GIVE YOURSELF SOMETHING TO WORK TOWARD - - - CONSTANTLY.
Mary Kay Ash
Jenna originally set up this blog for us to discuss the breast cancer situation, but since I am healthy and just fine and dandy now, I have found myself rambling about any number of different subjects. Therefore, I am bringing today's post back into the cancer subject realm. However, I want to lighten the mood by printing my little ditty that I sent to Writer's Digest magazine for their writing challenge (which did me no good to submit, but who cares?) Anyhoo, the challenge was to write a short story or article using the line "I KNEW IT WAS A MISTAKE THE MOMENT IT WAS OVER". This is what weird thing I came up with. Remember, it is 99 per cent fiction. Yeah . . . yeah . . . that's my story and I'm sticking to it.
PLEASE, PLEASE PARDON ME!
I knew it was a mistake the moment it was over. Let’s just say I had a gut feeling (in more ways than one) that trouble was abrewing. As I regretfully patted my too-full stomach, I shuddered at the thought of what the following hours would bring.
Every third Wednesday morning, I enter an oncology clinic for my chemo infusion. This morning I dutifully showed up for my scheduled appointment, and sat patiently for four hours while my special concoction drip-drip-dripped through an IV line plugged into my Power Port. This part of breast cancer is not difficult. It’s the darn symptoms that occur after treatment that make life miserable. Simply put, chemo makes me gassy.
Oh, I could call it something else – you know, a rose by any other name and all that. There are other words we can use; breaking wind, passing gas, puttering, bombing. Or we can just cut to the chase and call a spade a spade, or in this case, a fart. Yes, I said fart. That’s what I do now. I am a serial farter.
Seriously, this is a huge inconvenience. Anything I eat turns to wicked manure-smelling putters. I’m not talking about a little squeaky tooting or a small explosion that a carefully timed cough or clearing of the throat disguises. I mean the down-home, countrified, ripping sound that roars behind you with every step you take and every move you make. And the odor is to die for, or rather to die from. Whew!
DON'T MOCK ME! We’ve all been there at one time or another. Symptoms from the first few sessions were not too bothersome, simply because I didn’t eat very much. Fact is, all foods began to taste crappy. Bread was a floury-pasty experience on the tastebuds, and chocolate (my wonderful, darling chocolate) tasted like bitter unsweetened cocoa powder. Cookies had a very earthy flavor, which in cancer lingo, meant that their flavor resembled dirt.
I had to resort to yucky foods that I had avoided over the years like vegetables, salads, clear broths, and fruits. However, the nice part of the change in diet became apparent when I dropped two butt sizes. The sad part is that a smaller butt does not excuse you for polluting the air around you.
Sigh. I’ll share a little example of what I am destined to experience for the next several months.
After my last chemo, I stopped at a convenience store for a few purchases. A young couple was ahead of me in line. The man was holding a baby, gently rocking it back and forth. Behind me stood a woman with a toddler by her side. Suddenly, pressure began to build up inside me, and I knew trouble was indeed abrewing. At that point I felt trapped as I looked casually over my shoulder and realized that the line of customers had grown. God help me, I didn’t have a path of escape. As the pressure continued to build, I prayed that my – well – fart, would slip out seamlessly and silently and not arrive with a sharp bark or growl. I was concerned about the toddler, who was standing at Ground Zero. If hit by a foul air-bomb, he was likely to express his displeasure by yelping something like “Heeeeyy – what stinks?”
The countdown continued. Five, four, three, two, one . . . detonation completed. I did luck out when the fart escaped with just a whisper of a sound.
Now, I went into my “Academy Award winning” acting mode, looking off into the distance as though my mind was miles away and I didn’t have a care in the world. My first indication that (let’s all say it together) “trouble was abrewing” was when the poor tot who was standing at butt level, began coughing and crying while burying his nose in his mother’s pant-leg. My second indication occurred when the young man in front of me lifted his child up and smelled the kid’s behind, thinking that Baby had dropped a klunker in his Pamper. He raised an eyebrow and carried the little darling out to the car.
Chemo treatments will eventually be done, but for right now this is the beginning of another “smells bad” day. Darn that big meal. I knew it was a mistake the moment it was over!
GOD BLESS YOU ALL
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