Update.

Last week I took this photo on the way home from a part-time day at work. I waited for the second of two pieces of mass transit that get me from the workplace to the apartment. I decided to take a closer look at the progress being made in these two buildings at the Burnside Bridgehead, the eastern end of the Burnside Bridge that crosses the Willamette River. Yes, progress has been made towards completion of both of these buildings because professionals have been at work, much like the progress that has been made in my cancer treatment.

I figured as I sat at my iMac for a few minutes blocking someone I don't want to have access to my Flickr photos that I ought to use this photo to share with you the latest in my health issues. I know that some of you have followed along on Facebook and/or Instagram, which have been much easier to update for me than has been my sweet old friend, the blog. I apologize for leaving some of you in the dark, but for weeks I was too weak to sit here in this chair; I stayed in the recliner, bundled up and setting my reminder to get up and walk frequently to build my strength, then going back to the recliner. I haven't figured out how to post on the blog from the recliner. Anyway, here's what's been happening.

On November 19, I finished the last of the six planned rounds of chemo. Believe you me, that stuff did a job on my fast-growing cells that I needed for my bone marrow to be able to create white blood cells, red blood cells, and platelets. It caused all of my hair, eyebrows and eyelashes to disappear. It took practically every bit of my stamina, no matter if I got a good night's sleep or a good nap. We knew that these things happened by monitoring blood counts and seeing my face and head. Hopefully it also killed every single cancer cell anywhere in my body. We don't know the outcome of that hope yet.

On November 28 a fever of almost 103 degrees sent me to the emergency room and then to be admitted to the cancer ward of the hospital. It turned out that I had a neutropenic fever which means I didn't have enough white blood cells to fight off an infection. I had E coli in my blood, the source of which we never discovered. I had a CT scan on November 29. That scan didn't identify a source for the E coli, but it showed a new mass near where the cancerous one had been removed surgically on June 25. All three of my cancer doctors (surgeon, oncologist, radiologist) feel like it is what is known as a lymphocele, something that shows up when lymph nodes have been removed. Three had been removed on June 25 but had nothing cancerous in them. I stayed in the hospital until December 4 and came home to slowly get better. By December 24, I was able to once again return to work part time, two or three days a week. I'm still at that point now and thankful to be able to do so. I like doing normal, every day stuff!

Next Thursday, January 14, I go to the radiologist for the planning CT that will set my radiation treatments. They begin sometime within two weeks after that appointment. They will go on for five weeks, whole abdomen, then one more week, right side of abdomen. Everyone tells me that radiation will not treat my body as horribly as the chemo did. I certainly hope that turns out to be true with me.

That same CT scan will be used to look at the new mass and find out if any changes have occurred in it. If they have, the entire game plan could change. I will do better in keeping up here so that you won't be left out of the loop.

Thank you for your continued prayers, love, and concern.

UPDATE and a break from The World . . .

UPDATE: Yesterday afternoon Dr. Steiner went over the first pathology report from the needle biopsy and then what our plan would be based on the pathologist's final report which is expected early next week. The final report will reflect what may be learned from a stain being applied to the tissue; they felt this was necessary in order to get a better look.

So, it may definitely not be cancer, it may definitely be cancer, or there may not be a definitive answer either way. If it is not cancer, all of the plan we made will be cancelled and I will be followed closely in two months with a CT scan. If it is cancer or we don't know for sure, I will have surgery to remove the lymph node(s) and any other suspicious tissue--next Thursday, June 25. Dr. Steiner will control the robot's 3-D camera and, as she put it, its little hands. Her nurse Naomi says Dr. Steiner's a champ with that robot!

If I have surgery, I will be off work for six weeks. If it turns out to be cancer for sure, not only from the pathologist report before the surgery but also from the one they will get after they examine the tissues removed during surgery, then I will have radiation and chemotherapy. I don't have any details on that right now. It's a wait-and-see thing, of course.

I so appreciate your prayers, love and concern.

Now for today's break from The World.



