug 25th. Ive been off grid 3 days.  We are at some place called Thunder Canyon or Creek or whatever. Id suggest calling it fly, gnat and mosquito hell. Ita 331 p.m., and the flies have disappated, although I would wager every square foot had 100, they are down now to 50 or so, and tbe mosquitos are just rolling in, like a black cloud over Thunder Canyon. I got here to this third camp about 115.  Dave, my BIL, arrived quite some time earlier.  We are not just in the middle of nowhere, we are surrounded by mountains and glaciers.  We had to bushwack through miles of trail today to get here. Its a treacherous route, and not for the faint of hearted, or the injured.  Injured?  Yes.  I would tell you from experience that hiking with a jacked up knee is risky.  More risky, hiking with 2 jacked up knees.  I only had one until Monday, when I slipped and fell crossing a stream, only to slip and fall again while trying to cross a second tim...

 Yesterday's service was lovely. Jenny and her sisters really went the extra mile. Jenny's eulogy to her mother was moving and quite beautiful. Omi will be missed. I am no Alexander Supertramp, but into the wild we go.

 Entry 1.    8:21 a.m. Jenny, who has taken the dogs at night in preparation of my backpacking trip, somehow managed to keep them placated until 7:30. Down in my Skinner box of a bedroom, I woke up at 6:00, around the time the dogs (on average) like to wake me.   Willow rang the bells hanging from the front door to go outside, the second time in the last few days. Progress grinds slowly with this one, but we are making headway.

  Entry 1     8;07 a.m. This house.    The bathtub is the longest and deepest i have seen in a home. A soaking morning bath is well deserved.

  Entry 1     7:48 a.m. I woke up at 6:00 a.m. to a dog scratching at my bedroom door.  Because I am leaving for a week on Monday to backpack in the North Cascades, Jenny wanted the dogs with her last night as practice and to allow them to get used to being with her at night. She crated Willow but not Buddy, apparently. Depending on the night, he may or may not share Willow's crate. While Jenny had her door closed, many rooms in our home have cat openings in the doors, and pudgy little Buddy somehow manages to fit through them.  I took him out to the bathroom while Jenny remained asleep.  I bring him in, he has some water and it's back to bed.  For about 10 minutes. Buddy fits through this opening somehow . At 6:20, as per usual, Willow is alive, alert, awake,  enthusiastic.  I climb out of bed, pull my Levis on, and walk to Jenny, who is just opening the door. She gives me a disdainful look as Willow, freed from her crate, dashes to my...

I am not a religious person. Not even slightly.  I am not an atheist.  I am not smart enough to stake out a position, or to say how or why we exist.  But when I am feeling low, give me Mahalia Jackson, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Hank Williams, Roy Acuff or F.C. Barnes singing about their faith, and it buoys me. People persevere, they push on through hard times.  That's what this particularly working-class flavor of gospel music says to me.  I don't have their gift of faith, but I know that this too shall pass.   I haven't written in so long because work, the dogs, Jenny's illness, Jenny's anger, moving, unpacking and preparing for next week's backpacking trip have sapped me. I have been holed up in my room for about an hour as I write this, listening to Fern Jones sing. She was a holy roller, tent revivalist musician whose music was almost lost, but rereleased a few years ago.  She has been compared to Patsy Cline, high praise, really. I digress.  ....

Entry 1      9:45 a.m. Moving Day Part Deux Off to Ravenna to meet the movers.

  Entry 1     8:54 a.m. Willow has learned to fly, or so she thinks.   Last night, as Jenny was laying on the sectional, Willow came around the corner, jumped and cleared the back of the couch. She pulled off a perfect four-point landing.  She literally stuck the landing. Unfortunately, by stuck I mean she landed on Jenny's chest where the needle from the chemo pump enters the port to her vein.  Jenny didn't see it coming. Neither of us did.  Jenny, after pushing off a clueless and cuddly behemoth (its like cuddling Wm. "Refrigerator" Perry as a toddler at this point), doubled over, more in fear than in pain.  But finding her port was secure, she wss still understandably shaken and also angry. She went to bed. This morning, she woke to find the chemotherapy drug FolFox leaked and leaking all over her clothes, and the needle completely out from the port. She bagged the pump and needle, and called Dr. P. The best laid plans, and all that. ...

