Paw Paw Salad

Trapped in the Drive Thru*

Something that intrigued me about Bali was the prominence of religious observance in daily life. According to our main driver, Andy, one factor that prevents most Balinese from visiting other parts of Indonesia is the extent of their ceremonial obligations. We often saw groups on their way to temples for what we were told could be rituals lasting several days. And every morning – before dawn in many cases – offerings were placed around people’s homes and places of business. Apparently, the Balinese version of Hinduism requires both good and bad spirits to be acknowledged. Woven baskets filled with flowers and small pieces of food, often accompanied by incense, were placed on shrines to honour the good spirits. Similar baskets were tossed onto the ground to keep the bad ones satisfied.

Given my frame of mind, the idea of fickle, mischievous spirits alongside good ones made a kind of sense, and I enjoyed stepping over their scattered gifts. I liked the idea of starting one’s day with a frank plea for good luck before plunging into the fray. It seemed to fit a society where there is less of an illusion of control – and appealing to a Westerner for whom that illusion lies in tatters.

Like countless others, I struggle with the Problem of Evil – the question of how the presence of an all-loving, all-powerful God can be compatible with the existence of seemingly pointless suffering.  I have wrestled with this for much of my adult life. Contemplating the possibility of not seeing one’s children grow up certainly doesn’t make the answer any clearer. While going through treatment, I stumbled upon this strip in one of my sons’ much-loved ‘Pearls Before Swine’ anthologies.

 
I shed a little tear while laughing at this comic, and the boys wanted to know why I loved it so much. I told them that there are some questions for which you may search all your life for an answer, and “Dude, I just make the tacos” sometimes feels like it’s as good as you’re ever going to get. Right now I feel like putting it on a t-shirt – and tossing a daily offering to the ground from the edge of my verandah.

[* The title of this post - as well as being an expression of existential angst - is a tribute to one of my sons' other favourite funnymen, Weird Al Yankovic].

Driving Miss Crazy.

We had a wonderful time in Bali. During 2010 our little family undertook a fourteen-week road trip, and learnt to travel beautifully together. It was fantastic to be off on another shared adventure. We trekked between tiny mountain villages, rode on elephants, blasted down waterslides, puzzled over the storyline in a Kecak dance and sampled Luwak coffee. We had drinks on a mountainside gazing at the Northern coast, lunch next to an active volcano and dinner at a lamp-lit table on the beach while the sun set.

We also had some wobbly times in Bali – or at least, John and I did. Watching our children relish new experiences, playing our traditional travelling games of ‘500’ and gazing at beautiful views could quickly create a kind of poignance overload. An extraordinary level of mental discipline is required to let cancer heighten your awareness of mortality just enough to enhance your gratitude for happy times, but not so much as to leave you sobbing in the foetal position on your sunbed. “Nothing is certain! I must enjoy every moment to the fullest!” - this much is OK; good, even. But letting these thoughts reach their logical conclusion (“....because this time next year I might have metastases on my liver!”) tends to kill the holiday mood. It’s a difficult line to draw. We hope we’ll get better with practice.

Since diagnosis, alongside the omens, I see metaphors everywhere. At the risk of drowning this blog in a kind of symbolism tsunami, I find that they help me get a grip on the foreign, frightening experience of cancer in a way that little else does. The use of metaphor is a time-honoured counselling technique, after all. Perhaps their seeming omnipresence over recent months springs from a subconscious attempt to conduct my own therapy. Or perhaps I've just overdosed on green tea.

Metaphors followed me to Bali. Like most tourists there, we hired local drivers whenever we needed transport. On several occasions I found myself volunteering for a spot without a seatbelt in the middle of the back seat, in circumstances where it seemed like too much hassle to search for a vehicle with a full complement of belts (previous travel experiences in Asia meant that I was happy there were any belts in the vehicles at all!). With each new driver I initially felt scared, and kept imagining my body flying through the windscreen. But the drivers were careful and cautious (their vehicles were the source of their families' livelihoods, after all) and I was surprised at how quickly I was able to put these fears from my mind almost entirely. Yes, my risk of catastrophe was enormously increased by not wearing a seatbelt. But this level of risk was normal here; and the driver was doing the best that he could to avoid disaster.

It occurred to my metaphor-seeking brain that life before and after a cancer diagnosis feels like being a backseat passenger in two very different cars. Before cancer, life felt like a ride in a Toyota Camry with disc brakes, air bags, stability control and – most definitely – a complete set of seatbelts, the presence of which I absolutely took for granted. In remission, I feel like I've hopped into a Toyota Kijang - lovingly maintained but rather battered - and I’m not strapped into my seat. Right now the beauty of my journey is overshadowed by thoughts of my dramatically heightened peril. But I'm hoping that, with time, my fears will fade and I'll be able to enjoy the view.

Here's one I prepared earlier!

I am about to go ‘off blog’ for a week or so. While I don’t like to advertise these things too much on the internet, my absence will involve a family celebration, some extraordinarily cheap middle-of-the-night plane fares and a nearby tropical location about which I will say nothing other than: “Don't mention Elizabeth Gilbert.”

