Saturday 04:33, I’m awake, so are the birds, dawn chorusing and the carriage clock is ticking in the quiet of the lounge. I cannot sleep, my blood results are in. Again the arithmetic is good, PSA has fallen again, so I’m not sure why I feel so crap as I sit here sipping hot water. I do not know what to think any more.

Just two out of range measurements, marginally so. My platelet count has ducked under 150 again and my Urea count has crept up again to be 0.9 above range once again. Apart from that every thing is tickety boo. I should be pleased and part of me is, but I am left wondering why I feel so crap, fatigued and anxious. My gut feels so off at the moment and I do not know if it is the drugs or not, its perplexing. I guess I need to try and sleep again and hope this break in the night will help me do that. The electrician is due in the morning.

The morning turns up and I have managed some sleep. My partner brings warm drinks and we chat for a while. While she gets up I do my vitals. It takes a while for my blood pressure to settle, but settle it does. I have the first muesli breakfast I have had for a long time and then set to work on the first draft of Herod’s Children Crumulent Collection (HCCC). There is a lot to do and it is pains taking work but I think I get to a version that can be worked with by the American team. My partner has taken my eldest daughter to a local jewellers to get a necklace mended. As I edit the HCCC draft the electrician arrives and starts to install a ring circuit in the new patio. He works away on it until lunchtime when he disappears and my partner returns. My eldest decides to go a Eurovision party in Norwich so goes off in an Uber to catch the train from town. This leaves me and my partner to sit on the garden swing seat to talk and soak up some sun. I pop some washing in and we go in search of Dawn’s Delight a cafe at the local equestrian centre. It is closed, permanently! We go to our usual place and indulge in treats before returning home. I watch rugby knowing tonight is Dr Who and Eurovision night. I hope I last.

Friday, jab Friday to be precise, how quickly they come round. I wake up and know I have a trip to the GPs this morning so I do my vitals to see how the arithmetic is. To my surprise it is not as good as usual as my first reading of my blood pressure is up over my usual range. I decide to let myself calm down, listen to Alexa play me meditation music, eat the toast and hot water my partner brings me and then repeat my measurements a couple of times more. They eventually settle back into their usual range at which point I get up and dress. Having got myself ready I prepare for the walk to the GPs and as my partner is at home today I ask her to accompany me. I’m not feeling that confident today. So we stroll to the GPs and I book in. The nurse notices immediately that I am not my usual chipper self and offers encouragement as she vampires me for my required two vials of blood. I say farewell and my partner and I return home, picking up paper on the way.

The builder badgers are working on the raised bed at the end of the garden, and my partner and I go and sit on the swing seat to have a drink and reflect on how the garden is beginning to look. Its a sunny day and I look forward to when I can go and tinker with mother nature in my on little patch of her. After a while I return in side and complete todays cross words, I’m still on form although Damask Rose threw me for a while. As I complete the puzzles the post arrives and in it a lovely long letter from my friend in Scotland who has now got a new printer but whose speech software has ben upgrade and is now doing some funny things. The letter is a delight and brightens my morning no end. It is a very welcome distraction from the now long wait for my blood results to come through on the Patient Knows Best application around midnight.

Now days I tend to start the blog earlier in the day to try and avoid the late night tiredness that often accompanies it, so as the morning moves on I start to draft the blog. I decide its time for a new picture of Rocket to head the page. My internalised Rocket which I use to fight needs an injection of newness and energy. It reflects how I am feeling about things at the moment, in need of fresh energy and a bit more get up and go in the face of my fatigue and more Eeyore moments. I realise as I write this that my new daily food/ activity/and hematuria journal is a fluffy Eeyore book that I had stored away and chose to use at this time. I love the way the unconscious works.

By lunchtime I am feeling tired and as my partner has gone to the physio and the hairdresser this afternoon I prepare lunch and then give myself an afternoon of reading. It feels that today is a waiting day, waiting for blood results, waiting for the Americans to get going on my books and waiting, as it turns out, for the electrician to turn up to finish his work on the new patio.