Imagine your loved one is suffering from a terminal illness.  Fighting off death valiantly, but suffering inconceivable agony while trying to forestall the inevitable. The  suffering is every day, but the agony arises several days every other week as a reaction. To the chemo.  Your loved one, after every single chemo, wants to quit. She tells you, quite seriously, she can't stand to suffer any more, her eyes pleading for you to rescue her. The misery slowly abates over several days, and she forgets just enough of the pain to keep going forward. Banner day.  I went to my office. I spent several hours on the 54th floor, alone.  Creepy. Jenny's chemo was today. She was sick tonight and is miserable.  I, otoh, have to sleep now. More later.

Tied To The Whipping Post Another busy day.  Work in the time of COVID-19 is predictably unpredictable.  The solar company representative came today to show me how the 27 solar panels on top of the house work.  I had no idea the meter runs backwards as the solar is pumping in power to the system. Pretty impressed, honestly.  Many months are electric bill will be $12 dollars, the minimum amount charged.  I like that.  A lot.   However, our thermostat isn't working, which means our air conditioning isn't working. For some reason I had it in my head that the solar company was responsible for the thermostat.  In fact, that is not the case.  So, I called the number on the side of our our HVAC system, and someone is coming out on Monday, after the heatwave.  I pleaded to put us at the front of the line should there be any cancellations, and explained Jenny's condition. Tomorrow she has chemo, and the weekend will be hell with the heat and...

Moved yesterday. It was a smooth move, for what its worth, until, after thr truck was loaded, the kid in charge told me the truck was full and they weren't coming back.  Their requisition was for one truck.  We hadn't asked for one truck, just to be moved.  In fact, Jenny who ordered the movers, called to tell them we moved the boxes, and the coordinator said, oh, then we will bring just ine truck.  Ok, she said. We assumed they'd come back if it all didn't fit in the truck. This may shock you, but no one told us, hey, you get one truck, for one load.  That's it.  This is a very expensive mover--and aside from the fuck up, its my first use of movers (we have used them a lot) where nothing was broken, scratched, or lost.   In a stroke of luck, a fb friend reached out to me last night to ask about the move. She too was livid, upon hearing what happened. I was clear that this was not Jenny's fault.  Unlike me, my fb friend knows ppl at the compa...

Entry 1     6:27 a.m. Woke up at 430 to the sound of packing tape being unspooled.  Twas, Abby, who had yet completed packing, and consistently refused to let anyone help her. Her room went quiet around 5.  The movers arrive between 8-9. She will be cranky today, to be sure. Jenny was texting with el pinché, under the full effect of her nightime meds, when I pried her off the sectional and coaxed her to her bed. I was angry about this, but said nothing. She would lie or feign surprise, or more likely, both. I am, after almost a year of this, exhausted.  I am tired.  I am weary. I could sleep for 1000 years. I think my anger today stems from the fact that everything I do is for her, whether its a vacation the week we should be moving or readying the house for a move, the extra work I had and have to do because we weren't home; the riding in the sand dunes, riding with her behind the wheel despite the risk. Shit, the purchase of the car itself.  He...

 Entry 1    9:54 a.m. Leiney and I went on a quest for coffee this morning and ended up at Stumptown and Voodoo Doughnuts.  Predictable, but also, delectable.  So, yeah.   I tried to convince Leiney that, given the beauty of the weather, that we stay in PDX today. We are right on the river.  We could rent cruisers and have a time. But, unfortunately, I already primed them for Suicide Squad at an AMC tbd in Vancouver, while Jenny attends a baby shower. Abby will back her. Given it was my idea to see the movie, I guess we are going to the movies. I found an amazing book at Powell's yesterday, The New Star Chamber by Edgar Lee Masters. He was an intellectual and law partner of Clarence Darrow, novelist, biographer, poet and serial philanderer.  The last descriptor caused Clarence Darrow, of all people, to end their law practice. Written around 1900, The New Star Chamber is a series of essays deconstructing and criticizing  U.S. imperialism....

