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When most people think of a terminal cancer patient, they think of the end-stage, when the person is bed-ridden and so heavily medicated, they’re barely aware of where they are. I’m about as far from that as most healthy people so it may seem strange for me to refer to myself as terminal. After all, where there’s life, there’s hope, yes? It ain’t over till it’s over, right? Sure.

If I wake up tomorrow morning to news that they’ve found the cure for recurrent uterine cancer, I will no longer be terminal. Recent work involving the use of viral cells to carry targeted medication directly to cancer cells to eradicate them shows a lot of promise, so much so that this may well prove to be the treatment all cancer patients have been waiting for. But so far, we’re all still waiting.

Meanwhile, I’m taking progesterone, which as I’ve said may be able to hold the cancer at a low level and prevent it from growing and spreading. This coming week, I’ll have a blood test; the following week, I’ll meet with my oncologist or a member of her team to get the results and find out how well that’s working. Her team members have said they’re hopeful about progesterone holding off the cancer for years; they’re all younger doctors. My oncologist doesn’t talk hope; she talks in terms of what results she has in front of her. Hope is my department.

I suppose calling myself terminal doesn’t sound like I have much hope but in fact I do. I hope to live longer than my oncologist’s original estimate, despite knowing that her estimate is based on however many patients she has seen. The long-shot is that I live long enough to see the viral-cell treatment succeed and be among the first to experience an actual cure. But those really are long odds, on the order of being struck by lightning, winning the lottery, or getting a personal phone call from Steven Spielberg begging me to accept two million GBP in option money for “The Girl-Thing Who Went Out For Sushi.� (I can dream; as Blondie pointed out, dreaming is free.)

Until there is an actual cure, all the treatment I receive is palliative. Palliative treatment is not curative treatment. Palliative treatment is meant strictly to alleviate symptoms and relieve pain, resulting in improved quality of life.

But if life itself is the terminal condition we all have, I’m not actually doing anything out of the ordinary. As I said when I started this blog, if mortality is certain, then putting off the inevitable is not only business as usual for us, it’s also the whole point. So in the larger sense, nothing has really changed for me.

Nothing…and everything.

I didn’t plan to travel as much as I did this year, it just happened that way. And I’m not done yet. I have at least one trip, possibly two left before I put the suitcase away till next year.

It’s been very good for me, physically as well as mentally. In May, I visited Copenhagen for the first time. In June, I took a road-trip from Virginia to a college reunion in Massachusetts. In July, I spent most of a week at a festival in Spain. And in mid-August, I went to Spokane, WA for Sasquan, the world sf convention. The difference in my physical condition now compared to the same time last year is virtually miraculous. I could walk reasonable distances without collapsing. On Saturday night, I went to the Hugo Losers Party––the one given by original co-founder George RR Martin––and didn’t go to bed till four a.m. Then I was up at 9-ish to meet a friend for breakfast.

Last year at this time, I was pretty feeble. This year, I’m hopping around like an ingenue. I appear to be well, so much so that you’d never guess I had terminal cancer. A lot of people didn’t know––they thought I was in remission. It was no fun to correct them. I hated making them feel bad. Seriously; I remember what it was like to be in their shoes. I have a lot more experience being them than being terminal.

I’ve been saying that more often in the last few weeks: terminal cancer; I’m terminal; treatment is palliative. There’s about a year and four months left of my oncologist’s original two-year estimate. Where did the time go? 

Suddenly it’s September. My autumn allergies have kicked in with gusto. I haven’t made as much progress on the sushi novel as I planned (that sound you hear is God, laughing her head off). Just reading a book seems to take twice as much effort to concentrate as it used to. Even my character leaves something to be desired––despite my vow to cheer when good things happened to my fellow writers instead of giving in to jealousy, I got sniffy over someone else’s good fortune.

I’m probably going to have to die before that happens to me, I groused to my husband sulkily, then couldn’t resist adding: Oh, wait––good news! I’m going to!

And Chris, a man of intelligence, grace, and compassion, said, No, you aren’t.

Angry, jealous terminal cancer patient instantly undone by the eloquence of love.

I’ve made plenty of jokes about achieving success posthumously but none since the Diagnosis of Doom––I thought it would be too tacky. Now that I had, it was far more pathetically self-pitying than I could have imagined.