As it turns out the electrician does not arrive but will arrive tomorrow morning, which goes to show electricians will come out at the weekend. After an evening of rugby and Have I Got News For You I Am idling away time when out of the blue the first draft of Herod’s Children Crumulent Collection arrives. I have a quick look and it is obvious that there is a lot missing and the tenses are wrong in the introduction. I’m too tired to do the work tonight so I download it to work on tomorrow. Its 11 o’clock and I have taken my night meds, my intention was to stay up until my blood results are posted but I’m far too tired to do that so I’m off to bed hoping to sleep. I keep hoping that at any moment I Am going to feel better but it has yet to materialise.

So Thursday rolls around and after a disturbed night I wake to a sunny day and the sound of the builder badgers cement mixer going in the front garden. I do not know what I will do when they finally finish and I wake to a different soundscape. When I check myself I find I am not feeling that chipper, the curry and the sweets I had yesterday are probably a major contributing feature, the price of self comforting I suspect. My vitals when taken are okay, I am just finishing them when my partner brings me hot water. On getting up I find there are some emails I need to deal with, the most pertinent is the subscription to the service that keeps this website free of spam adn unwanted stuff. It appears that my subscription has not renewed due to my card being old. I talk to the Bot who tells me how to go about remedying the situation, which I duly do, so hopefully this site will be spam free for another year.

A brief breakfast and I cast around for things to attend to and a single line keeps coming to me. “I m like a dog in a new basket”. Clearly there is a new poem inside trying to get out, this is the way it sometimes happens. I try to put pen to paper but I get no further, again this often happens, time is required for whatever is going on to ripen till it is ready to flow. At these time my garden sometimes comes to the rescue and it seems to be trying despite the builder badgers continuing there work. The flowers are doing their best despite their pots being moved around or being planted in a new part of the garden. Here are a few that are trying really hard to inspire.

PURPLE IS CLEARLY THE COLOUR OF THE SEASON

Despite the flowers efforts my poem does not materialise. My eldest daughter pops in for a chat about a hospital appointment later today, so we look at the options, I’m not up to taking her so we talk about how that will work out. I am sure that the household will come to the right solution. I have lunch with my partner and start to draft the blog but I am feeling very much like a dog in a new basket and find it difficult to settle. The sun is shining, its a lovely day, I have a Hippo waste bag to fill and things to do in the garden but cannot get myself going beyond coping with my electronic bubble that I seem to have created around me. Apart from the blog I have recently taken to recording video letters with a varying degree of success, and I have started to make public videos for the poetry collections on my YouTube channel, Prost8kancerman. I am trying to think through how best to use them all and whether I should link the two, but I am wary of doing that as this space is meant for family and friends, not the general public. I do have another Prost8Kance man domain but at the moment cannot face creating another website, although I could shift all the poetry related stuff into it and make it more public. It is something I need to give a lot of thought to. It raises issues about what I really want for the poetry I have published and are publishing. My initial goal was to make my poetry available to family and friends, to share more of myself with them adn I think that is still my aim. However it is very alluring to take up some of the publishing options and to be lured into believing that my collections have relevance beyond friend and family. When I look at what I have written in the acknowledgments and book descriptions of the two new collections in production and I seem to have strayed into addressing wider audiences, e.g dyslexics or rejected and unpublished poets. For the time being I shall contain the public awareness via the YouTube channel and try and keep this space for family and friends and live with the fact that some seepage or osmosis may occur. Making money from my poetry was never an issue and was extremely unlikely any way, I am no John Cooper Clark after all.

I have lunch and then spend a little time resting and continuing to try and write but it does not work, as the afternoon goes on I get progressively more tired and restless. Eventually the builder badgers leave for the day so I take the chance to take some photos of the work that has been done so far. Its beginning to look good and I can visualise what the finished patio will look like.

The work is coming along and after 10 days and I am hoping that by the start of next week the project at the rear of the house will be complete or that by the end of the week the front drive will be started on. Having eaten tea my partner and eldest daughter prepare to go to a hospital appointment to have my eldest daughters ankle ligament damage assessed. A friend rings and there is time for a brief chat as she ferries her cat back home from the vets. Its all too short but it is really nice to talk for a brief to time to someone outside the household. After the call my partner and eldest daughter leave for the appointment and I return to drafting the blog. There is a difficult decision to make tonight, football or the semi-final of Eurovision. It remains to be see what I chose. More important is for me to prepare for my bloods to be take tomorrow so I need to focus on drinking a lot of water to keep my platelet count up. Of course it means a late night as I will wait up for the results and I find out whether my arithmetic is holding up.