 Entry 1.     6:25 a.m. Waxing Awake Time  I was up fretting over Jenny's health  until 3, and then woke over and over. When I managed to sleep, I had nightmare after nightmare. My last dream involved giving Willow away to Pat Morita and his adorable little grand daughter. This isn't turning into a dream journal, but I can say I was incredibly relieved when I woke up that I didn't have to tell Jenny I gave the dog away.

Entry 1    10:33 a.m. The running water went out at the campground last night around 10, and it's yet to be restored.  For those of us in bondage to the coffee bean, this was no bueno.

Entry 1    Going Nowhere, Going Nowhere I've been awake much of the.night, and gave up trying to sleep around 6 a.m.  I am sharing a bed with Jenny for the first time in a year out of necessity and a misunderstanding that when the place said it sleeps 5, that I would have my own sleeping space.  The good news is, the bed we are sleeping on, a pull-out couch, is so uncomfortable it is not possible to sleep soundly.  That last fact came in handy last night when I was having an M. Night Shyalamanesque nightmare , after spending the afternoon telling my kids what a terrible filmmaker he is. I dreamt I was at a multiplex to see a movie, not "Old" (his latest), but some movie created by my psyche. Jenny and I got into a row at the theater over the baseball hat she was wearing ( Eric's el pinché's. The real one somehow disappeared in the move. . . weird) and I stormed off. I ended up in a theater playing the faux-Shyamalan movie. The storyline was about going to ...

  Florence , Oregon  Not to be a snob, but if you are brown, black, Asian, Latinx, gay,  liberal, disabled, or are a woman with little or no hair who could be read as being queer, well, small town America is about as welcoming as a Currier and Ives tableau.  Yes, they too were abject racists. Guess I should toss my sanitized coffee table book of their works.  Florence, Oregon, ostensibly ensconced in a blue county is, well, utterly scary.  We saw Nazi bikers, American flag art (always a dead giveaway), a bar with a sign that said any government inspector would require a warrant prior to entering the premises to inspect.  Meanwhile, here we are bopping along, my brown leftist queer daughter who was instructed by me not to wear her "defund the police" mask and who couldn't quit ranting about Christian Fascists; my other queer daughter with gorgeously died red hair and out and proud; my white wife whose hair has grown back just enough so that she looks s...

  Entry 1.    3:42 p.m. It's the last day of July. I am sitting on the front porch enjoying the new place.  Friends came and moved just about every single 📦 over here this morning, and my niece Sarah also came over and helped unpack and also helped get boxes moved to their appropriate spot in the house. I am grateful for our friends and family.  It is nice to have everything moved. Leiney and Abby also schlepped boxes over and stayed here for quite a few hours.  I did some unpacking and loading too.  Jenny, getting sicker, had almost no energy. She couldn't help at the old place, and barely functioned here, despite her best efforts and desire to do so.  She slept for almost 3 hours as well, and has some significant pain. We were preparing to leave a few minutes ago, maybe 15, and she disappeared.  I expect she is sleeping again.

 Entry 1           9:26 a.m. Jenny seems okay this morning. More resilient.

Entry 8 The cancer is growing. One of her mets grew a full centimeter in a couple months. All of her mets have grown. Her CA 19-9 is at almost 26k.  Dr. P told her the cancer is progressing.  She will soon receive, as of August 12, Folfox for 8 weeks.  During that time they will biopsy her liver to do genetic testing to see if any targeted therapy will work. The hardest part, the hardest most painful part of the day, came when we met with palliative care.  They were taken aback that she thinks she can work full-time, out of the gate.  She asked Dr. B., "Aren't there people who just go on living with tumors on their liver and live normal lives for a long time?"  He took a deep breath, paused and said, "Not really." Then, they talked a bit about having a terminal disease, which is hard for Jenny to hear. But the social worker ratcheting it up after the palliative care doctor left, began discussing the fact that this will kill Jenny. At one point she tal...

  Entry 1     9:56 a.m. New scan, new plan.  This is the day . Jenny seems so relatively healthy, thus I don't have any prognostication.  Keep her, us, in your thoughts today.

