Saturday, June 29, 2013

A Dogs Life


Up at the Huntsman, we completed Round Eleven on Friday.

Up at the Huntsman, children under 14, 

and pets, 

are discouraged.

Except for trained service animals.

Trained children are optional.  
(but equally hard to find)

So every once in a while you see a child.
An oldish looking one.

And every once in a while you see a dog.
A service dog.

On Friday, there was a golden retriever walking through
the "Infusion Room."

("Infusion" is secret code for chemo room.  They try
and make it sound all infusion-y and nice...but it still
means the same thing.  We are getting "infused" simply
means we're getting chemo dripped in.)

Back to the dog.

Who doesn't love a golden retriever?

Those soulful eyes.

That soft golden fur.

We owned, not one, but two during our first 10 years
of marriage.

Such great dogs.

Fiercely Loyal.  True.  Committed. 

I jumped up from my seat and told its owner to walk
over to our "pod" where the chemo/infusion was taking place.

"My husband he LOVES those dogs!" I said.

I asked the young lady how old her dog was.

He had a gray face and looked like he'd been around
the dog park a time, or three.

She replied, "4 years old."

To which I expressed my shock at his appearance.

She explained that this was her husbands dog.

She explained that the dog had "absorbed all the stress
of her husbands cancer."

Apparently, quite literally.

She explained that the dog had aged before his time from 
the experience.

I asked how her husband was doing, to which she replied he
had died 3 months earlier.

She was half my age.  So young.

"I'm so sorry", I whispered in sorrow and reverence and
sincerity.  

Those words COMPLETELY inadequate to express the extent 
of sorrow in my heart and soul for her.

And as if I were standing beside myself whispering, to myself,
my very next thought came unbidden.

"She's still alive,"  I thought.  "Her husband died
and SHE'S STILL ALIVE!"

"How is that possible?"

"How can she be standing here in front of me after 
having passed through that...that unimaginable thing."

I was shocked at the very possibility.

It did not seem possible that someone can
come out the other side
of this intact.  Or whole.  Or alive.

For either her, or the dog.

Or me.

How is it possible without being ripped to shreds
from the inside of your soul out.

That is how I feel some days.

Like her golden retriever.

A little old before my time.

Absorbing the pain, and heartache, and sadness, and grief
from this journey.

And some days I think to myself, with equal amounts of shock...

...You're still here.

...You're still alive.

...You're still getting up everyday and living this.

How is that possible?

And so I look in the mirror, directly into my eyes.

And I brush my slightly reddish brownish hair, that has
gathered a few extra gray hairs along this ride.

And I breath in and out...

And I say...

"You're still here!"

"Look people DO make it out the other side...."

(though the thought that always comes unbidden with this is...
"how damaged"  "how much of their souls have been given
to this fight"  "how much destruction is done along the way,
to hearts, and families and children, and lives" "HOW do
people survive 'over there', on the 'other side' of this 
after all they've seen and been through?")

And I square my shoulders and face a new day.

Fiercely Loyal.  Committed and True.

A little worse for the wear, but still kickin'.

(And clawing and fighting and gnashing and trying
and hoping and weeping and laughing and growing
and sighing.)

Who's to say dogs aren't doing something right?

Fiercely Loyal.

Committed.

And True.

That's what I've got for today!

That and...

...I wish I had more soulful eyes...

Or a tail to wag.



Thursday, June 27, 2013

Snapshots of New York City. Part One, in which I speak of True Love.

Listen, I won't bore you with ALL of our pictures.

And I won't give a "play by play" of our trip.

That would take weeks, and you know what they say?

Pictures are worth a thousand words.

What I will do is give you a few days in posts of all
our adventures.

New York City is vibrant, and alive.

It hums and thrums and beats and has it's very own rhythm.

At ALL hours of the day and night.

I think people either LOVE it or HATE it.

We LOVE it!

We are so grateful for the chance we had to go to a place
we love.

We are grateful to my "Britches" (of the "Fancy" kind).

We are grateful to skymile donors.

We are grateful to the Wilcox family for letting us 
crash in their apartment while they were packing up
and moving.  (That right there folks??  That's true love!)

Without further adieu ...



 We found not only one, but TWO kinds of Superman Shoes
at Yellow Rat B*stard (a funky clothing store).  
We didn't buy any, but we had to take a photo or two.