I took a shower to spruce myself up and then elected to watch the football. After an early goal I chose Eurovision. It is the usual rag bag of stuff where anyone could win, what is clear is that Sweden is obsessed by Eurovision. Once over I do the admin required for tomorrows bloods, take my night meds and finish off the blog for the day. I am hoping for a smooth night of sleep so that I am at my best for an early start tomorrow.

Wednesday and I am awake to the sound of a gently turning cement mixer below the bedroom window. It can only mean one thing, the builder badgers are on site and started their day. My partner has already given them cmy list of offee to get them going and brings me my morning hot water. I do my vitals, all good there, and get up to go through my ritual of emptying Daisy dishwasher and making my breakfast. Its one of those mornings when I can not decide what to have and finally go for a toasted cheese bagel and water. With that out of the way I check my messages and emails and reply to those I need to before I start to check one or two things that I have sent the Americans. I had found that I had made a dyslexic mistake on the acknowledgements page of one of the collections. There was an omission that I had realised suddenly when I was drifting off to sleep last night. I had missed someone important from the list of people I wanted to thank and was appalled I had done so. That was my first rectification to be made and my second was to correct my spelling of “Knight” and had originally left the “K” out. In the context in which this happened it made a huge difference to the meaning. I send the Americans an email with the corrected page and then settle down to read.

Its been a while that I have let myself have a morning of reading and it I find it eases me. My book of choice is Italo Calvino’s Cosmicomics. It has appeared in the blog before but I am still enthralled by the stories, they are so rich and inventive that they make think a great deal, this is indeed rich brain food and it comes in small digestible meals that are a treat.

My reading is interrupted by the arrival of the post and to my delight there is a letter for me, a real ink and paper letter. This is a good day. As it is lunchtime I settle down to a dish of chicken soup and read my letter. It is a real lift to my day and makes me Shed itchy, so that I can return to my pen and ink world. The expectation is that the garden guy will turn up today so I write a list of jobs that need doing before I complete the last thing on my to do list for the day, namely to trim my beard. Feeling less fluffy and dishevelled I read some more Calvino and then start to draft the blog for the day. As the sun is shining I am tempted to visit the local shop and buy myself a treat and a paper for the crosswords.

The papers crosswords are soon done with little problem and I am soon chatting to the garden guy. He is soon rescuing some of the iris that have got displaced by the builder badgers, there are also some roses to try and keep alive. Looking around the pots its clear that once the building is over they will need to be planted up for the summer. Looking at the patio as it grows I keep thinking that there is room for a pergola. It is noted for the future. My partner returns from seeing her mother with her brother and starts to get ready to go out with a friend for a meal. My eldest daughter and I order in an Indian takeaway and as its only down the road it arrives quickly. There is time to eat before the nights big European football game. I settle down to watch. A good game. My partner returns home and we watch the finish. There is just time to watch an episode of Race Across the World and then its time to take my meds and head for bed. I am pleased to have managed to avoid taking more co-codamol. I need to begin to become more active and will use my garden to do this.

Tuesday and it back to work for everyone, except me who wakes up feeling strangely hung over, for which I have no logical explanation. So I do my vitals and find my blood pressure slightly elevated, I wonder if I am excited, I check and find I am not, so I get up. With the kitchen cleared I make the builder badgers coffee and have a conversation about the invoice for the electrician. A take time over breakfast and then I am in full poet admin mode. There is a sheaf of questionnaires to fill in about the two new collections, including cover designs, proofreading and production details. Its a flog but I get there in the end and send them off to the Americans to start the work in earnest. Its lunch time and I’ve run out of spoons already so I start to draft the blog to the background of old TV dramas.

I lunch late as I am not feeling well, but make the effort to clear out the fridge of all the food that is out of date or that we will never eat and then make the builder badgers more coffee. These badgers are diligent builders and earning their corn, the walls of the new patio are growing with the wiring being built in for the lighting. At the top of the garden they have already dug out the old raised bed ready to put in the new sleeper surround. It is building in the wall lighting in the patio that is the tricky and precision work, so the lead badger is being very careful to get it right. At the moment there is no rain forecast until Friday so the badgers have a good run at the project. I am hoping that by the weekend the back garden part of the project will be nearing completion. I take the blog forward a bit more and begin to plan the evening, of course there is the Red Eye to finish.