Entry 1     11:55 p.m.    Couples therapy was fun.  One would never have imagined that Jenny finds me a problem.  She said she is convinced that without me she wouldn't be alive.  She prattled on and on about how much she has learned and changed in the last year.  I argued that this wasn't a growth opportunity for me, and that while I have adjusted my expectations given her illness. The affair and her abject refusal to stop it, I certainly don't feel I've grown. That may largely be a true description of how I feel, but I was really speaking to how little she has changed, and debunking the idea that a terminal illness helps you see more clearly. Instead, from my perspective, it can also magnify your faults, and make them more pervasive, more likely to show up.

Entry 1           Note to self: Never use Old Republic Escrow company if you can help it.  A frantic 7 a.m. e-mail from them asking where the wire transfer is, started the day.  I ignored it, we set the  transfer to take place today, and let the escrow company know that last week.  When Jenny responded and said the money was coming and told them the name of the investment firm it was coming from, Old Republic sent a form demanding we complete it because the money was coming from an individual. This all before 8 a.m.  Jenny let them know, actually the investment firm is not an individual.  Its a national firm, one would think an escrow company might be familiar with it's name.  Anyway, the money has been wired, and now we wait for the word of official closing.  That I have work today is good and bad, I need the distraction, but want to be holding the keys now.

Entry 1  The Week Ahead, The Week Before We make payment via wire today on the home. Over the weekend we signed all the final paperwork. The notary was from Sumner, and was clearly afraid of the city--so cliche that Aesop captured the phenomenon 2500 years ago in the fable of the City Mouse and The Country Mouse .  Wow.  We get the keys tomorrow at 5.  We will bring a few boxes with us, and my coffee maker, which was too big for the current kitchen.  We went and walked the property over the weekend.  It's lovely.  I am pretty sure that it used to be a farm back in the day.  I came upon an old plum tree at the back of the yard, that had tiny yellow plums, the size of a thumbnail.  They were sweet and delicious. I have every reason to believe that the property to the south of us, covered in Himalayan blackberry bramble, likely has many more fruit trees. Packing is a slow process.  We have packed more boxes than I care to admit.  Yeste...

 Entry 1    4:39 p.m.  The 🐕 🐶 🐶 🐩 🐺 🦊 , pack animals that live with us, have decided not to let me sleep.  Bless their hearts.  That said, the joy my days are filled with, and they are, is because of the dogs and the kids. So, I will pay my dues, sacrifice sleep for happiness. We planned to pack today. We had a late start, Jenny's energy level has crashed the last few days. I made breakfast for the family, after Jenny and I got boxes around 11ish, and then packed a box and cleaned the kitchen.  Jenny just couldn't move.  We finally got downstairs, and her energy didn't pick up. At one point I turned to find her curled into a ball from exhaustion.  So, I packed a couple boxes downstairs and she did too.  But that was it. The kids have been little help, although Abby is far ahead of Leiney in packing her room.

Sonny Bono. This is not life sized.  He stood 5'5", pretty sure this statue was 6'.  And The Beat Goes On Jenny came home from Priest Lake today.  I was in a meeting, on the sectional.  She and her sister went through packed and sealed boxes looking for Omi's  photo albums. They needed pictures for the celebration of life that will take place in late August.  I went from one meeting to another.  It was that kind of day.  I moved to the kitchen counter so I could stand for the meeting.  While on the phone Old Republic Escrow company called.  I couldn't answer.  Immediately upon finishing the meeting, Jenny, sitting in the living room, begins to tell me that I need to call Old Republic. She was very short with me. I come and sit on the sectional, opposite the chair she is sitting in, and check my email so I can call.  I place the call and leave a voicemail with the assistant of the person I was trying to reach.  I finish, an...