My Saturday morning breakfast--a toasted Fred Meyer Crispy English Muffin, some grape tomatoes, and some blueberries. I drank water. After I ate, I sorted some photos from iPhoto into Flickr, put a load in one of the washing machines downstairs, and went for a six-block walk. In a little while, I'll get those clothes out of the dryer and get them put away. Leland called and he and Rachel invited me to go pick blueberries later on today with them, up on Sauvie Island. I've never done that! It sounds exciting; I've already got my sunhat hanging on the door knob and some plastic containers with lids ready, too. I think I'll take my folding lawn chair with me, too.

UPDATE: It ain't the news we wanted. And upside what happened in Charleston, SC, Wednesday night, my news is an eyelash loosened from our eyes by the tears we have shed. While you're praying for me, please, I entreat you, consider praying for all of us to treat each other as the valuable people we each are. Now, for the blog post I already had made for Friday: Size, often it's all in perspective and location. Sometimes, it's just flat out huge. No. 3

UPDATE: The needle biopsy results say that there are fragments of atypical cells like the adenocarcinoma which was the kind of cancer that was in my uterus. So, I have an appointment tomorrow at 2 p.m. with the doctor. Tentatively scheduled to have surgery at a different Kaiser facility where there is a robot which will be used for the surgery to remove lymph nodes. I will know about those two things, the pathology and the plan, after the appointment tomorrow. I will have to be off work for probably five weeks. I will not give up. Thursday at work I felt a consisten energy level throughout the day, a decent energy level. I take that to mean that I am stronger. I know that I have lost weight, I know that I recovered smoothly from the hysterectomy. I intend to do that this time as well. I will not give up. Thank you for your prayers, your love and your concern. Love y'all.



One more close up before the photos that I took of The World's journey north on the Willamette. I couldn't be at the beginning of it and along the river, so I opted to get up very early and ride a bus to somewhere I'd never been, get off, and walk back onto the Broadway Bridge to see what I could see.



Here comes The World. That is a smokestack that you see to the right of the raised Morrison Bridge. The white things sticking up in between the decks are part of The World. I am standing east of center of the Broadway Bridge, zoomed in as far as I can.



In this photo, three bridges are lifted simultaneously. To the far right, that's the Morrison beginning to close. In the center, that's the Burnside Bridge, not quite raised all the way. And to the left, the Steel Bridge looks about half raised.

Come back tomorrow for more photos of The World's exit from Portland on the Willamette River. Thanks!

Taking steps, out and about inside my building - I live in a studio which is absolutely perfect for me, space-wise and location-wise.

I'm standing on the level of my front door, around the corner from it--this loop in the hallway is 67 of my steps around. I could take the steps down to the vestibule seen through that closed door or up to the second floor landing. I knew yesterday that it's time to take a walk up those stairs. Right at my fingertips, well, at my feet, the perfect way to get moving more and more on this road to recovery from surgery a week ago yesterday! To put some variety in my work out, complete with the safety of a handrail.



Ever curious, I decided to find online a diagram of wooden staircase parts so that I would know the exact name of what my hand grasped, of where my feet landed. I like a sturdy handrail connected to well-installed balusters. To tell you the truth, my all-time-fantasy hiking trail in the outdoors would come with just such a set up. I believe that my fear of heights would be negated as I held onto such a handrail.



Here's a direct look up the eleven treads in this riser, counting the landing at the top as eleven. Is that the way you count, officially as a carpenter? It's how I count as a walker.



At the top I turned left, looked out through the screen and took this photo. You can see the tile roof on the building's entrance, there to the right. The windows on the lower level on the left are mine! I have a total of eight, four in each room.



The first three you see are part of the four that make up the bonus room's outer wall--my twin bed, a narrow storage unit; a waist-high,long, narrow bookcase; and a chest of drawers are in there, too. This is a photo I took of the bonus room that first day, checking out the apartment. FYI, that silver vehicle across the street is the one whose alarm went off yesterday from approximately 3:30 p.m. until 5:09 p.m. when it ceased. Hallelujah!



There is an extra-wide opening with no door straight across from my bed which opens into my kitchen. I've gotten used to sleeping through the occasional refrigerator gurgle and/or electronic whir. Here you are looking through that opening and out the windows. You can see the building's entrance and the gutter. When we get a lot of rain, it sounds like I'm sleeping behind a waterfall. I love it!