I’ve entered the inpatient waiting on the Americans stage now and find myself checking my emails to see if they have started work on my collections, as they are five hours behind us they do not start their working day till 1 o’clock our time, so its the afternoon or evening when I am most likely to get any glimmer of hope to see my new collections become tangible books. It is the proof reading and corrections that keeps me occupied and engaged until I get to hold the new book. I spend some time reading the collections that I have already published. I know I am biased but when I go back and read some of them I think that they are not so bad. They may not be the universal stuff of Pablo Neruda, Ginsberg or any of the great poets but they do at least say something about my personal universe. Once the next two are published it will probably be time to take a break and have a period of reflection and recharging the verbal batteries.

My partner returns from work and the builder badgers start to pack for the day. Once they are waved on their way the bins can go our and Tesco can deliver unhindered. So the evening beckons and I ease towards it with my eye on taking my night meds and getting a good nights sleep. All goes to plan apart from falling into the Eurovision semi final trap. Its that time of year and no doubt I will be glued to the final on Saturday. On the positive side the Americans have confirmed they have received everything that I have sent them and that they are starting work on the collections. Once again I am starting to get excited about the new collections as I head towards bed.

Monday and I wake up aware that I did not return to the blog yesterday. My grandson had been taken home as his cough was worsening so wise parents had taken him home to keep him in his familiar environment. So we had waved them good bye mid Sunday afternoon loaded with food and good wishes. As a result we had the evening to ourselves, in which we discovered Red Eye and will doubtless continue to binge watch it later today. After a long lay and doing my vital, (all good), I got up for breakfast and reoriented for a grandsonless Bank Holiday Monday. I noticed that the temporary overflow that I had rigged up while the builder bunnies do their thing, had come apart again. Despite the sunshine my weather app said it was going to rain latter in the day so I needed to do something about it.

In this situation there is only one thing to do and that is to do the thing properly so I take my partner to the local Wickes to buy three lengths of standard 68 millimeter down pipe and a couple of straight joints. Fortunately I can get the pipes into my car. Back home I set to work with the help of my partner to put in a proper temporary down pipe. After some experimentation with support for the pipes and cutting one to drain length the task gets completed. We cannot open the rear patio doors but it is only temporary inconvenience.

Having packed away the tools I am very hot and sweaty so take to the recliner to rest. I’ve clearly over reached myself for the moment and take time to recover. Its a beautiful day outside but I do not have the energy to go out in it. The nap I have does not last long and then I am back on the laptop to see if there is a reply from the American publishers. There is and they have reduced the price of my publishing to something I can manage so I accept their offer. I then set about checking the materials to go and find that I have mislaid a USB stick so have to copy the final poem off the website and then rejig some bits of the materials. I am still not feeling that chipper and so continue to try and rest. I pop out of the room for a pee and the Americans ring me so miss the call, clearly they do not do May Bank Holiday. I am not in a rush so I update the blog before checking the email they say they have sent me. My cousin in Scotland has sent an email saying that they have received my video letter and encouraged me to ask them anything about the family if it will help to build the family tree.

I shall reply to the Americans and send them the Zip files today before I settle into the evening. I note the promised late afternoon showers have not materialised, perhaps the night will be different and my down pipe will prove its worth. For now its rest and recovery leading to night meds and hopefully a peaceful night.

Sunday and I seem to have had a good night. It appears that, at least initially, I am pain free. My partner is awake and has brought us warm drinks, she no longer needs to ask what, its always hot water. We chat for a while and then my partner gets up and reappears with our grandson. Of course there is then a prolonged bout of play and engagement with the young man as he curiously explores the world, us and of course his socks. He is of course the most delightful child, smiley and “chatty”, who seems to have a lovely temperament.

My grandson goes off to breakfast and I do my vitals, which are normal again, before I join the rest of the family for breakfast. With the meal cleared away my partner and youngest daughter go off to do some clothes shopping for the small person and when they are away my grandson goes for a short walk with me and his dad around the village. He naps briefly but when returning home he is awake again. My eldest daughter and I take turns at entertaining him until his mum returns home to give him lunch. The poor mite has a bit of a cough but he seems to be well within himself. I take some pictures of my garden. There are many displaced pots due to the landscaping work that is being carried out and some of the pots are flowering for the first time, notably a pot of my grandfathers iris that I had moved to the front of the house last years. There are daisies as well that always make me smile and make me feel happy.