To keep this baby blog a lively place I wanted to put up a new post before our departure, but I've been too distracted to write anything. Glimpsing the horrifyingly bald identity photo in my new passport reminded me that I had written something during chemotherapy. A friend had suggested that writing might be helpful during active treatment, but I felt utterly dried up and as if I had nothing whatsoever to say (this has obviously changed - ahem!). The only things that I wrote during all those months were one poem and this little piece about my first chemotherapy session. (And yes, I did make it to the end of 'The Sopranos' - I hope to reflect on that later!). Best wishes to all, and back soon...

At my first chemotherapy session I am directed to an armchair, beside which stand an IV pole and a table. After setting up my laptop and headphones, I pull series 1 of ‘The Sopranos’ out of my handbag. Somehow I have reached the age of 41 without seeing this HBO classic. Six chemo treatments, each three weeks apart, six ‘Sopranos’ series – perfect! Something good has to come of this, I say jokingly to the nurse. In truth, I need the distraction.  Other patients sit alone or with a supporter, talking softly, reading, or gazing around the room, but I need diversion with heft. I am shown an instructional film about infection risk, hair loss, exhaustion, premature menopause. The nurse puts heat packs and a tourniquet on my arm, skilfully teases up a vein and tells me to stay very still. I feel stinging and a rush of coldness. At last I press ‘play’, and sink with relief into Tony Soprano’s passenger seat as he drives along the New Jersey Turnpike.

In the pilot episode we meet Tony, a mobster whose life has been thrown into turmoil by the onset of panic attacks. His line of work has no room for frailty, either real or perceived. In secrecy he starts therapy, and it is unveiled that the first attack coincided with the departure of a family of wild ducks which had made a home in his pool, bringing him an intense and uncharacteristically innocent delight.

Tony reminds me a little of Captain Ahab. Both are impatient, violent men in positions of authority. Both experience anguish due to the actions of wild creatures which symbolise things beyond their control. To me, the malevolent white whale whose existence Ahab cannot bear is the randomness of the universe; the dreadful truth that our fortunes are largely governed by luck and do not correspond to our godliness or what we may deserve. Tony’s therapist thinks the ducks represent his family, but they could also stand for love itself, or the relentless cycle of life - things he cannot bend to his will. As toxins flow into my body – to no guaranteed end – I realise the strength that it takes to fully acknowledge lack of control without having it break you; or at least without wanting to ram the next person who chirps “everything happens for a reason” with your car, Tony Soprano-style. 

The IV bag is changed and episode 2 begins. An elderly man in an armchair on the other side of the room sees me flinch at the violence on screen - I almost call out to let him know I’m OK. The nurse comes to tell me I’m finished just as Tony uses a telephone to bash a strip club barman in the face. Embarrassed, I hurriedly close the screen as she hands me a bag containing five different anti-nausea medications. Tablets are to nausea as telephone is to barman. Cannula removed, I pack up my laptop, confirm my next session and walk out to wait for my lift home and then – what? Mouth ulcers? Vomiting? Forgetfulness? I have no idea what chemotherapy – or ‘The Sopranos’ – will bring, but sense that I’ll draw a twisted comfort from one while enduring the other. As I sink into a real life passenger seat, the theme song pulses in my head. Woke up this morning, the world turned upside down...

 

The Not-Dead-Yet Poets' Society.

While staring haggardly at a blur of organisational emails on the computer screen far too late last night, it dawned on me that I was suffering from Carpe Diem Syndrome. It was a textbook presentation. Following treatment for a life-threatening illness, I had become obsessed with a need to:

• Commence long-dreamt-of activities.
• Complete time-consuming and abandoned tasks (compilation of photo books is a classic indicator).
• Exercise daily.
• Compile nutritious weekly menus requiring multiple shopping trips and the preparation of all meals from scratch.
• Develop a sophisticated level of knowledge about aforementioned life-threatening illness, so as to become an Informed and Outspoken Advocate.
• Form connections with others who had experienced said illness (involving support group attendance, intensive blog perusal and participation in Dragon Boat racing).
• Tidy my house and garden.
• Organise a bonding family holiday.
• Grab every opportunity to be a fun, involved mother.
• Review after-school activities to ensure that my offspring were (a) mastering crucial life skills and (b) exploring their passions, remedying any oversights on an urgent basis.
• Learn to perform all domestic tasks previously undertaken by my spouse (thus moving towards goal of being a Highly Capable & Well Rounded Person).
• Maintain contact with family and friends.
• Start a babysitting club (facilitating re-connection with Highly Capable & Well Rounded Spouse).
• Invigorate my family’s social life.
• Try (again) to learn piano.
• Fill gaping holes in my historical, geographical and scientific knowledge.
• Read the entire canon of English literature.

Sufferers experience high levels of anxiety due to the inconsistency of their multiple compulsions with three strongly internalised beliefs about their future well-being:

1. That life must henceforth be appreciated ‘in the moment’.
2. That stress must be minimised.
3. That eight hours of sleep per night is mandatory.

And the cure? Well, for the moment, I’ve decided that my diem should be carpe'd a little less forcefully. I haven't just been seizing the day, I’ve been putting it in a headlock until it begs for mercy. I think that maybe I should just...cuddle my diem for a while. And then give it a footrub and a nice cup of tea.