In that photo taken from the upstairs landing, the one window you see at the start of the bow-window area is the first of the four in the living room. There is a bit of wall in between first one and the center two. That bit of wall is repeated between those center two and the fourth one at the opposite end of the bow. These windows grabbed hold of me when I first walked through the apartment's front door, sunshine streaming onto the hardwood floors. This is a photo of the center two windows and the fourth one--I took it on that same day when I first saw what turned out to be my new home.

GOOD NEWS UPDATE - Sights I've seen for years, when I use the stairway to the laundry room and/or the building's side door

In order to pay constant, close attention to the 10 steps down and the 10 steps up, I count each step in my mind as I grasp the handrail. So, for years and years, I've noticed the lower particular worn spot in the treads of one of the steps closer to the bottom. To me, it looks like a side view of the Yellow Submarine of The Beatles' fame. I called it to Lamont's attention yesterday when we did a load of laundry; he agreed! What say you?

Plus, to me the one above it looks a bit like an upside down game fish breaking water. Lamont even said that without my mentioning it!

Y'all may think I'm crazy for seeing such sights in worn treads, but I'm of a mind that the more one enjoys, interprets, notices one's surroundings, the more engaged in life one is which surely makes for a huge plus.

Thanks again for all of the prayers, love and concern. More news after the doctor appointment at 8 a.m. Portland time, Friday, May 1.



Here's the entire stairwell.

UPDATE: Great news! Dr. Steiner says that the cancer I have is endometrial adenocarcinoma. It is grade one of three it is minimal invasion at a 1 mm focal invasion in the endometrium. She has recommended no additional treatment, follow up with an exam every three months for two years, then every six months until five years and then annually. She has ordered a baseline study, a CT of the chest, abdomen and pelvis. She wants to see if the lymph node area shows anything to her on the CT scan. She did look at the lymph nodes some during my hysterectomy last Friday and found nothing out of the ordinary with that look. There was no involvement with the tubes or the ovaries there was no identified vascular invasion to the lymph node area. In other words, this is exactly what we have all been praying to hear. Thank you! Thank you!

Sights I'll miss until I am about out and about again, No. 4 - no biopsy results yet, not expected until later this week

Steps inside bus front doors, almost completely gone in my experience over the past eight plus years. And, even without undergoing a laproscopic hysterectomy last Friday, this is a sight I do not want to see when the bus door opens. In fact, if I'm not in a hurry and notice these steps through the bus door windows, I sometimes take a chance and wait for the next bus, especially at stops where I have several bus line options.

While the kneeling bus helps in getting from the sidewalk to that first step, the rest of the steps are higher than normal and not easy to maneuver.

RECOVERY UPDATE: After watching on TV the Trail Blazers win over the Grizzlies with Leland last night, I felt good enough to send him on home--I knew he was just a phone call and less than two miles away. (It was Lamont's turn to go to the game. What a fine one to witness, stopping a sweep by Memphis!) I slept very well, waking up twice during the night, but went right back to sleep. Woke up Tuesday morning, April 28, at 4:30 a.m., ate some warmed up leftover plain rice and drank some Twinings English Breakfast Tea. Washed those few dishes. Washed my face and brushed my teeth. No need for pain medication. Much less discomfort in the abdominal area today which I take the mean that the tissues severed at the four small incisions are getting back together satisfactorily. I will not go overboard with activity. I will walk around in the apartment, in the apartment hallway where there is a chair rail at a good height for helping to balance one if one feels tilty. I am happy to have one window open completely, another one open a few inches, because it is 57 now. However, it's supposed to only get to 61, so I may have to close that wide open one some, if it gets breezy.

Thanks for every single prayer, all the love and concern.

A Current Monday Morning Photo!

I took this photo a little while ago with my iPhone 5 so that I could have something current on here! Lamont and Leland's friends Lance and Kendra gave me this superb wall hanging and a couple of other nice items on Saturday, by way of Leland, I think--I was still groggy when I got home from the hospital. Thanks, you two! Congrats on the baby on the way!