With the return of he shopping duo the happy little boy is fed lunch as I start the blog for the day.

Its five thirty on Saturday morning and I am up. My symptoms of disruption to my urine flow have sneaked up on me again. no blood but soreness. I did not drink much yesterday so I am up early and on to my second hot water of the day in no time. I’ve taken my meds with three biscuits and had an early co-codamol to stave off pain, I’m desperate to be okay for the arrival of my grandson and his parents later this morning. I do what I always do when I get into a corner, I write. This is not a pretty poem or an easy one, or one to lift the spirits, but its how I am at five thirty in the morning when not doing okay and that is what this blog was and is intended for. No one needs to ask how I am or ask the awkward questions.

386
I am trying really hard
not to be a nuisance,
endeavouring not to add
to the general pain. 
Every way I turn those I love
are battling oceans of storms. 
It is as if the world
has filled its self with illness
without cure or palliative care.
I really am trying
but its hard to deny my decline,
those subtle, sore signs
that things are getting worse.
My head weaves benign explanations,
makes up logical explanations 
for this and that 
ache and ague,
each difficulty and soreness,
but deep down I know 
I’m on a slippery slope.
I tell myself that this is 
a negative mind set, 
that I am making things worse,
that being chipper and up beat
would help, but I know it’s not true.
I’ve either been or being ground 
fine in the grindstones of my disease
and finally, it’s found its way 
to bring me down. 
I really am trying 
to be brave and not cause a fuss,
I’d just like a hug,
but so would everyone else 
in the midst of their travails.
It’s a busy world of pain 
And there is no time 
to stop, just rest when opportunity arises
and then start all over again.
I realise we are all trying hard
and the silence of my loved ones
is a different kind of unbearable,
a mute gagging on the expected 
loss and perception of the ebbing
flow from those they love. 
I’m trying really hard 
in my way to carry on,
but the mirrors I look into 
show me failure, decline and 
worst of all the aloneness.
No one else but me can do this,
this standing, looking over
the landscape of my life 
and putting away my feelings
knowing there is not enough 
care or love to take away or slay 
this singularity.
I am trying really hard
not to be a miserable old git,
the downer in every one’s day,
the grandfather and father 
who is no fun anymore,
just the old guy who has to be asked,
“are you okay”?
I miss being loved,
I miss the no strings attached affection,
the delight in me,
like some immortal,
an everlasting thing of joy.
A shiny object with a future 
and more fun to come.
The Real World swallows us whole
and love becomes duty,
obligation and a chore, 
a world devoid of its core.
Is this depression,
is this the manifestation 
of some chemical imbalance 
or is this life in its later form?
I do not know 
but I’m trying really hard.
Trying really hard to be okay,
to ignore my longings and to 
get on. 
To that end I’ll take the drugs
and hope at least the pain subsides 
long enough to give another hug.
I’m trying really hard.
Perhaps my next collection will be called
“Self Pitying Bastard” 
I think I’m trying really hard,
perhaps I’m not;
not hard enough.																		
                                                                                                                        386 04-05-2024

By seven thirty I’ve blogged just as a way to keep me occupied while the drugs kick in, my partner is up and showered and making toast, now the day starts in earnest and I need to get going to be ready for my grandson to arrive. It is all hands to the psychological pumps.

Post toast I am struggling and although I manage a shower I’m not functioning well. Although I’m not experiencing haematuria I am in some discomfort as I frequently visit the bathroom. This is how I am when my youngest daughter , her partner and my grandson arrive late morning. He is a delight and is gurgling and smiling happily all the way to lunch time, when we all make sandwiches and indulge in cake. I help to clear away and load the dishwasher while the family prepare to go for a walk in Bradgate park. They drive off and I settle down to rest and watch some football and rugby noting that my symptoms are decreasing in frequency if I stay reclined and quiet. This is how my afternoon goes.