 Lots of waiting for the subway.  This is how we traveled.

 Seriously, EVERY DAY we could have eaten pizza there.
 Big Gay Ice Cream was FABULOUS, soft serve with 
fun toppings and even funner names.
I had the "Salty Pimp"...delish!


 I love all the open air fresh flower and fruit stands in they city.  They make the streets so pretty!

 It was hot, some foot soaking was necessary.
 The Rock, we go to the Top and loose a child in a few days.
Stay Tuned.

 They were all so happy I took so many pictures!

Oh all right you talked me into it....

I will tell ONE STORY (funny or otherwise) from each day.

This was our first day here.

Thursday. 

After walking, and eating, our way through town we stopped in 

Washington Square Park to rest and soak our feet in the fountain like all the other tourists.

I'm not sure this is even allowed and we may have stooped
to "beige trash" status (which is ONE STEP above "white trash").

Listen, if we're going to be trashy, we still like to play 
it cool!

On the bench behind was a couple (how shall I say this?)...

...Passionately engaged in physical contact.

They appeared to be homeless.  Or wandering travelers.

They were clothed (thank goodness), however a bit scantily.

What they looked like they needed was a hotel room.

And a bath.   Or both.

As luck would have it, which often happens in New York City--
(the luck part)--A group from Planned Parenthood was roaming
the park handing out free condoms.

(They skipped our family--it appears they didn't think we 
need any.  Luck OR condoms.)

Or maybe they figured with 4 kids, it was just simply 
too late for either the luck OR the condoms.

(ha ha ha)

When they got to this couple, they presented them with an
entire box, instead of just the usual "one" they had been
handing out.

At which point, the woman got off the park bench and went to...
erm... "bathe" in the fountain.

Whilst she was bathing, her "man" got out a Lice Kit Removal
box from his bags and proceeded to rub it through her hair 
upon her return from said bath.

He then diligently took the lice comb and began combing 
through and removing lice from her head.

Now that there folks?

That's true love.

Kyle...I may have to change your diapers at some point.

But when it comes to lice?

You had better be calling someone else!

So that's what I've got for today.

True Love in the Big Apple.

Wouldn't have believed it had I not seen it with my 
very own eyes!

I love Manhattan.

Love, Lice, Beige Trash and All!





Wednesday, June 26, 2013

New York New York...

We just returned from a fabulous 5 days in NYC.

For some reason, we had Iphone "superpowers" and I could
connect to Instagram, sometimes to Facebook and hardly at
all to my email or the internet.  I could sometimes read
emails, but only once did the connection let me respond.

I survived for 6 days without it just fine.
But was very glad I had Instagram to OVER-document our travels.

In pictures, per usual, my chosen way to document.

As always at: "thebompie4" if anyone wants to peek.

Thank you a million times over my "Sisters of the Fancy Britches"

Our vacation included...

1. A lost child, she was found.  Fortunately. 

2. 2 days over 90 (that feels like 100 with humidity)

3. Several cold showers

4. Many slices of pizza

5. A handful (or more, arguments) between siblings.  
    We know! We know!  We are the ONLY family that
    fights on vacations.  Right? Right?

6. Copious amounts of shopping  (each kid earned and
   saved their own money for this trip--Olivia spent a 
   total of $18!!  That's awesome isn't it?!) $18!  ha ha

7. Loads and loads of laundry to catch up on.

8. One mini breakdown on the subway by yours truly...
   ...sometimes that darn (cancer) word even follows you
   to New York City.

9. Picture after picture taken (and STILL not enough)

10. Will be back to blogging and post some of my zillion
    pictures soon!

Kyle did GREAT!  We took naps each day in the hottest part
of the day and then headed out in the evenings again to make
the most of our time.

Stay tuned for more to follow!

And as a teaser....



This is what "Chemo Friday" AKA "NO CHEMO FRIDAY"
looks like in the Big Apple.  Kyle in the Subway
posed with the Man of Steel movie poster.

And the view from Morningside Park in NYC.
Our friends (that we stayed with) live half
a block from this overlook.  There were some
BEAUTIFUL nights in Manhattan while we were there.


Wednesday, June 19, 2013

God and Cancer....



I have spent a lot of time on the internet since Kyle's diagnosis.

A lot.  A lot.

Searching.  Researching.  Studying.  Reading.  Thinking.

