Last week I went up to the Christie for a review and what I thought would be my final prescription for Capecitabine. Although I've been suffering a bit lately (mostly from the Mytomycin), I was determined to finish the course. So I was a bit taken aback when the oncologist said categorically that there was no way she'd allow me to continue. My bowel is very inflamed, I've had a bit of a scare with chest pain, pins and needles down my left side, cracks in my fingers etc, so all in all they're putting my wellbeing ahead of the need to poison me any more. When she told me this, I felt a huge wave of relief wash over me, and even wept a little. I've had a nasty bout of bowel problems since then, but I'm sure that things will start to get better now. I have a scan on 5th June and the results a week later. Thereafter I can expect 3-monthly scans.
I was accompanied to the hospital by my dear friend J. I particularly wanted to see the mosaic floor in the magnificently gothic Manchester Town Hall which depicts bees, representing the work ethic, I suppose, so we took a detour there before catching the bus to the hospital. I've been thinking a lot about bees lately. I may have said elsewhere in this blog that I used to be a beekeeper, but became allergic to bee stings at the same time that I had my first diagnosis of cancer, whereupon I sold all my bees and equipment in a panic. The only thing I kept was my bee-suit.
I'd heard about the mosaic floor from Martha Kearney's TV series, 'The Wonder of Bees'. She herself is allergic to bee stings, but she keeps bees anyway. Maybe I could start again?
After the hospital visit, J and I went back to York where she lives. The following day we went to Helmsley Walled Gardens to have a wander in their meadows, orchard, formal gardens and potager. It's a lovely spot, and I wasn't surprised to see in the Saturday Times that it's one of the ten best gardens to visit in the whole country. It was a beautiful day, the countryside foaming with may blossom and cow parsley, and the garden looking its best, but still full of promise for the season to come. There is a very good café there, and we had a fabulous veggie lunch sitting on the terrace outside the restaurant which is housed in a Victorian greenhouse. I felt on top of the world.
There were lots of bees in the garden, because there are hives somewhere out of sight of the public. I was reminded of a poem from Carol Ann Duffy's latest collection, 'The Bees':
'For this,
let gardens grow, where beelines end,
sighing in roses, saffron blooms, buddleia;
where bees pray on their knees, sing, praise
in pear trees, plum trees; bees
are the batteries of orchards, gardens, guard them.'
So on Sunday, when I was back home again, I ventured for the first time in 3 years to an apiary meeting organised by my local beekeeping association, of which I am still a member. It was great to see my old beekeeping friends, but especially thrilling (and emotional) to be handling bees again, to be with a group of like-minded people, clustered around the hives, with bees buzzing everywhere. We were all kitted out in bee-suits, even the children, dressed in suits so big for them that they could barely move, and gloves the fingers of which were twice as long as their arms. But it's great to see the children involved, learning about the worker bees, the queen and the 'man bees', handling frames of bees, taut with excitement but no fear. I wasn't frightened either, snug in my old bee suit, and even felt useful, as I dredged up old beekeeping knowledge from the back of my brain to enlighten the newcomers. AND NOT THINKING ABOUT CANCER! (though I came down to earth with a bump when I was cornered at tea time by an old friend who wanted to compare notes with me about our different reactions to the same chemo. We landed up sitting on a bench talking about our bowel problems while everyone else was tucking into tea and cake!)
I have been thinking positively since then about getting a couple of colonies and starting up again. It's such a gentle craft, though you need strong muscles to heave heavy hives around, and there's the occasional excitement/inconvenience of a swarm to be retrieved from some impossibly high tree. I would welcome being able to confide in my bees again. This is an ancient practice. You're supposed to tell them of events in the family, such as births, marriages and deaths. In the past, if there was a death, the hives were hung with black cloth, or decorated for a wedding. Sometimes wedding cake or funeral biscuits and wine were left outside for the bees. If you failed to do this, bad luck might befall the hive.
It's good to be looking forward and thinking positively - thanks to the bees.
