Thoughts from the frontline - 10

So I'm up to number 10 of my blog on here. Not 10 days as I have decided that unless there are special circumstances that I will have the weekends off. See my new work ethic is paying off!! But I do need to tell you about the weekend as it became probably the most important weekend of my life... At about 3am on Saturday morning, well during the night really isn't it, I needed to get up and have a wee. Nothing but normality there and in fact it is still great to actually have a wee without all the staining to get if past the large growth that had been in my bladder. Too much information? Sorry!! Well, I went back to bed but was wide awake so decided to read for a while. Now this normally only takes about 3 pages of reading before I feel tired again put my book down and drift off to sleep. But not this time. No, no, no. I was awake and really awake. Felt really tired but knew sleep was not going to come soon but I wasn't going to be beaten. For about the last two years when a lot of my tubes down there had been obstructed a trip to the loo was a long process and one that could last about half an hour. Now that wasn't sitting or standing there for that time but after a brief but limited disposal victory I knew that about 15 minutes later I would need to go again so it was a trip down stairs to watch a short piece of something that I'd recorded on TV whilst I waited for the sudden urgent need to take over my lower body. And when you had to go you HAD to go!!! Out of my way, man coming through for a pee!!! Back to the early hours of this Saturday morning. So I laid in bed and read some more but after a short time I knew that my eyes were cleverer than my brain. They knew it was the middle of the night and that I needed sleep. My brain didn't. Funny that, the brain being the most stupid part of the human body... In fact, is that not the ultimate problem of mankind? Find a tablet that makes our brains as intelligent as the rest of the organs in our body and we cure all the evils of mankind? Perhaps I have just found the route to salvation. :-) Now a mused about life whilst laying there and for some reason I asked myself this question. "If I knew that I had only 5 years to live what would I be doing differently" Now I don't know if I only have 5 years to live. Could be a lot less or it could be a lot more. Family and friends out there do do remember that I still plan to be around for my 100th birthday so please don't calculate a reduction in birthday present costs just yet!!! But it was a good question that had been spurned on by my son's blog on here (PhilConsequence) where he reminds me of the advice I had given him all his life. It did make me think in those hours of darkness before I drifted off to sleep. Now my thoughts were not negative, not about life being unfair about only having a fixed short length to live. All of us on here know the truth about cancer in that we could beat the average prognosis for our infliction by miles or we can be unlucky and be on the lower figures within the range. That is the reality of cancer. Shit has happened to us but we're going forward in fight mode. Onwards and upwards. So I gathered my thoughts and decide to tell T in the morning what I'd been thinking about. It is important to me that I am totally honest with her. I need to be honest about my fears and feelings, good or bad. It helps me and she tell me it's what she wants too. (If I've got this wrong babe do let me know before I drive you to distraction!!!) But Later that morning I also asked her the same question "If YOU had only five years to live what would you be doing differently". Now asking that of a carer can be quite a risk but T started straight away to think about the question. We chatted that morning about life, our life together, our families and friends. Our jobs, our pleasures and pastimes and hobbies. Now what we have decided to do is not really that important. In fact we might change our plans in a weeks time or even change them 5 times over the next few months. The important thing is that we're not putting life off until the future. Life is for living now, today, tomorrow. If you wait too long you could miss it and that would be a shame. Now it was nearly 12 o'clock and our chatting had got in the way of my planned trip to the leisure centre for my keeping fit swim. Never mind, there's always tomorrow! But it was now collect up the wine bottle, pick up the chocolate brownies, we're off the Banstead!!! The great Banstead Booze Up. Yay!!! Now if you have already read some of the blogs on here over the weekend you will know that a good time was had by all. All I will say is to be careful about what you write on here. In a throw away comment in an earlier blog I mentioned that I was a champion of sucking jelly through a straw. That's right, one of my claims to fame is a silly party trick. And about a couple of hours into the party our glorious host came out of her kitchen with a tray of jellies and a packet of straws. Bum I thought. What if I had lost my touch? Now for this trick I would normally make the jelly myself so that I can ensure that the consistency is just right and that the straw is just the right size. No, not cheat, just have the right equipment! How do you think Houdini did his tricks??? But the challenge was live and in front of an audience. And a lively audience at that, one that was sure to heckle and throw things if I failed to live up to my boasts. So I took the first of my deep breaths, slid the straw into the lime green coloured jelly and went for it. Suck, suck, suck. It began to raise itself up the straw. It was working!! Keep going I thought, I might actually get this right. Suck, breath, suck, breath and then... Yay!!!! I'd done it. Success!!! The almighty jelly sucker had triumphed. :-) Life is good and I had done something again that I really needed to do within my 5 years and I was proud of it. And Sunday for T and me was another day of doing things that we wanted to do. Bugger the cancer and like the rest of them from Banstead on Saturday we were smiling at the pleasures of life and ensuring that this dreaded cancer does not stop the living we all have to do. Bless you all Andrew xxx