Self-pity is my instant time-out/take-a-moment/hit-the-brakes switch. I detest self-pity; it’s so easy to fall into and once you get some on you, it’s hell to scrub off. Self-pity is sneaky. One moment you’re consoling yourself after some kind of loss or defeat––could be major, like seeing a promotion or an award go to someone else––or something less consequential, like having a bad hair day and a fat day next to someone who’s just lost twenty pounds and is having their best hair day ever. (Why, God, why?) Then suddenly you’re telling yourself that of course you’re a failure––fat people with bad hair don’t get promotions or awards and you’re the reason you can’t have nice things. But you wouldn’t be that way if the world weren’t so cold and cruel to you while other people get not only everything they want but everything you want, etc., etc., etc.

(If you’re so virtuous you’ve never had an inner monolog like that, don’t even try to talk to me. Fuck off and d…don’t have fun.)

That shit isn’t me. I’m the woman who, absent a better offer, is going to teach a horse to sing in a year. I’m the woman crawling out onto the front step on her hands and knees to save her own life. I’m the woman who got so tipsy on chemo day, she pole-danced with her IV tree. I’m the woman who will tell you that everyone who woke up this morning won the lottery. I’m the woman who’s been defying the odds all her life and sees no reason to stop now. 

I’m the woman who believes we were all put on this Earth to accomplish a certain number of things and is now so far behind that she can never die (that one always makes me laugh).

Then the sun gets low and the shadows stretch. My energy starts to flag and no matter how good the day has been, I’m tired. Eventually my mind turns to finding my location on my various axes––x, y, and z, but mostly t, for time.

I feel good; I feel strong. I feel no more mortal than I felt before I took up residence in Cancerland. Everybody, every single one of us, we proceed on the basis that, all evidence to the contrary, we will live forever, and I’m no different. Hell, I’ve actually been dead and I still can’t imagine not being alive.

Maybe my thinking about how much is left of the two years my oncologist gave me is a sort of mindfulness. Sure, it’s great to be optimistic, to go all in––and all out––to defy the odds. But even optimists are subject to natural laws. Once in a while, you get a miracle but miracles are scarce, not something you can, or should, count on. 

You can work with the idea that anything is possible, and it’s probably true, more often that not. Anything…but not everything. I know, I’ve said that before; I’m old and I repeat myself–�

Actually, that’s probably it––I’m about to get older. My birthday is coming up on 10 September; I’ll be sixty-mumble (I’m in my early sixty-mumbles). No, I don’t feel bad about being this old. To be honest, I’m glad I’m not younger––even at forty, I’d have been devastated at losing my hair and even more devastated by a hysterectomy. Instead, I went through a phase of ostentatious hair extensions and left my child-bearing years on Nature’s timetable. I know some breast cancer patients fifteen to twenty years younger than I am who aren’t so lucky. Fortunately they aren’t terminal––migod, how horribly unfair would that be?

Even if you’re healthy, when you enter your sixty-mumbles you start thinking about how many good years you’ve got left. You think about what you’d still like to do as well as what you never want to do again. As a writer, I think about the stories I have yet to tell and how to get better at telling them. I don’t think about stopping; I’m not going to stop. I’ll have to be stopped. Until I am, I’ll proceed on the basis…well, you know.

And now looking down the next eight days to my birthday, I feel a renewal of that strong, good, making-cancer-my-bitch feeling. Terminal? Feh. So what if I am? I can still make cancer my bitch.

Now I think of Rosemarie, my best friend from childhood. We ruled the solar system, partied with the Beatles, and saved the Earth at least once a week. Rose died of cancer in 2001. I remember what her brother Joe told me: she said it wouldn’t beat her. It might kill her but it wouldn’t beat her. She made cancer her bitch. So can I. 

I guess that’s why I’m terminal. It can’t beat me so it’s got to kill me. But it won’t be easy…and it will still be my bitch.

No, that’s not just when you’re tired of hearing about it, or when you’re tired of having it––It’s being tired because you have it.

Well, the oncologists and the nurses did mention that cancer is tiring and I could expect it to hit me. I came back from Spain buoyed up by the good time I’d had with old friends and new. I could walk farther than I had in years. I did have a few moments now and then when I sagged so visibly that whoever was closest would ask if I were okay. But I managed not to collapse. So I figured after I came home, I’d just slide back into my exercise routine for the next two weeks before carrying myself off to the worldcon in Spokane.

