Cancer 62

Another successful break while undergoing chemo, or at least I hope so. It has been suggested that I am trying to do too much, which is probably true and might explain why I am incredibly tired all the time, my legs ache as though I have walked for miles, and I have actually slept more than the best-normal 5 hours for the last couple of nights. I have walked around Roman forts and National Trust houses, around Hexham and Corbridge. It is suggested that I ought to relax at home at the weekend, put my feet up, read a book (I have finished three books since the beginning of July and it is only the 4th today), and not go roaming around the countryside. The problem is I don’t want to put my feet up. I will be a long time dead; what is the point of resting before I get there? I want to run around as much as possible, do things – not necessarily exciting things like climbing Mount Everest, Formula One racing, playing cricket for England or flying off into space, the local cafe with a little walk will be fine thank you, but I do want to be active while I can. Perhaps I do have years rather than months, but I don’t know that so I want to be active. I know I am sore. My abdomen feels churned up, and not just because I have eaten too much cake, too any beef and gravy sandwiches, too much smoked fish over the last few days. It is a little painful. My stoma has had a couple of bouts of diarrhoea. Behaving unlike myself I will spare you the details of that. It is all a bit messy. I worry that it is time for the downturn, that in a week or two I will be confined to bed and morphine, and in a month I will be food for worms. It is the neurotic in me, or is it the realist? As I said in the last blog I have had this craving for life in the last few days. If I was a different person I would say life is unfair, that I haven’t had enough, though I am fully aware I have had a lot more than many, both in terms of longevity and in terms of perceived quality of life. These feelings fight within me. Acceptance and rejection; awareness of mortality and screaming kicking rejection of mortality. OK, I will sit still and get on with my book. We have a long drive down through the Pennines tomorrow. It will be beautiful, rain or shine, wilderness and some of the finest parts of the country. I know a little pub that does steak and kidney puddings, a fine diet for someone with bowel cancer who is on chemotherapy. They also do a nice black pudding starter….