I have found blog after blog of people effected with 
cancer, this cancer and other kinds of cancers.

It's so very interesting to me to read so many variations
on the same theme.

So many religions, and no religions, and how it all plays
in to what people think about this disease.

Some people think God gave them cancer.

Some people KNOW He did.

Some people think the Devil gave them cancer.

Some people know He did.

Some people think cancer just happened because we live in
a fallen world with mortal bodies, and sometimes bad things
JUST happen to us.

Some people find great comfort in hope and faith and God.

Some people rage at the sky against Him. 

Some people think if they loose faith, the devil will
make their cancer worse, and then they will die.

Some people hold out hope against hope that if they 
have enough faith and prayers God will step in and cure
terminal cancer.

It only takes enough.

Hope, and faith, and prayers.

I have been a veritable see saw of emotion, and thought,
and feeling on this journey thus far.

NO ONE is right or wrong with how they deal with this,

and view it.  Everyone is right.  Everyone HAS the right
to believe what feels right to them.

There only rules in this "game"?

Well, is that there are NO RULES!

We are all speaking the faith languages most familiar to each 
of us.

I listened to a podcast this week about cancer, and dying.

The storyteller spoke of how cancer rocked her beliefs in God
to the very core of who she thought she was, and what she 
believed.

It changed her entire paradigm of an "intervening" God into a 
God of comfort.  One who cannot reach in and "fix", but
rather comforts us during these hard times. (Much like 
Rabbi Kushner feels.  MORE press for the Rabbi!)

I felt a great kinship with her thought process.

I know Kyle feels this way as well.

We have started attending a "support group" with weekly
meetings.

To talk about cancer and life and our feelings with other
cancer patients.

A few weeks back the discussion centered around cancer and God
and how this ton of bricks (cancer) can greatly impact our faith.

I was telling the story of how in our religion we believe in 
a God that can find lost car keys, and how I have a hard time
with a God that helps someone find their lost keys, but cannot
reach in and cure this disease.

Seriously?  Are lost keys more important than healing the sick?

That just blows my little mortal mind.

(I know everyone has a different spin on why this happens
and how this is....I'm just giving you MY spin for today.)

Are the proverbial "lost keys" more important than....

...female genital mutilation in Africa on millions of
little girls everyday?  Why doesn't God help them?

Or more important than the tens of thousands of little children being sold into sex slavery at the ages of 6, or 8 all over the world?  Where is God then?

My list goes on and on.  I am curious why God (seemingly)
chooses (those figurative) lost car keys over the millions of other great sufferings in our world that happen everyday.

Why does God pick and chooses favorites to save and cure? 
(again, seemingly)

Those He will help.

Or those He will not help.

Why are some people more worthy and deserving of His help
and healing?  And not others?

Is it lack of faith?  Does he not see, or care, or hear the 
billions of prayers from those children crying for relief in 
Africa.  Or is there just "some lesson" they need to be learning?

Maybe God cannot reach in like we like to think He can.

Maybe He's bound by the laws of this earth, and universe He
created.

Maybe he cannot change the inevitable.

Maybe sometimes He just has to sit back and watch.

As a natural disaster unfolds.

Or the cancer becomes terminal.


Or the child cries for relief in a foreign country.

Maybe.

Maybe. I don't know.

Or maybe He can help heal us, or find lost keys.

(I'm just asking the questions....I don't have the answers).

I know people say we just don't always understand HIS "will."

And people can believe anything they want to, they have that right.

I'm just not sure how I feel about all of this right now.

Please don't judge me for how I feel.

Remember this is our journey, and we are entitled to feel anyway
we want to.

I'm putting it all on the line.

How I feel.  Very publicly.   

We also have the right to change our minds.

At any given point along our journey.

Here's what I have learned so far along the way though.

1.  Goodness and kindness and acts of love toward my family
    are NOT limited to people of my faith and religion.  We do
    not have the sole ownership of goodness in this world.  Not
    by a long shot!

2.  Somehow, someway, we are all connected in this great world
    and can receive and act on "inspiration". (this is my faith
    language--you can call it whatever you want in your faith
    language).  Whether we are Mormon, Catholic, Baptist,     
    Atheist, Buddhist, or Agnostic.  We have received kindness
    and goodness and acts of love and service from ALL of
    the above!  Friends and strangers alike reaching out to us.
    From all over this country.  Something prompts them to reach,
    and they do.  In love.  With love.  (Don't we say "God is 
    Love?", if so aren't they acting in His name?)