And then wham! It’s a different sledgehammer than chemo fatigue but it’s a sledgehammer. It was almost like cancer ambushed me just to remind me it’s still here.

One of the stages of grief is bargaining and I guess that’s where I am. I realised I’ve been proceeding as if my working hard on improving my physical condition, getting back into shape, and acting like I don’t have anything wrong with me will drive the cancer away. Hell, if my blood pressure, heart-rate, BMI, weight, and general physical condition are all in the healthy range, then how could I possibly have cancer?

Yes, yes, I know––people in peak physical condition get cancer all the time. I know that intellectually. I also know you can’t cure cancer by working out. (If you don’t know this, or you don’t want to believe it, you can either do the research or just take my word for it; just don’t argue with me, I’m too tired.) I also know, because my no-nonsense oncologist explained it to me, that I can’t expect to be cured or to go into remission. The best I can hope for is that treatment will keep the cancer stabilised at a low level and prevent it from growing and spreading for a while; probably not a long while but hey, I’ll take what I can get.

I know this. I’ve said it before, many times. I’ve explained it to friends who have mistakenly thought I’m in remission because I don’t look or act sick. I know exactly what’s going on, what to expect, and what not to expect. And still I’m trying to make secret deals with the universe: If I lose 10-12kg over the next 6 months…if I build up my endurance…if I exercise at least four days out of seven and build up to five…then could I please not have cancer?

Even admitting what I’m doing doesn’t stop it, maybe because bargaining with the universe involves a certain amount of denial. And anger––cancer patients are angry, even when they don’t show it.

Well, what the hell. There’s no downside to being in good physical condition. Or even just better physical condition. I’ll still get hit with the cancer fatigue sledgehammer. But when I’m not tired, I’ll be unstoppable…and despite all evidence to the contrary, still trying to make a deal.

This, too, is part of the cancer experience. Cancer, cancer fatigue, and cancer neurosis.

Fuck it. It’s cancer––give yourself a medal just for showing up. Walk tall. Unless you have to lie down for three hours. Then lie down tall.

Estoy teniendo un tiempo maravilloso aquí en Avilés en Asturias en el festival Celsius 232*

No, I don’t actually speak Spanish that well. But I wish I did and I’ve decided I’m going to. Every time I go to a non-English-speaking country, I fall in love with the language, whatever it is. I used to learn languages as a hobby and Old Eternal’s side of our family is blessed with the gift of tongues. I have found to my great joy that even though I’m much older than I was when I first set out to learn Russian and German and Mandarin, it’s not harder for me to pick up another language, provided I devote enough time  and concentration to it. 

(I also want to learn Finnish. Considering that I grew up in a town with such a large Finnish population that we had a branch of the Finnish embassy, I’m almost embarrassed that I haven’t. And I want to learn Japanese, too––considering I’ve just won the Seiun Award for short fiction in translation, and considering I have a son who has been learning the language while getting his MA in Japanese Cultural Studies [with merit, no less!], it’s kind of embarrassing that I haven’t. I love learning languages. Pero estoy divagando.**)

But today I would just like to speak Spanish while walking around without back pain––which is where the “Push It Redux� comes in. This beautiful hotel has a small gym, and the small gym has a lovely recumbent bike and yesterday, I fully intended to rise before dawn today to use it. But that was before I did so much walking around. Well, it’s a lot for me. And I decided that riding a recumbent bike is something I can do at home. Here I am, in beautiful Avilés where I have been plodding up and down inclines and stairs and my back has been really liking it…not during, of course, but afterwards. Last night, after enjoying some vino and wonderful company and listening to stories that made me laugh so hard it engaged my core muscles, I found myself walking back to the hotel with my cane still folded up in my shoulder bag and my back feeling like it did when I was 9 and taking ballet lessons (just to be clear: I took feeling that good for granted).

And to think I had actually toyed with the idea of cancelling because I’m still not very rehabilitated physically.

¡Si, es cierto!***

I was seriously considering wimping out and then decided to honour my commitment instead, and I’m so glad I did. I knew that any physical help I needed would be available to me on request so there was nothing to worry about on that score. But would I be up to the socialising? I love to give a convention or a conference their money’s worth.