The family return and dinner is prepared, the grandson fed and prepared for bed and then the family eat. I cannot face it, I just want to rest really, but eat I must and spend the evening with my family. I make the effort knowing there is co-codamol to fall back on. Its what I do, having watched a film with the family I take my night meds, finish the blog and take yet more co-codamol, vowing that if I am not improving tomorrow it will be time to call 111 again. What all this does do is prompt me to email the Americans to begin to haggle over the price of my next two collections. I’m very tired.

Friday and it starts with my partner thrown into the need to go to see her mother with her brother as her mother has had a fall in the night and the paramedics are in attendance. My partner goes off to deal with the situation. I take my vitals and then get up to make breakfast. The builder badgers have arrived and already are laying bricks on the new patio. They are given coffee and encouraged in their work. I clear the kitchen and then go to take my morning meds to find my wallet empty, when I check my spare one is as well so its time to do my fortnightly drug load up. Its a boring thing to be doing but its one of those tasks that forms the structures that help me stay on track and in control of the things I can keep control of.

Once I have filled my wallets I take my morning meds and get on with things, which includes giving the builder badgers another coffee. My partner returns from her mothers and there is time for a quick chat before we go off to the local garden centre to buy food for the weekend and our family visitors. The shopping goes well and so we stop off at our favourite coffee house at the next garden centre down the road. It gives us time to sit and talk through where we are with coping with all the stuff that is going on. It seems there is a lot of heavy lifting to be done in the future and we need to find ways to have time to recover and to replenish ourselves as we do the lifting.

By the time we get home the builder badgers have gone and before we can squirrel the shopping away the first part invoice for the badgers work arrives in my in box. I pay it by BACS and send the head badger a text to tell him the moneys gone, to which he promptly replies that the payment has gone through. My partner goes for a rest and I clear up some chores and tidy away things. I join my partner and take the opportunity to try out the new blood pressure cuff that has been delivered. Its a large size one that makes taking my blood pressure easier. With a successful test of the cuff I have a nap and when I wake I go on getting the house ready for our youngest daughter visit tomorrow. Everywhere I turn my friends and family appear to be struggling with weaving the mundane work and family stuff with ongoing extraordinary distressing demands. No one I know seems to be living lives of serene satisfaction, perhaps its just my age or the times we live in or my particular view of the world. In my small way I try to keep with them all.

When my partner

Thursday and after a reasonable nights sleep I take my time getting up, taking my vitals before I actually do. The readings are good and are normal. Once up I clear he kitchen and make myself one of my favourite breakfast of fried egg sandwich and coffee. The builder badgers are well under way and spend all day brick laying, it is in marked contrast to the literal heavy lifting and clearing they did yesterday. There is a lot of meticulous brick alignment going on and careful consideration going on. By the end of the day the patio has acquired its shape and the walls are growing. Within the brickwork is woven the trunking for the lighting that is being incorporated. Apart from providing coffee these badgers are very self sufficient.

I settle into my sofa office and set about recording more video letters. Its quite a slow process as I find appropriate conversation and try to produce some sort of appropriate flow. Some are easier than others but I try not to pause the recording. I would rather create a shorter letter than struggle to fid things to say. So my day is filled with spoken word as I talk watching myself on the screen, it is a strange process. I try to imagine the person in front of me and therefore create a conversational tone. When I play them back I am appalled by how often I Um and Ah and use certain fill in words. Part of the problem is needing to produce all the content without having someone to provide feedback or any conversational content. It makes me realise how brilliant Alastair Cook was when he recorded his Letters from America. He did have the advantage of having to produce fifteen minutes on a topic of his choosing but nevertheless it was a master class in verbal letter making.

By mid afternoon I have completed all the letters that I intend to record. There is all the envelopes and insert notes to do which takes a while and then I take a trip to the Post Office. I have seven small packets to send and I see the post folk sag as they realise I shall want all my packets sent to be signed for. We get the business done and I by a paper and some treats and return home to do todays crosswords. I am on form and soon whizz thorough the crosswords in time for tea. Its tuna pasta night as my partner will be doing her singing her lesson. As for me I am hoping to watch some football tonight and then have another early night to continue resting in anticipation of the visit by our new grandson at the weekend. So another mundane day where I have tried to rest. It makes me uneasy to be this passive but I am trusting there will be a pay off at the weekend.