3.  I don't know how much God actually changes the natural 
    outcome of things in this world, regardless of ALL of our
    collective faith and prayers and hopes.  But I do believe
    that we can ABSOLUTELY feel (tangibly) the energy and prayers
    and goodness from others coming our way. We have felt it. 
    Without question. It holds us up when all else fails.


4.  I've learned I don't really KNOW anything.  I have lots of
    hope and faith.  and I hope that it is enough to get me
    through. 

Maybe the Devil made me write this post.  

Or maybe God did.

Maybe I don't have enough faith.

Or MAYBE I just JUST enough.

That's what I've got for today.

What do YOU think?









Monday, June 17, 2013

The Sisterhood of the Fancy Britches....

For the past 10 years, or so, I have been an Ebay seller
to supplement our family income.

It's not a ton of money, but its been enough to be our "slush
fund" or "vacation fund" to use over the years.

To learn how to be a "STELLAR SELLER" on Ebay all those
years ago I joined an online "moms group" to meet up with 
a bunch of women who could teach me all the tricks of the
trade.

The Sisterhood of the Fancy Britches.

It worked.

I made "power seller" and did pretty darn good.

In the interim, I also "chatted with" and made a new group
of online friends.

Some of whom I've met in real life over the years.

Some of whom I've talked to on the phone.

All of whom I've called friends.

They are a great group of ladies.

We have watched each others kids grow up, been through hard
times, struggles, divorces, and the ups and downs of life.

Even though I have not met most of them in my real life,
they are women I consider friends.

Unknown to me, at the time of my husbands diagnosis, online
emails and messages began to fly.

Fundraisers were set up, people donated of their time, gifts
and money to help my family.

When the day arrived that I was to be "let into the loop"--they 
texted me and told me to get online.

They had something to tell me.

What they told me (once again) made me cry.

They had earned some money for my family to take a trip.

It was ONLY to be used for a trip.

Explicit instructions were given NOT to use it for medical
bills or anything else.

They wanted my family to go away, and take a zillion pictures,
and make a memory that we could all cherish forever.

I checked.  

I doubled checked.

I triple checked.

Really?  Should we use the money, their hard earned money,
for my family to have a good time.

It just seemed so wrong.

Feeling great guilt at using someone else's money for our pleasure.

They assured me that it was in THIS spirit, the spirit of love, and fun, and memory making, that they had raised the money and to please please please use it for that.

I was once again humbled at the kindness and generosity and
goodness of the world.

Cancer seems to touch lives in ways that I never imagined.

While all this was happening, another friend (who wishes to 
remain anonymous--you know who you are!) called to say they
had something to contribute to our family, to help us get
away.

They had some spare frequent flier miles that they were
gifting to our family for a trip.

The money along with the miles dropped us (again and again)
to our knees in gratitude.

Our "vacation fund" for the year, this year, had been used
up paying co-pays and meeting deductibles for Kyle's cancer.

So armed with a free place to stay, airline miles and money--
Kyle requested a trip to one of his favorite places on earth.

New York City.

Kyle and I have friends that live in The Big Apple that are letting us stay for free.

We call them "Hotel Wilcox" and are grateful for their generosity
to our family during a busy time for them.

We have been there a number of times, and Kyle completed a 
course at Columbia University a few years ago and traveled there
often for school over a 6 month period of time.

It is a place that holds a little piece of all of our hearts.

So in the next little while, we are packing our bags, charging
our camera batteries, eating good food, and making a memory to last a lifetime.

We are so grateful to the many people that made this trip possible.

In ALL ways, it is hard to except this kind of generosity.

In ALL ways, it is a reminder of "WHY" people are doing nice
things.

In ALL ways, we are thankful and happy beyond words that we
are loved and cared about.

In ALL ways, we will use this to make a happy memory to
make us smile when the time comes we can no longer smile.

In EVERY WAY, we say "THANK YOU" to all my "SISTERS!"

Thank you!

Thank you!

Thank you!

We are so grateful for your love and kindness to us.

We are so happy to be able to do this through your kindness
and generosity to us.

Remember the old Wayne's World Clip from Saturday Night Live?

"We are not worthy!"

This is how we feel.

But Thank You again and again and again!

Love,

All of us at the Nielson home