Well, the people here make it easy to rise to the occasion. Spanish fans are sensational––friendly, welcoming––they are the kind of people who, when you meet them, you realise they are friends you just didn’t know before. If I can come back here on my own next year––if I’m solvent enough and physically able enough––I will. 

This is one more reminder: Push through the fatigue. Push through the inertia. Push throught the uncertainty. Push through the physical discomfort.  Push through the anxiety. Otherwise, you might miss one of those life-savours.

*I’m having a wonderful time here in Avilés in Asturias at the Celsius 232 festival 

[Celsius 232 = Fahrenheit 451]

**But I digress.

***Yes, it’s true!

Today I saw the oncologist, the team leader; the one who never smiles unless she has something to smile about.

She was smiling.

The cancer is at the same level it was when I last came in for a check-up. It’s not gone and never will be, but for the time being, it has stabilised. This is a win.

There are no guarantees, of course, but really––are there ever?

I’ve spent the last month taking hormones that the oncologist hopes will keep the cancer cowering at a low level for a very long period of time. I have an appointment later this month so they can check on how well this is working. And in the meantime, I’ve been re-introduced to hormonal side-effects.

Back when I was taking Hormone Replacement Therapy, I became so attuned to my physical condition that when something went a little wonky, I could tell whether it was the HRT or the antidepressants that needed adjusting. Eventually I tapered off the HRT and never gave it another thought. I’d been off HRT for seven years when I was diagnosed with my first bout of uterine cancer in 2013.

So when the oncologist told me they were going to try hormone therapy in the hope that I’m one of the women for whom this treatment will successfully prevent further growth of cancer cells, I simply added the prescription to my nightly pill regimen, figuring that way I could sleep through most of the side effects.

Nobody sleeps through night sweats, not even me. But night sweats are just weird, not serious like deep vein thrombosis, and it wasn’t long before they tapered off. There was the occasional unexpected nausea but my anti-nausea meds took care of it. (The anti-nausea medications for chemo patients these days are prima. For those who have told me they are about to start chemo and they’re a little nervous: when it comes to nausea, they’ve got you covered.)

Once or twice I had a little trouble getting to sleep but that didn’t last. No blood clots, no stroke, no heart-attack, not for Super-Duper-Recumbent-Bike-Riding Woman and her above-average circulatory system! I figured I had everything under control.

And then one afternoon a couple of weeks ago, after I had been working for a little while, I felt something I had not felt in at least five years: a mood swing, down. (When I have mood swings, they only go in one direction: down, down, down.) The first time it happened, I thought it was either low blood sugar or low potassium; I ate a piece of fruit and it went away. But then it kept happening. Not every day but too often to be random.

Now, I’m on a very quirky cocktail of antidepressants; even my psychiatrist says she has never had a patient on this combination. But it has been working for at least five years with no tweaking. I feel so normal on it that sometimes when I’ve been giving a medical history, I’ve almost forgotten to add the meds I take for clicnical depression. So the sudden dip was both disheartening and worrying. The last thing I need right now is for my anti-depressants to crap out on me. Except this didn’t really feel like an anti-depressant problem. 

Then I remembered I was taking hormones. I had a look at the package insert and yes, there it was on the list of side effects: depression. And when I thought about it some more, I realised that I didn’t have dips on those days when I went to the gym.

So here’s a tip for my fellow travellers in Cancerland who may also be taking hormones––or, hell, maybe for anyone who experiences hormonal fluctuations great enough to get them all bent out of shape: exercise.

I know, I know: when you hear that word, or read that word, you immediately get this picture in your head of hard-bodied young women doing push-ups outdoors at some get-a-bikini-body boot-camp––and smiling. Yeah, I hate those shiny-happy bitches, too and I’m here to tell you that it doesn’t have to be that way. The recumbent bike––my cardio of choice––allows you to sit up straight, with the added benefit that you don’t need padded bike shorts because you won’t get saddle-sore. On the other hand, some people like a regular bike, one that they can ride around outside. If that’s you, you don’t have to ride it like you’re in the Tour de France––you can just take a nice, leusurely ride, enjoy the weather or the flowers or whatever.

Or you can try a rowing machine, which will work all your parts. Once again, you don’t have to thrash away like you’re in the final qualifying round for the Olympics––you just have to move for a while. Or maybe you like lifting weights instead.

