I wake up this Friday and note the rain, I notice I am slightly smug for the decision to return from holiday a day early and avoid the long drive in this weather. My partner brings me a coffee in bed having showered and we plan the day. I unpack and then put the car back to normal having had breakfast. I drive my partner and eldest daughter to town where they go off to buy haberdashery while I saunter off in the rain to the hospital pharmacy to collect my chemo drugs. I give my name and details and then take a seat in the waiting area. I think I am in for a long wait and settle down into my meditative waiting stance. In this I abandon my phone and half doze with just half an ear open for my name. People come and go and I just wait, it takes me back to my waiting days working in therapeutic communities. To my surprise my name gets called quite quickly. The drugs are more or less shoved at me and my details checked. I walk off into the rain with my drugs carefully stowed in my shoulder bag, taken specifically for the purpose of carrying my drugs.

Back at the car park I stow my drugs in the boot and ring my partner. I head into town and meet my partner and eldest daughter in a small Italian café that had just lost its power. My eldest daughter goes off to the gym and I take my partner to the Italian restaurant round the corner for lunch. The food is good and we chat about how we are and what is coming our way over the next couple of weeks. Having downed my pasta I indulged in a decaf coffee and the biggest cannoli I’ve ever seen. At the back of my mind is the intention to resume my pre holiday ban on sweets and treats, I need to get back to my discipline and resolve.

Once home I sort out my drugs wallets for the next two weeks adding in my chemo tablets, so tonight my night meds will include the start of a new round of chemo. I can feel myself losing spoons so I start to draft the blog while watching Alcaraz demolish Medvedev in men’s semi final at Wimbledon. Still it rains and still it is dull and grim.

There is much to do still to organise my space and fully get control of my environment to get back on track but initially I need to prepare for tomorrows poetry Stanza. This month it is a zoom meeting so I need to set up the office for tomorrow afternoon. The poems this month are particularly good so despite the lack of face to face it should be an interesting meeting. So I need to print off the poems and. arrange my stanza file. That will take some of the evening, the rest of it will be resting with TV and perhaps some reading. I am aware that I am still catching up on my birthday and need time to return to all my cards and presents, I also have letters to reread and absorb.