I slept fine last night, even with a couple of short naps during the day, woke up at 6 a.m. hungry. Ate a little bit of oatmeal. No pain medication needed--hallelujah! Took a shower without any consequence other than being clean. Decided I wanted some hot tea, thus the photo opportunity. I got that wonderful mug some months ago at the Goodwill Super Store near where I work, walked down there on my lunch hour one day. What a fantastic find for a fan like me!

Lamont and Leland took turns being here yesterday, with some overlap for super hero movies on FX; I watched and/or dozed and thoroughly enjoyed peeking at my sweet sons, all day long. Lamont spent the night and just left to go to work for a few hours. He'll be back later before he needs to head home to get ready to go to the Blazers' vs the Grizzlies game this evening. Leland will come here after he gets off work and stay throughout the basketball game which we desperately need to win. Go, Blazers!

Later on I'll eat some of the baked chicken Lamont got off the bone for me--Leland picked it up at Fred Meyer on Saturday at Freddie's, along with a few other items. I've been eating it with plain rice, but yesterday I asked Leland to buy some russet potatoes and carrots which Lamont has scrubbed, wrapped in foil, put onto the cookie sheet and placed in the oven for baking. I'll check on them after the timer goes off. They will go very well with the baked chicken. By tomorrow, I should be able to eat something like a hamburger from The Blue Diamond! They've said they will deliver to me! And some folks from work put some funds on the books there, in my name, for just that purpose. Thanks, y'all!

Unless something unexpected happens during the day, I shall be A-OK by myself tonight and in the morning. Today, when I feel like I need a nap, I'll take one. No over-doing it for me, period. I'll wait until one of the sons is here to walk a short distance in the hallway of the apartment building. It is supposed to be 77 here today. Maybe I'll go, with help and support, out the front door onto the sidewalk in the sunshine! I promise, no over-doing it for me, so do not be alarmed at my maybe.

Thanks for your continued prayers and concern and love. We don't expect any biopsy news until late this week, so, until then, no news is good news!

Sights I'll miss until I am about out and about again, No. 3 - plus an update

Graffiti, Portland style. I took this photo April 26, 2008. Looks like it was a nice sunny day for leaving a trail.

RECOVERY UPDATE: Slept pretty good, in the recliner which meant less stress on my body. Thank goodness I had the laproscopic procedure, not the full abdominal one; that should make my recovery less stressful. Lamont sacked out on my twin bed. I ate a piece of toast around 6 a.m., took a Oxycodone and a 600 Ibuprofen at 6:20 a.m. By 7:20 a.m., outrageous nausea set it. Lamont and I both thought we'd heard two names of over-the-counter nausea meds, so he got in his car and drove to Freddie's where he found nothing, not even a helpful employee; then he drove to Walgreens where a worker explained to him that both were prescription drugs. Lamont called me to report this. While he was on the way back here, I was able to call the discharged-from-the-hospital-within-five-days advice nurse and get some advice: Eat some protein, like a scrambled egg, and some dry toast, slowly, over a period of time. Within two hours of having done that, if I still felt totally terrible, call back. She said it could have been either pill that caused the nausea.

Well, it worked! Actually, by the time I ate it, an hour and a half had passed since I took the pills, so a bit of relief seemed to be already on its way. But, eating that dry scrambled egg and that dry toast, slowly, over an hour, made a huge change. Since then, I've walked in the hall of the apartment building, as well as around in the apartment between kitchen, bathroom and living room. I've had a bit of baked chicken and some plain rice, plus a few strawberries from the box of cut fruit that Leland got yesterday when he went to the grocery store for me. Today he got a few more items that I wanted but didn't think of yesterday. I'm heading for the recliner in a few to take a nap.

Thanks to everyone for your prayers and concern. We really appreciate it.

Big room, big, happy crowd. I was there last night in a big, happy crowd. Different reason.