Or maybe you aren’t cursed with a back like mine and you can take a walk. Take a walk with a friend. Take a wlk with your sweetheart and hold hands. Go shopping––that’s walking, too.

You can even pull down all the shades, put on MTV, and try twerking. Just trying it, even if you can’t get it right, is probably some seriously good cardio.

I know, I’m repeating a lot of what I’ve already said about exercise and maybe simply reading it is making you feel exxhausted. But it’s important just to move. I like the social feeling of going to a gym and I have never once been fat-shamed or made to feel like I should be hiding at home. Other people prefer privacy; still others would rather be outdoors. There is no one true way to take care of yourself. You only have to find the way that works for you.

So I’ve just returned from a college reunion. Or rather, a college-within-a-college reunion. Many, many years ago, in a galaxy far, far away––in western Massachusetts––the University of Massachusetts set up something called Project 10 and I signed up for it. Naturally, it changed the course of my life, as these things do. It changed the course of many lives, and there have been a few reunions in the past, though none I was ever able to attend until now.

The brilliant and beautiful K, my roommate from that time, suggested that, if my health permitted, we road-trip from her place in Virginia. My health did (and does) permit even if I am not yet up to a lot of heavy lifting or long distance walking, and this sounded good to me. Besides, she works as a public defender so if it all went pear-shaped, I figured I was in good hands. And the timing was good––it was something like two months since my final round of chemo, with no recurrence of anaemia.

The seven-or-so-hour drive north was really pleasant, not at all gruelling. Of course, I wasn’t driving. K managed to miss that portion of my life during which I had a driver’s license. But lawyers and writers are people used to doing things for seven straight hours or longer. Plus as old hippies, we embody Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. The pleasures of a long car ride can’t be over-estimated. K and I once drove all over the Massachusetts coast looking for a beach that met our exacting standards. We followed signs to a place called Sippiewissit and discovered to our amusement that it was not a Lake Winnipesaukee kind of place but a trailer park. Didn’t matter––the journey was the destination. (The drive back took almost twelve hours, with lousy weather and long delays due to construction.)

The reunion was a fascinating experience. We watched the famous 1971 Mayday in Washington DC video, which I had seen only parts of. I was there and got my head split open when a cop whacked me with a billyclub, although I failed to get arrested. This still rates as the scariest experience of my life. Yeah, scarier than cancer. Maybe I’ll talk about why in another entry.

I didn’t overdo. I couldn’t have if I’d wanted to––I don’t have enough energy. But I did push myself; it was time. At some point in physical recovery, you have to do that. Exactly when is hard to say because everybody is different and one size does not fit all. But you start by pushing a little bit, and after a while, a little more, until eventually, you have periods when you’re functioning at a pre-illness level or close to it.

How you can tell it’s time to push yourself hard to say. It’s all in how you feel, physically, psychologically, emotionally, or all of the above. I felt physically ready. Then I looked in the mirror and saw that my eyebrows were coming back. By the end of the trip, they were almost all filled in again.

My head hair has gone from fuzz to real hair, and it’s not all white. There’s a fair amount of brown. I’ve heard it may come in curly at first. Some of the longer sections look like they might be coming in that way but really, it’s still too short to tell. Nonetheless, I can feel that it’s a little bit thicker all the time and even my husband, who sees me all the time, says he can tell the difference from day to day. Hair growth is a sign of life.

Last December, my oncologist told me I might have about two years, which leaves me with a little less than a year and a half of her original estimate. That means every day after the end of December 2016 will be a gift.

I’ve decided I can recover from cancer, even if I can’t be cured.

Tomorrow, I’m heading off to the US. My erstwhile UMass roomie K and I are going to a UMass reuinion. Chris has to stay home and look after Gentleman Jynx, Coolest Black Cat In London while I get to spend time with people I haven’t seen for close to four decades. The last time I was in Amherst was in 1980. The last time I was anywhere in Massachusetts was 4 September 2001––I was in Boston and flew out of Logan airport exactly one week before 9/11. But I digress.

