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6:15a
Why is it when you’re the first one up, everything you do makes noise? I am trying to tip-toe around, but even that tip-toeing could set off an avalanche. Every door and drawer and floor board squeaks at this hour. The coffee is COFFEE-er and my pill bottles could pass for a percussion section of a Mariachi band. The click-clicking of my keyboard echoes off the walls.

And now I have hick-ups. I have to go outside.

Dan should be getting up anyway. The kids and I have to take him to work this morning. We left the van on the job. They are not real keen on multiple vehicles in this new park. $10.00 extra per day for the second car will add up over a month’s time. In fact, every extra charge that could be charged, they went for with gusto. The monthly rates do not start here until mid September, so we are paying “nightly” for the first week at a rate that would come with housekeeping service and breakfast in bed in the best spot on the river back in the old park. Weekend nights are $2 more and each kid costs three bucks a piece per night over and above that. When it came to the extra vehicle extra charge, Dan put on the brakes! It would cost less to get a ticket for parking on the street! They saw us coming with no place else to go. They did say that we could stay the following three weeks for just the cost of a month plus metered electric. Wasn’t that nice?

My appointment for take off is not until 2:45 this afternoon. That means I can drop the kids off at daycare with only a half-a-day charge and still make it over the river and through the woods. (. . .to the doctor’s house I go . . .) That $30 saved will pay for my gas. All the better since the little old lady in the camp store charged our debit card twice when checking us in yesterday. Only the owner can give a credit, we are told. Go figure. We are budgeted so close, that error will cost dearly if it’s not corrected swiftly. I have one less day in the hotel this week. That will help.

I guess you noticed that I have money on the mind. No matter how we try to plan ahead, there is never enough to go around. At a time when we have so many expenses, Dan has had to cut back on his hours in order to care for the kids. He isn’t complaining about the extra money flowing through his fingers, but it weighs on my mind. It’s all so crazy.

Time to wake the pit crew.

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9:30a

I hope I can make it two and a half hours without a potty stop. I hate using public restrooms. Most of the way, there isn’t a public anything anyway. If I take the right pills before I leave, it might be ok. I should see the doctor today. I’m going to find out what’s going on.

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10:45a
Just had a call from my surgeon’s scheduler. Dr. H had left a note for her check on me and schedule another MRI and Chest X-ray for one week before my operation. I already have the pre-op appointment with him on October 2nd. Now I have the tests the day before. I don’t know how we will swing that with the kids in school. There is also a pre-op with the anesthesiologist too. (I need to look that date up.) While I had my scheduling supergirl on the phone, I thought I would pick her brain about what I could expect after the surgery. I told her how the Oncology nurse seemed to think I would need specialized care from trained therapist dealing with cancer rehab and that she didn’t think I could get that on the coast. “We live in a motorhome. If we have to move to Portland, we could do it. It’s just that I have the three kids that I am putting in school in Lincoln to think about.”

“I don’t think it will be a problem to do the rehab in Lincoln. At that point you will be dealing with a surgical therapy- getting you on your feet, range of motion and so on. Depending in the extent of the surgery . . . If you did need a managed care facility it wouldn’t be for long.”

“What do you mean?”

“People who get a whole hip replacement and are sent to a nursing home need a month. You wouldn’t need more than a week or two.”

If we had been on a video phone, she would have gotten my extreme what-you-talkin’-’bout-Willis look. A nursing home? It never occurred to me that a nursing home would enter into this story!

“I don’t have insurance. Or money! Wouldn’t out patient care be enough?”

“And they are expensive. I don’t know, I really think they will just send you home.”

“I need to know. I have to make plans.”

And she said she would ask for me and call me back. A nursing home? You have to be kidding. I’m going to ask Dr G when I see him today.

I won’t be writing as I drive back to the city today. Dan made me promise. . .

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I took pictures instead! Hehe

Gotta Love me, it’s a rule!

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6:00p

I was early enough to check into my room before my treatment. Last week I asked for a ground floor room in the back and away from the stairs. Ground floor because I don’t want to deal with the stairs. In the back because it looks more park-like. And away from the stairs so I can open the curtains and not get the upstairs guests looking in my room as they descend. Two out of three are going to have to do. I’m in the back on the ground, but only one room over from the stairwell. Anyway it’s better. I wanted this building earlier, but I would have missed the sign on the bus last week, see? Since I am here now, God must be planning some other canvas for this week’s lesson. The room is nearly the same: different chair and ottoman (like the other model better) and the remote is better (more buttons -I like options). It’s just like being in the motorhome with the curtains drawn. Still home, but with a new view.

I looked at the clock in the room and ran out for my session across the street. Driving this time. Turns out the clock was wrong and I had a ten minute wait! In the waiting room I met up with a woman I had seen there before with her mother and we started talking. She is also from the coast, but further north. She drives her mother back and forth everyday.

“Where is your cancer?”
(That was the same question a lady at the daycare asked me just this morning.)

“In my gluteal muscle.”
(The same reply I gave to the other lady.)

“Where is that?”
(Neither lady spoke medical.)

“In my tush.”
(Same look in both cases, of course.)

“I have never heard of that.”
(Nobody has.)

“Nobody has.”
(I kid you not. Exact same. Is there a lesson coming on?)

Before I knew what was happening I was telling her my whole story. I never set out to do it. I don’t seek out strangers to unload on. (Present company excluded.) I told her about how we moved from the house into the motorhome; how it was a part of this story, but we didn’t know it then. I told her about the ER doctor’s “cyst,” the “splinter” that wasn’t, the pathology debacle, the denials and delays while the tumor grew and grew. I told her how wonderful the staff at this treatment center is. (That she already knew.) I told her of the surgeon who is the only man for the job. My kids. My husband. My life in a motorhome. I told her that I just take one day at a time. “I’m going to be alright. It’s hard, but I’m doing it the best I can muster.”

There was just enough time to tell her it all. (Makes you wonder who set the clock back in the room! Hmmmm?) As she rose to greet her mother returning from the Tropical Room, she said, “Thank you. It’s good to hear someone else’s story just when you are all bogged down in your own. We sometimes get so caught up in our own troubles . . . You have given me plenty to think about.”

Sometimes your lesson is that it wasn’t your lesson.

I have so much more to tell you about my day, but I’m tired. I think the days are getting shorter. It will keep until tomorrow. I hope you understand.