The last week or so I have been in a wrestling match with the people securing our loan.  The number of times we have had to produce documents, many superfluous in my estimation, others certainly duplicates or a variation on a theme, was ridiculous. But, that said, and I don't mean to bury the lede, the house appraised and we have been approved for our loan. Next, the closing.  Depending on the document, we close the 26th or 27th.  The seller told the solar people, with whom he is arranging for us to meet, the 28th of July.  Certainly he is wrong. I am so excited to be moving, words fail.  No matter how you slice it, it comes up 7 days or fewer. I'm good with that.   The house is filled with boxes, and if you've seen Jenny's caringbridge, she did an all call for help moving boxes between the day we take possession and August 2, when we leave for the Oregon coast for a week. If I had my druthers, and I am a curmudgeon, I would skip the vacation and focus...

 Keep 'Em Separated Tonight was therapy. Jenny is in Idaho with her sisters at Priest Lake until Friday.  Yes, she is well enough to travel and, contrary to yesterday's lament, doing something.  We did therapy over Zoom, as always, but for the first time separated by several hundred miles.   Therapy, as often is the case, started out and continued on for some time focused on the mundane, as if there is nothing to talk about.  Jenny volunteered that we had dinner at Daniels on July 11, and she had a lovely time.  I pointed out that only after I sat down did I realize that Daniel's is a favorite haunt of el pinché and Jenny, which soured my experience.  I was beginning, at this point, to quietly let my anger over the last year flow.  My upset increased as Jenny raised the issue of anniversaries of traumatic events causing a person to reexperience that trauma. She said she is worried about not just herself and me, but the kids as well....

  Entry 1      8:30 p.m. Busy day.  Work. Packing.  Dogs.  Dinner was delivered by friends.  Jenny ran errands this morning, came home and napped, and then took Willow to see Jennifer Murray. My shoulder hurts tonight, but was mostly fine all day.  I shed the sling.  I am tired.  We are edging toward home ownership, just a few more hoops to jump through. I am looking forward to playing fetch with Willow.  She is a quick study.  She pounces on the toy when she is retrieving it.   Love her. 

 Entry 1     1:49 p.m. I am taking care of the dogs, have emptied and refilled the dishwasher, managed to dress myself and packed 3 boxes, all with my arm in a sling. I tried to pack with two arms  but that was stoopid.  I absolutely love all the physical chicanery y body has played on me these last few months.  The mind-body connection is real. We hired movers. Nevertheless, we are so excited Jenny has invited people to come move boxes over between the time we close and the day of the move.  I even rented a van for a few days before moving to transport boxes.  With my arm and shoulder malfunctioning, and a possible heart problem, well, I am not sure what I should and shouldn't be doing, other than changing my diet completely. Having a new puppy has been a great occupier of my time. I have potty trained her, taught her to sit. If there were ever a custody battle, I'm the primary, hahahaha.  It thrills me. I haven't had a puppy since I wa...

Entry 1     7:57 a.m. " She's So Many Women, He Can't Find The One Who Was His Friend" I'm going to a cardiologist next week.  Even absent an MI, something is rotten in the state of Denmark. Heart problems run in the family.  Killed my uncle.  So, I now have a cardiologist.  Moving up in the world, also, just around the time I receive my AARP card.  Perfect. I am typing with one hand.  it isn't terrible.  It does allow for fewer typing errors.  I will make an appt. to get an MRI on my shoulder and back today. I feel like some old engine that's lost its driving wheel . Meanwhile, Leiney is working two jobs.  She went from camp counselor to door knocking for Amnesty this week.  12 hour days.  Outside,  Wrangling kids and engaging in political conversations. She is exhausted, but in heaven.

To Bring You My Love I went to check on Jenny this morning about 8:30 a.m.  She was awake, on her phone--which is like saying she was awake and breathing.  We exchanged morning greetings, and then she said, "I'm meeting  Eric  el pinché  at 9:00 a.m. for breakfast." I said, o.k. and spu n around on my heels to get my coffee.  I needed my coffee.  I am expected not to have a reaction, and really, for the first time since this all came to be known last year, I mentally shrugged.  As my therapist would likely say, what else would you expect?  I have been here for a year, knowing this is going on, caring for her without exception nor expectation of appreciation.  Maybe that latter part isn't actually true--sometimes she says she appreciates me.  She has repeatedly said that she won't stop seeing this person because it's not worth the risk that we can rebuild what I didn't know was so broken she would feel no moral qualms about a multi-y...