I’m really looking forward to this trip. I love my friend K; I love her forever. Some of the best times we’ve had together was driving up and down the Massachusetts coast, looking for a beach. The beach actually wasn’t as important as the time we spent together in the car. It’s a long drive from her place to Amherst and it’s going to be fun. Even if she’s going to be stuck doing all the driving again, as I no longer have a valid driver’s license. (I could drive in an emergency but there’s no point in getting a driver’s license here in London. We don’t have a car and couldn’t afford it even if we wanted one. But I digress again.)

In preparation for the trip, I’ve been riding a stationary recumbent bike every other day at EasyGym, my new health club of choice––inexpensive but even more important, so conveniently located that total round-trip travel time is under half an hour on the bus.

I haven’t had a gym membership for almost three years and I haven’t been regularly active for slightly longer––Old Eternal (my late mother) made getting to the gym almost impossible. But prior to that, I was getting a fair amount of exercise regularly, which paid off when I got cancer. Nurses regularly exclaimed over my magnificent veins (unquote), resting pulse, and blood pressure.

Starting over again after a stretch of relative inactivity is something I’ve always hated. But I always forget how much the body remembers: after only three sessions, my colour was better, my endurance was up, and my heart-rate was down. Like the man said, reasons to be cheerful, one, two three. I came out of the gym after each session tired, but in a good way––not fatigued. I felt bulletproof.

Exercise is something every cancer patient needs. If you have a friend who has cancer or some other chronic illness and you wish you could do something to help, help them get some exercise. If you belong to a gym, take them with you as a guest––either drive them there or splurge on a cab to and from. Sometimes it’s the mere prospect of having to get to and from that defeats them before they can even get off the couch. That was true for me.

Of course, that’s assuming there is no medical impediment or handicap that would prevent their becoming more active. I would be doing this even if I didn’t have cancer because of my lower back. There is absolutely nothing organically wrong with my back––no disc problems, no bad bones. It’s all strain from muscles that need to be conditioned and toned up. The recumbent exercise bike, as one of my all-time favourite gps Dr. A told me, works exactly the right muscles to make my lower back stop screaming, ONE MORE STEP, BITCH, AND I’LL KILL YOU!!!!! every time I walk farther than a block. I know he’s right because it’s always worked before. I think it will probably work even better since the hernia operation (which for the record was how they found the cancer). The repair has held up.

I prefer the recument bike to the regular bike. For one thing, it’s better for your posture––instead of being hunched over handlebars, you sit up straight, with your legs stretched out in front of you. For another, a recumbent bike doesn’t hurt your inner thigh/groin area; there’s no need for padded bike shorts. The “handlebars� are on either side of the (comfortable not cushy) seat. I plug into my music, set my mind on Create: Freestyle (okay, maybe some people would say ‘daydream�) and pedal away for thirty minutes. It’s probably very revealing that to me, this is a description of heaven. Maybe pretty obvious as well.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: But, Pat––indoors? Wouldn’t it be nicer outdoors?

Two words: climate control. That’s air conditioning in the summer and heat in the winter.

Two more words: traffic and topography. Biking in London is a risky proposition. Yes, there are bike lanes but not nearly enough. When a bike lane comes to an end––and they all come to an end, usually before your journey does––that’s it. You’re either in a bus lane or mixed into regular traffic. And bus lanes come to an end, too. You’ve got to be an experienced city biker or, failing that, you have to have quick reflexes and 360º awareness. I’m so medicated, I’d end up as a smear on someone’s front end.

Yes, I’m sure. Embarrassing admission: I have never ridden a bicycle with handbrakes––only footbrakes. I’m that old. But I digress.

The other t-word, topography, is basically, Damn, I never noticed this stretch is uphill. Even a gentle slop upward can be trying. On a recumbent exercise bike, I can increase the resistance in stages. When I reach my limit, I leave it there; when it becomes too much, I adjust it downward. Customised terrain! (That’s on the manual setting; there are preset programs, too, but after thirty-six years as a freelancer, I prefer to call the shots.)

I’ve become such an exercise bore that I’ve taken to posting warnings on my Facebook page whenever I’m going to talk about exercise. I probably should have posted a warning on this entry except I didn’t know I was going to digress so much.

Anyway. I haven’t put in enough time on the bike to fix my lower back but I feel sturdy enough for several days with K and all the other people I haven’t seen for yonks and yonks.

