Heading to Arizona

Just my luck, on the weather-and-gardening front, not to mention the driving-around-in-the-Corvair-looking-like-a-healthy-person front, it is beautiful in Seattle today, with temperatures expected to hit 78 degrees (unheard of for May), and I'm busy getting ready to head to Arizona tomorrow.

Where it will be 98 degrees. Which is great. I love hot weather. I'm just sorry to miss this spell of wonderful weather in Seattle, and a bit worried about my garden, even though a good friend has agreed to water for me. Strawberries are already forming on the plants, and I expect to be picking berries (and making jam) about three weeks from now.

Tomatoes are blooming, peas are two feet tall, and I have more onions and garlic than I will ever be able to eat. But I'll do my best. Send garlic recipes my way!

I haven't been blogging as much as usual lately, just a post on Mother's Day and another on that awful Australian quack Paul Rana, who will probably pop up somewhere else with a new name and a new scam. He sounds like that kind of guy.

But I haven't been blogging much lately because my brain has been too full with the major events coming up on the horizon in the next couple of weeks:

* The trip to Arizona to check in with my long-time oncologist, Dr. Robert Livingston, who still surpervises my treatment.

* A appointment with a new oncologist here in Seattle next week, after my previous oncologist suggested I find someone else after I apparently upset her office staff.

* A mediation with the father of my younger son to decide with whom said Younger Son will live next year.
This is the one that is really killing me, because I am not well enough to have my son live with me full-time any longer, and that fact alone breaks my heart.

Plus, of course, when you prepare for mediation you have to read the paperwork presented by the other side, and that is always tremendously upsetting. (Note my restraint here: I have NOT said my son's father lies through his teeth, and is incredibly believable while doing so.)

I also don't have the emotional energy right now to interview yet another doctor, with my almost-nine-year cancer history and hundreds of pages of medical chart, but I'm counting on the appointment with Dr. L to get me in mental/emotional shape for that. The new doctor apparently trained under Dr. L, so that should help.

If this doesn't work out, my fall-back plan is to follow my doctor to Arizona.

Getting Out of Town
Getting out of town is tougher than it used to be, BC (before cancer). My ability to multitask is gone, destroyed by chemo or stress, or a combination of the two. I don't have much energy, so it takes days to get ready for a simple trip (I remember when I packed at midnight the night before and that was it). And of course there is the list making--lists on top of lists, to make sure I don't forget anything important.

So, the dogs left this morning for a stay at Bone-A-Fide, a great dog ranch north of Seattle. They will be transported both ways by Jerky, the new owner of Seattle Dog Taxi ($70 round trip for two dogs--such a deal).

The tiny foster kitten, Percival, will have a new foster home while I'm gone. I'm dropping him off at the rescue late this afternoon.

Older Son has promised to stay at the house and feed the cats and birds and bring in the mail. He's also promised NOT to host any parties, and I trust him, partly because he has good sense and partly because the neighbors will be watching.

And my good friend Laurie will be coming by to splash water around so that my plants don't die.

So what's left? Packing. That's next. Cleaning the bird cage. Cleaning the cats' litter boxes. Getting Percival ready to go. Gathering up all the various paperwork I need.

Putting all my toiletries in small containers and then in a one-quart zip-lock plastic bag (a recycled plastic bag from the grocery store is a no-no), so that they aren't confiscated at the airport. The last time I flew, the security guard took away a brand-new $5 tube of toothpaste because it was larger than 3 ounces.

He decided to let my 3.5 ounce container of hair goop go, because, he said, I had used some of it so the contents were probably no more than 3 ounces. I kid you not. And I got the full body scan, pat down by a woman, sit over there and wait while we pull everything out of your bags, treatment.

I kept telling myself that I had done my part to keep the country safe by giving up my toothpaste without an argument, but it still rankles, obviously.

My friend Monica is going with me (I rarely travel alone these days), and she has arranged transportation to the airport, at 5:30 a.m. tomorrow. Ugh.

Oh, and two hours from now I will be at First Place, teaching Japanese to my darling kids. I'm not taking Percival along this time, and they will miss him, but last week things got just a bit too chaotic. (Another understatement, but we'll leave it at that.)

So, onward and upward, or I'll miss my plane.

@ Jeanne Sather 2007.

Comments

[Jacqueline]

oh, have a wonderful/fabulous time- i know you will. i'm glad you have people around to help take care of all the thriving things, plants, garden, birdies (what kind?). anyway- you'll be missed around here!

[Jeanne]

Thanks! I'll have my iBook with me, so expect to be blogging while I'm there, in between hiking and swimming and chatting with my lovely doctor.

Jeanne

[Sara]

Sorry, but I have to ask this (because I have poor impulse control, I guess):

When you see Dr. L do you say, "Dr. Livingston, I presume?" Does everybody?

I would. I probably would about three times and then stop. Because that's how big an obnoxious nerd I am.

Regardless of how you will greet him, I hope your trip will be helpful and even fun. The southwest is gorgeous at this time of year.

Cheers!

[Jeanne]

Jacqueline--forgot to say earlier, the birds are parakeets. They are pretty, but not all that friendly, so they're more like living flowers than pets that cuddle--but I have plenty of other pets to cuddle with: cats, dogs, the foster kitten ... gold fish outside in the pond that also don't cuddle.

Sara--that is so funny. I never once thought of saying that to Dr. L, and it's the kind of thing I would do as well.

I'll have to ask him if he gets that often.

One thing I never do is call him "Bob," although I call most of the other people who take care of me by their first names.

From the Hotel Arizona in Tucson. See the good doctor tomorrow, then it's play time for three days, and then home.

Jeanne