Friends

Happy Valentine's Day everyone. I am so happy that my Valentine is still around. We might argue today... not many days go by that we don't just a little bit about some inconsequential thing, life should be normal, right?... but we will also each tell the other "I love you" and mean it, and we will sit together on the couch and watch the baby play, loving each other in the knowledge that, without us, she would not be here. I will also make the ultimate sacrifice and take Papa on a coffee ride... sacrifice because I do not like going out in the cold unless absolutely necessary but I will do it for him. Oh man, I am such a martyr : )

This coming Wednesday marks the beginning of Papa's last chemo cycle. Three more treatments, ten more Neupogen injections, two more rounds of lab work. How can all of this have passed so slowly and so quickly at the same time? There will still be CT scans and doctor visits and occasional lab work though. Papa has his next CT on March 9th... I am looking for a good result and praying the doctor will tell us the cancer is in remission.

Through out this ordeal Papa has been surrounded by many people who love him, our children and their families chief among them. Eric and Pamela call and check on him frequently and make special trips home with our grand daughters to see him when they can. Of course, Mel and Ryan and their kids live with us and Ben stops by several times a week to see his dad, it's nice that his store is so close. Ben and Sara bring Noelle over every week too. Andrea we haven't been able to see much lately... her step children were living with her and Jerry for a while because their mom was very sick and in the hospital, but Papa talks to Jerry every day on the phone. Jerry is a truck driver and works for the same company Papa used to work for. Papa helps him with directions and just generally passes the time with him. It gets lonely out on the road and Papa remembers that lonliness. Tammy and kids make their presence known too and then there are Mel and Ben's friends, my sister and brother-in-law and my internet friends who always ask how he is doing and offer up prayers for healing. How very thankful we are for everyone's prayers.

Then there is the guy Papa went to truck driving school with. They worked together on and off over the years too and ended up their careers at the same company. He helped us with our renovations before the kids moved in and continues to do little things here and there. Bob has made things so much easier for us, we are very grateful to him.

The guy across the street we don't see as much right now because of the weather. He is the one who built the room in the basement for us. We wave at each other in passing and once the weather is better, we will see a lot of him and his family as we relax on our respective front porch's. The lady across the street is the mother of Papa's best friend. She sits on her front porch in the summer too. If we don't see her every so often, I call over there to make sure she is ok. She has many children and grandchildren to check on her but I do it anyway. Just after Christmas she was in and out of the hospital a couple times but she is better now. I hear from her via e-mail too as she asks how Papa is doing. She and members of our family have been neighbors for over 50 years now.

During the length of our marriage Papa has never been a very social person. When he quit drinking he had some bad experiences with "friends" trying to get him to drink again and he cut many ties as a matter of self preservation. When we would eventually go to some gathering he never felt comfortable, especially if we were to be around smoking and drinking. Gradually the frequency of said gatherings grew more and more infrequent until the majority of them became family gatherings and sometimes he was not comfortable at them either.

Regardless of this fact, his friends from long ago have made themselves known. The wife of his best friend organized a benefit chili dinner for Papa last October. This is Michigan, a big time hunting state and most of Papa's acquaintances are hunters. Jaye got people who know him to donate the venison for the chili, the vegetables and beans and spices, cakes and dozens of cookies for desserts, garlic bread and bread sticks for dinner, the place to hold the benefit was donated, the tables and chairs, the silverware, plates and napkins, glasses. She called in all her markers and got prizes donated for raffles, 50/50 drawings, door prizes. Someone donated tickets for the drawings, someone else put donation canisters in local convenience stores. Others went door to door handing out informational flyer's and put flyer's up in stores and on telephone poles.

Jaye put a tremendous amount of work into this benefit and we can not thank her enough. She sure knows a lot of people, I can say that. And she did this for a man who, during the early stages of her marriage, caused many hard feelings between husband and wife. Those were Papa's drinking days and he would go and get Jaye's husband and take him out when husband should have been home helping with two tiny children or maybe should have been at work but wasn't cause he and Papa were busy riding around, throwing empty beer bottles at mail boxes and stop signs. Jaye probably hated Papa back in those days, probably did for a long time.

The benefit was a huge success and raised a lot of money for us during a time when pickins were slim to none. Papa did not attend. He was very sick right then from radiation treatments and in passing said to me... "no one will be there anyway, I'm nothing special." But they came... old high school friends, people from work that he barely knows, people from church that he does not know. Friends of our children were there or sent money... they all have fond memories of the tree house that Papa built so long ago, the one that had electricity and heat and lights and was insulated, where my kids stayed over many Christmas vacation's and where they lived in the summer. There were customers from Sara's bead shop, including three very chic older women who looked totally out of their element in the bar where the benefit was held. They bought a lot of pumpkin bread and cookies and raffle tickets though.

Jaye took lots of photos for Papa to enjoy and he has seen many old friends in them and some of them have subsequently phoned to see how he is. I think a lot of them are afraid to come over here... they don't know what to say to someone who may be dying. But they are friends none the less and they mean a lot to the man sitting in the corner of the couch.


Addendum: I can not forget to mention my blog readers. I am very grateful to you all for your comments... both those added here and the numerous letters I receive privately. You all understand that this is not something that only Papa is going through. It affects all of us here. I began this as a way to relieve stress and hopefully to help anyone, any reader, who may also be going through major illness with someone they love. Papa may not know you but you have all helped me. Thank you.