Although I have to say, I’m a little bit nervous. In 1988, I was in Boston doing a talk and K and her husband D came to take me out to dinner. Shortly after that, K told me she was pregnant. Then something over ten years later, Chris and I visited K and D while I was on a book tour. Shortly after I got home, K wrote to tell me she was pregnant…with twins.

And now, I’m going to see her again.

Whatever it was about me, I hope it’s worn off�

I guess I’m going to find out.

Today, I did a whole fifteen minutes on the recumbent exercise bike. Okay, fifteen minutes with breaks.

EasyGym has fancy-schmancy machines with hook-ups for iPads and iPods, as well as a whole entertainment package (which costs extra). I’m not sure if the wifi is free or not. I forgot my earphones so I had to cycle with only the sound of other cardio machines in the background. I will never, ever forget my earphones again.

I’m not sure I’ve ever been so out of condition; not even after childbirth (they don’t call it ‘labour� ironically). It was the toughest fifteen minutes I’ve put myself through lately, even with breaks. But I did it. Tomorrow, maybe sixteen minutes (with breaks).

Afterwards, in the locker room, I discovered EasyGym’s secret to keeping costs down: you have to keep pressing the shower button. There’s no just standing under the spray like a zombie who cares about personal hygiene. No temperature or spray adjustment, either––the water comes out how it comes out and you adjust yourself to it. In between, you soap up without the water running (this makes sense to me). Then you rinse off.

As I still don’t have enough hair for shampooing, the inconvenience is minor. But what the hell, the membership is super-cheap, especially if you don’t take classes.

Once clean, I had to sit down and recover from standing for a prolonged period. I must have looked pretty done in. A young woman who was putting on her make-up nearby asked me if I were all right. 

“Yeah,� I said, “I’m just out of condition.� This was genuine British understatement. I’ll have to train every day for at least three months before my level of fitness is high enough to qualify as very poor. Right now, I’m off the scale, and not in a good way.

And speaking of scales: I got on one. The good news is, I am not even close to the upper limit of the mechanism. (According to the sign, the upper limit is 500 pounds but what the hell, good news is where you find it and what you make of it.) The better news is, I have already lost another kilos since I saw the oncologist. (Well, yes, it might have been sweat. But the scale doesn’t make any distinctions––weight is weight. If the scale doesn’t care, why should I?)

It was a pay scale––for a quid, it told me my height, weight, BMI, and percentage of body fat. None of that was good news but the bar for bad news is now so high that the worst thing I can say about these figures is, they’re data.

More good news: while it doesn’t take much to raise my heart-rate, it comes right down again just as it always has. Also, no chest pains, no problems breathing, and no dizziness. (The tiny hairs in my inner ear have grown back so I’m not suddenly lurching to one side or the other like a drunk failing to keep it together.) What this means is, as woefully out of shape as I am, I have no physical problems that would prevent me from getting fit again.

The oncologist recommended I make that a priority now that I’m done with chemo and taking hormones (not HRT––certain hormones can in some cases keep recurrent uterine cancer stable and prevent it from growing). As I’m so unfit, exercise is going to own the days for a while––I came home feeling good but done. Eventually, however, I’ll be able to do more than take myself to the gym and go home afterwards.

And I’ll be able to walk all I want without my lower back screaming, ONE MORE STEP, BITCH, AND I WILL CUT YOU!

It’s nice to have things to look forward to.

We now resume our regular programme, which is already in progress. I.e., if you’re not completely well, you’re as good as, so get back to work, kiddo. 

Crisis more or less over, it’s now time to pick up where you left off in normal living. And honey, if you thought were behind before, you must now run about a hundred miles an hour just to keep from falling any farther behind.

It’s my belief that we were all put on this earth to accomplish a certain number of things and I am now so far behind, I can never die.

Today is not all about cancer, or chemo, or life-span. It’s about getting back to work. It’s about getting more exercise, it’s about living, and living means you’ve got things to do.

No, you can’t go from 0 to 60 immediately––but you are expected to work your way back up to your previous level and then move beyond even that. You really want to live? Live is a verb, active not passive.

As an old Reebok commercial once pointed out, life has two settings: pause and play. Press play and get your ass in gear.

You don’t just beat cancer and celebrate. You have to keep get up and beat it again, every day. And in the wse words of the immortal Satchel Paige, Don’t look back––something might be gaining on you.

Okay…let’s go!