Half Life -13 - Six Pigeons
January 22nd 2021
The six fat pigeons bathed in the puddle the rain had made out of the large pothole in the road just outside my window. So little happens these days that their watery flapping around was the second most interesting thing that happened last week. With no way through the window, JJ the dog, up on her back legs with her tail slapping against my legs like a drumstick, had to satisfy her canine instincts by barking as she joined me in watching them frolic. Such is the excitement of lockdown, we wasted over fifteen minutes in this deeply pointless, but curiously satisfying, activity. Then, in a surprise attack, a delivery van rocketed around the corner at small-child killing speed and had a good go at squashing all six soggy birds. In a blur of legs and wings they managed to escape, just as a wheel temporarily emptied their pothole of its water. The excitement was almost too much for poor JJ to deal with as she ran to the front door to welcome the failed pigeon killer, only to watch the van drive away having successfully delivered its package to our neighbours.
Cancer is a team sport, with the whole family playing and, occasionally, roping in friends and relatives as reserves when the challenge gets too large for the home team. It entangles itself around every decision, and forces itself to be heard in discussions about holidays, trips out, or plans to redecorate the spare room. Nobby, my pet cancer, loiters invisibly like a poltergeist in the corner of every room, jumping out and demanding attention just when you think you can forget about him for a while. Every time he does it he manages to send shivers down spines, including those he has not chosen to live in. There is nothing he likes more than to force plans to be changed at the last minute due to his crashing about inside my bones.
Like the obese and overconfident pothole wallowing pigeons, the most interesting thing this week chucked itself unexpectedly around the corner right at me, disrupting everything. When the oncologist calls you out of the blue it’s worrying and never with good news or for a casual chat about the health of the local wildlife. A couple of days after my last scan, and the stealing of yet more of my life blood for tests, I was told that it looks like Nobby has gone walk-about again. Hopes of an uneventful year evaporated, with the sound of Nobby giggling quietly in the background. This time the docs think he may have gone further up my spine to a vertebrae level with my shoulder blade. If he is up to his old tricks again then it might explain the endless pins and needles I get in that arm and occasional pain in the shoulder. However, the ever-increasing pain in my lower back is becoming a greater concern and prompting me to take greater interest in all forms of painkillers without a cork. More scans are going to be needed as for some reason they didn’t get good enough pictures of these two parts of me. I think they just left the lens cap on when taking the last ones and are too embarrassed to admit it. The sense of deja-vue threw me back two years to when all this started with excruciating back pain, and Nobby had first hit me and the family, not like a badly driven van but a steam train at full speed.
The expectation of treatment, when you know what it is like, is its own special form of mental torture. Radiotherapy was strange with its science fiction reality of huge machines buzzing and whirring around. The Boys were deeply disappointed that I didn’t glow in the dark afterwards or develop super powers. So was I, it would have made the midnight toilet trips much easier. The the current opinion is, like last time, I will be doing not only the radiotherapy again but also a repeat of Chemo, which is a very different prospect and much less fun. If it happens, then I can look forward to thirty glorious weeks of being pumped full of toxic fluid, going bald again, feeling sick, and getting exhausted by the hobble from one side of a room to the other. It’s like the really nasty part of starting a serious bout of flu, but with it never developing into the full-blown thing. Summer looks like being spent hiding from the world trying not to get the sepsis I got last time, which almost did Nobby’s work for him in double-quick time by turning me into fertiliser and worm food.
Within a week all should become clear and a plan starting to form. The slim chance that there is nothing wrong and I can carry on as before is still there, but I would resist putting too much money on that horse, it’s got three legs and a blind jockey. In the mean time, Nobby gets to play his favourite game – worry. However sick-making doing whatever the plan consists of, it’s a plan and provides something to focus on and work through. Until then imagination has free rein, haunting both sleeping and waking moments with the possibilities. Since it all started, the spectre of Nobby has been inside everything, not only for me but those around me too. It is how he infects others, drilling into emotions and scratching his name on every wall in the house. The tears and worry come in the middle of the night for all of us. The Wife and I, both awake at 3.00 in the morning, frequently talk about the same thoughts. One or both Boys wander into our room during the dark hours, unable to sleep, not quite understanding but, at the same time, understanding all too well. We all have to live with Nobby, not just me.
I am so sorry to hear your latest news Charles but your attitude and resilience will support you and your family. Nobby got a formidable opponent!❤️
So love your writing style, Charlie. Just wish you'd find a way to uninvite or better yet banish Nobby!!! If you need help dreaming up an army, just let me know. 💖