Big crowd last year at the NBA First Round Playoffs, the night the Trail Blazers eliminated the Houston Rockets. May 2, 2014. On April 15, 2015, I was at the Moda Center for pure entertainment, the Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood concert! No confetti, but plenty, plenty of music and fine light show. What an evening. Now, the Blazers are back in the NBA First Round, but, since I'm having surgery on April 24 and our two for sure home games are on April 25 and April 27, I will be watching on the TV at home. Go, Blazers!

Special Delivery for Greg Oden

I've just been reading some of the comments at the Trail Blazer Facebook page--some of those people are way too mean, others are thankfully very supportive.

Greg, I want you to know something that is very important to me. My almost 85-year-old mother and I moved here to Portland from Jackson, Mississippi, the summer of 2006. My two wonderful sons had already moved here and welcomed us with open arms. When you were drafted by Portland in 2007, my Mama perked up at all the news stories and became a basketball fan--she'll even miss "Wheel of Fortune" to watch the Trail Blazers. This is a cutie-pie little ol' lady who merely tolerated all sorts of sports during her 57 and one half year marriage to my Daddy who always had the TV on some sort of sporting event, but never basketball. I myself have been a basketball fan since the 1960s watching my brother play in school, and I kept score for the high school teams where I was a librarian for six years, home and away games. I adore the squeak of sneakers on the gym floor.

Anyway, I want to say a great big THANK YOU for the part your smile and your desire to do your best for Portland had in turning my mother into a basketball fan because we now have one more thing we can share as a couple of widows living together. She sits in her recliner, pulling for the Trail Blazers, pleased as punch when things go right, uttering a four-letter word that starts with an S, which she turns into two syllables, when things go bad. She's asked me to explain all sorts of terms--pick and roll, in the paint, setting a pick, and from the bench, to name a few. I've had to look some of them up on the Internet, rely on my ol' lady memory, and/or call my brother in Mississippi to get some help with the definitions. He's in the wrong time zone to be much help. Beside Mama on the table, she's got the schedule I printed from the Internet so that she won't forget about an upcoming game--she's keeping up with the wins and losses.

I sit in my chair watching the games, too, but some of the time I'm watching my Mama, the basketball fan. Thanks, Greg. Mama and I wish you the best with your surgery and recovery. We know you will rise again. We know it.

ABC Wednesday - A is for All Service Musical Electronics Repair--one fine neon sign--and some new news, finally

At SE 6th and Morrison, this sign has long caught my eye as I happened to drive by. Luckily one day I had a chance to take some photos, especially for ABC Wednesday.

I also think this is fitting because, so to speak, we finally got some "service" and just might get a "repair" later this week, "all" for my little Mama.

Now for the new news:

Mama will have right subclavian bypass surgery on Thursday afternoon, some time after 2:30 p.m. ,Portland time, probably. Dr. Douville, the cardiovascular surgeon, put it to us--Mama, me, Howard and Lamont--like this. There's a 5 in 100 chance that she'll die, have a heart attack or stroke, during the surgery. There's a 50-50 chance that the surgery will get rid of her nausea, but it should allow her blood pressure to stabilize in her body so that if the surgery doesn't fix the problem, there should be a chance to work on it with medications.

Mama said to him that all she wanted was a chance to not feel like her eyes were floating in a pot of water. Right now that's not happening as often, but she's taking an anti-nausea med as needed.

So, she said to say thanks so much to everyone for your prayers and positive thoughts. We thank you, too.

Howard had to stay over a day because he felt so rotten, and he was very glad to be in the meeting today, to meet the surgeon and hear the answers to all of our questions. His plane takes off at 6 a.m. tomorrow, and I'm going to work tomorrow and half of Thursday. Lamont doesn't work on Thursdays, neither does Lindsay. Leland has class until over in the afternoon, but I'm sure he'll head to the hospital then, just like he did today.

I have not succumbed to the virus, thankfully. I am sleeping plenty, except for rising early to take Duncan out and then fooling around with my hair--gotta look presentable, don't you know? Thank goodness I got it cut two weeks ago, earlier in the day that Mama was first admitted tot he hospital. With the hair products that I purchased, I'm looking presentable each and every day.

Of course, all of this depends upon nothing else out of the ordinary happening.