May Day: toot toot

Tonight I brought my sister, who is ensconced in the hospital, a green glass vase filled with Spanish blue bells. She said, "I don't know if I can keep them when they move me to the oncology ward later tonight."

She's very weak, can't walk. Is on a heart monitor and enough big-guns pain meds to sedate a much larger mammal. Decided not to shave her head just yet — I put away the barber's clippers I'd carried in under my arm.

We talked about heads: heads shaved, heads with odd tufted hair, heads in prim crocheted caps and heads wigged in pink spikes. She's going to opt for the odd and funky: Yay sister! I'm taking on the task of searching out compelling head "treatments".  Nothing conservative or reserved for this one!

Chemo begins tomorrow, incidentally our father's birthday, he who left the land of the upright 46 years ago, half the age he'd be tomorrow.

Each day is another wave of the unexpected, another surge of new information. It baffles, it confounds. I go to bed each night cursing my inability to fix everything.

A fragment of the hilarious: the "stolen" dirt was taken by my younger son. I suspected him, but my older son, who was home all day, said that N. hadn't been by. I guess he did a drive-by. Grabbed the dirt and ran! Ha. He's already planted carrots, and has plans for a white peach tree in a big barrel.

And amidst some incredibly frustrating painting (at work) on a cylindrical piece of glass, I ended up with some perfectly stunning — if I may toot my own horn here — leaves and berries. I've mentioned before that painting has never been my forte, and I'm stunned with the completely unexpected joy that arises when I manage to do it right — and beautiful to boot. So: toot.