su-na-le-i gu-le--di-s-go-ni-hi (morning dove)

I saw it coming out of my right eye first and then the left, the vision unpleasant, the outcome anger and helplessness, a profound spiritual loss and the vision now reality upon first dawn. I have watched the morning doves and thought what they, the nested, symbolized to me and the hope they represented. Their flight, freedom, as I too will soon experience and I have stared with awe from egg to taking flight until innocence was lost this morning and I picked up the remains of hope, of peace and disposed of the tiny carcass.

For weeks I have listened to the chatter, mindless and pointed, the mess the doves were creating, their removal and the removal of the nest a daily contention at the kitchen table and elsewhere. The conversation gave way to a partial nest removal several weeks ago in an evening when the parents had wandered as birds are supposed to do, only to return to rebuild and give birth again as the rest had been bothered and destroyed, cleaned out of the gutters awaiting the rain we have not received all summer long.

This morning the two trying to take flight were blindsided by Ashley and as one quickly took flight the other landed in her clutches against my command. And as I reflected the ladder was brought out so that the remnants of the nest that so bothered my parents could be removed and I watched my mother make her way, with a ladder, toward the gutter and at this point it was obvious. I would climb the ladder for the alternative was unfathomable and those that could be paid a simple five dollars or maybe three to remove the nest that had the strength and the health to climb ladders were never asked for it was and has been easier to complain and carry on about the disruption the doves were creating than to fix it and have the nest removed by someone certainly more capable than I.

I am angered this morning and the feeling is tempered with the loss of hope and I see the parallels and irony of the helpless dove when I look in the mirror and through my eyes and what I see does not excite, only frightens me as I watch a tear representing so much emotion fall from my eye past my check, the salt of my wound tasted in the corner of my mouth.

friday 04.08

This early morning, I pretend to sip tea and walk barefoot through the lawn, wetted by a sprinkler but still dry to the core. I smoke a cigarette and watch the sky as the clouds roll in a direction I am not familiar with yet. I light a filter by mistake and the taste is repulsive.

I see no pictures and few stars. I drop my mug and carefully walk back to the chair hoping not to step on any more glass. I massage my leg, first the right and then the left, and wonder if the analogy I have created justifies the physical pain that is keeping me awake. Sleep I say and beg and eventually I will shut my eyes for awhile and rest...the morning birds will sing soon and the thump of the paper will startle me, it always does.

mental blunder

I find myself stoic, my face and my attitude even my clothing washed out and not worth a comment and this must be, I suppose and believe, from my Monday visit to the physician. I walked in stoic, sat there stoic and left stoic and have remained...stoic. And this emotional stance is a different one for me that I am not too fond off, often scaring me and testing my mental challenge of handling a terminal illness.

I have breathed away many fires and my breath is sore and no amount of lemon drops I find soothing on my throat. Food that I once enjoyed still looks good but my palette has lost interest in the taste, my memory providing me a serving. My weight remains constant and then it slides and this is simply the nature of the internal organs battling. And now that the kidneys have become prime target and the lungs find the routine of a simple in and out tiresome, I am forced to rest more.

My mental state can contribute to a downfall of significance and this I am aware of and pay close attention to from a distance as often time the thought itself is too bothersome to concentrate on.

I find now more than before an important time to concentrate on upcoming travel and trying to maintain some type of normal anything to cling to as hope since the medical community has none to offer yesterday, today and I wait for a tomorrow, living primarily without fear as I shut down and refuse to focus on that which ails me the most and those thoughts that are too surreal for me to acknowledge as fact.

I will travel again and I will travel soon and I will be asked, kindly I hope, to stop traveling before I am ready but this I knew and often figured once I saw the word terminal associated directly and only with my name.

hawaiian punch

My health aide came today like he has all others for at least the preceding sixty three, give or take a few times when I have taken a break or just not felt like dealing with me. Today I shared with him a zucchini cake I had made from scratch with extra cream cheese frosting and slightly more than half a box of raisins and pecan halves I stomped into pieces myself.

I sent him toward the refrigerator for a drink but offered him nothing and he looked at me as he always does, wanting me to wait on him which I have told him over and over and even again that my responsibility is my wellness, his responsibility is to assist me and the job descriptions are quite clear.

Today the look did not bother me as it has in the past and he did not whine as he has in the past at my refusal to wait on him for today I was ready with a Hawaiian Punch, not literally, but the beverage and there was not one but a case that were purchased just for him and his enjoyment.

And he glared at me with a smile and honor, baffled of sorts that I remembered our first meeting when I asked him, as a conversation filler, what he liked to drink and aside from the rootbeer he drank as a child sixty years ago he liked an occasional Hawaiian Punch which he did not purchase too often because of the price issue. So this weekend I remembered and told my mother the story and Hawaiian Punch was purchased as a subtle thank you from me and my family for that matter, a symbol that he belongs and his caring for me is important and most definitely appreciated today as it will be tomorrow and as many tomorrows as I am allowed.

monday 31.07

This morning was rough and it was not because of the hour of traffic that led to nowhere in front and in back of us. I could only look at so many homes from so many angles in the same spot for so long and then, I lost interest. The heat I was experiencing only intensified at my physician's office. He had the blood work. He had the look and the outcome was nothing more than a pep talk from him and his staff to me wishing there was something else he could tell me, possibly a new line or a simplified explanation as to why I am dying and the toll, the insurmountable toll the act of dying is taking on my system physically first and mentally second.

And I say this with a puzzled look on my face as I am resolute and still disbelieve and there is so much unknown for which I cannot control and the blessing of having life and experiencing life is worth hearing three thousand more times I am terminal as I am not too positive I lived vivaciously, with conviction, until I knew there was not a lot of livening to be done. So I sat and nodded and washed away a tear and left where I started. A little bolder and more anxious, inward, definitely more inward and lonely but not alone.

sunday 30.07

I awoke this morning with an agenda to accomplish little things and more importantly discover that which is missing. That which is awaking me at night without rhyme or reason, that which frightened me at twelve past two am, caused me to lift my head, walk around and end up in the backyard thinking, always thinking, and taking a long smoke of the cigarette I so carefully planted next to the chair, my water and the ashtray, in that order and for the reason of none other than false comfort.

And when I have completed what is becoming an all too frequent ritual I light another one hoping to yawn or see another sign of sleepiness or maybe even the answer that awoke me to begin with, that something is missing I feel down deep, capturing my essence with no proper fore warning and the residual affects troubling and sad...at best.

I carried through with my chores of few hoping that the feeling of missing would lift like the darkness and the clock would stop reminding me of that which I cannot fully grasp and instead, the missing continues and it is something.