Strange Times, Unimaginable Scenarios.

Edvard Munch - at the deathbed of a child.

My friend, who is so ill and looking at the final exit door has a huge challenge tomorrow. I keep thinking about it. My friend is nearly 70 and her parents are still alive and she has to tell them, face to face, she is dying. She wasn't going to. She had intended to have her brother break it to them when she'd passed as she is highly sensitive to prolonging pain for them. But her brother is, as he always has been, a complete and utter jerk. Oh, the stories I could tell you.

Her parents are on their way from the seniors' complex in Ottawa to Toronto where D**** is in hospital.

I can't truly imagine what this is going to be like. She's very close to her father particularly, and he will be devastated. I met her parents a few times back in the day. A spry and fun couple, her dad one of those enthusiastic jokesters interested in everyone and everything. Much like her. The news may just about kill them. Seriously.

And my own previously unimaginable scenario? Planning a dinner here in my house for Daughter, her father and his wife.

Strange times indeed.

Downhill to the Barriers

My friend goes downhill rapidly. We talk. She wants me to come. So we can hold hands for a while. All expenses paid (she can afford it).

I didn't sleep last night. Tossing and turning. "I have to." "I can't." Nothing was clear. There are too many commitments here. Not least of which is to elder dog, Ansa, who is getting frailer by the day. The walk tonight was pitifully slow. She's gone a bit barky also because she's deaf and also "sees" danger in the shadows of trees. She will go down protecting me. I can't pass her over for care to anyone. For one, she can't jump into the car anymore plus she's too heavy to lift. And she's a real care now.

Next, I have a performance - advertised on teevee yet - this Saturday, sold out. Like, I don't show for this?

Then I have two separate PGs coming to stay next week.

I could go on, there's loads more but I'm boring myself to bits as it is. Someone reminded me of how sick I got the last time I was in Toronto and I positively dread the polluted air there. I have weak lungs (double pneumonia and pleurisy as a 9 year old)and last time was so bad I had to leave earlier than expected.

And guilt, we haven't talked guilt yet. I'd love to see her and there is such urgency to it as she tells me she's terrified her brain won't be there by the weekend even. I cry a lot of useless tears.

But, I can't surmount all these obstacles to get to her. And I'm old. Did I mention that? And, um, tired and not overly well myself. And still reeling from Helen's death. And Laura's death.

Apologies to faithful readers: I'll get around to reading your blogs one of these days. Promise.

Terminal Technology

So. I write to my friend who is, to all intents and purposes, terminal. In the hospital. With bags and tubes and discomfort and pain and anger and frustration and fear.

These are her wishes. This is her e-mail from last night exactly as written:

Not a great day

Cleaning draining

Dr visits

Intravenus injections daily now - no oral

Learned how to check blood

Endericonolist testing gor cancer now

Sugars still up but coming down

No visitors please right now

No calls

Cannot answer easily

Easier to communicate by email

I am not going anywhere

This is my reply:

I hope today is less painful for you.

I hope your spirit can take little journeys inside you to better places.

I remember an A-Frame near Tweed where we had such a happy weekend sitting by the water. I was knitting. You were cross stitching. And we talked and talked.

I still have your needlework (in a frame) hanging on my wall.

{{{{{Dxxxx}}}}}

I thought to send a shared memory every day. I think that would help me if I were her.

Who's to tell? Who's to know?

I know I wouldn't want anyone around me. Email is good. Very, very good. The right distance.

And PS - this blog is anonymous, otherwise I would never breech her confidence.

Rose Gardens

OK. Stand up those amongst us who were promised one?

Not me.

Certainly not me.

And not those I care about, for sure.

Such sad news today. From my former life in Ontario: One old friend died on the weekend, he visited me here in Newfoundland a few years back. Another old friend was taken to hospital by ambulance in the last few days and she is riddled with The Lad*. She was terrified of doctors and now it's all too late, it seems. Another is in palliative/hospice care with a few days left.

I write all this down so I can look at the reality of it. My back (due to that awful fall I had) is acting up and causing me some grief and I could list a few other "what-ails-me"s for you but I won't as it all seems trivial and there's nothing more boring than a blow-by-blow of someone's health challenges.

Especially when those she cares about are in various stages of terminal illness and she's not.

But then again, we're all terminal. Savour the days, my friends. We never know when our numbers are called.

*Anyone ever heard this terminology used for cancer? We used it in Ireland back in the day. Maybe still, who knows?