Tuesday and I wake to my partner getting ready to go to work. She goes off to a retirement lunch and I take my vitals, that are all good. I have woken up with the same “itchy scratchy ” feeling which prompts me to scribble a rough poem.

435
There's a lot bubbling about
making me feel itchy and scratchy inside, 
my partner retires this week
and says farewell to her managers today.
Today the second anniversary of my
sisters death, 
still unpacked, unscattered in my wardrobe. 
I'm sleeping in a finger splint 
after the operation that has left me with
a Harry Potter across my palm.
All this and my cancer quietly 
gnaws away at me,
darkly threatening to over run me
at any time my resolve runs out. 
Still I count my energy in spoons
and wonder if I have enough
for each day in this changing world.
So I lay here
listening to meditation music
planning my resolution of the 
spoon to "to do" list equation,
trying to balance on tip toe
to reach up and out
to stay engaged and carry on. 
There is little room for fripperies
if my energy is to last the day, 
train I must to hold off chemo 
side effects
to be able to say 
"I stand".
To write and capture it all,
to understand,
to make meaning
and continue to build my personal universe
that sees me through
a changed world.
It would seem the sickle and 
the stars unite
to caste a deeper shadow 
to what should be light
in which I try to navigate 
my way into the night. 

                                     435   25-02-2025         

I do not often write early in the morning, so the above is probably a bit odd. Having got that out of my system I get up and get into my training gear and take my morning meds. With my earbuds in and music in my ears I go to the garage and the rowing machine. I make the decision to do a forty five minute session and see how my hand holds up. I get going and at the end of the session it feels like my hand has done well. The figures are reasonable, so I am cheered.

Having recorded the session I removed the plaster from my hand and headed off for a shower where I could thoroughly wash my hands without plasters or bandages. Once fresh and clean I attend to my scar. There is still some scabby bits that I dare not pull at so I disinfect and Nivea cream the top of the scar and put on a smaller plaster. I suspect this is going to be a daily ritual for a few days.

With the hand care done I start the draft the blog before getting myself lunch. A busy morning. I try to relax by listening to Mark Steeles In Town but after a couple of episodes I decide to put the bins out and to weed through the front drive flower pots. I have a pair of claw gardening gloves and they are just the ticket to weed out the flower pots and to rake through the surface soil to aerate them. It is clear that many of the pots have Spring bulbs in them that are just beginning to break through the surface. The Iris’s in the big pots are also shooting but they need to be put against the south facing wall to warm them up and encourage them to grow and possibly flower, but I doubt they will as they had such a disturbed summer and winter. They are quite sensitive flowers and need it to be just right for them to flower. Its been too wet for them this year I think.

As I am just finishing my partner returns home with arms full of flowers from her retirement lunch with her managers. I help carry some in and then return to sweep the drive clear of the dirt from the flower pots. We sit and chat about my partners day and I read her cards as we wait for the Tesco order to arrive. Right on time the delivery arrives and there is flurry of activity and rapid squirrelling of goodies. The problem of buying items when they are on a good offer can sometimes me a stock pile accrues, so I discover packs of baked beans I did not realise we had with the result that we could live for a month on rice and beans for a month if the Trump, Putin alliance decide to hold the world to ransom for the rare earth metals in the Ukraine. The Rum Tint Pup duo will have lot to answer for. With everything squirrelled away I continue the blog as the darkness of evening descends and I have the difficult decision of whether I watch football, more Pennyworth or find something else to occupy me before I take my night meds and go to bed hoping to wake up with enough energy to train again and to go to the Shed to write letters, a true test of my mending hand.