I came home yesterday with sand still in my shoe. I happen
to love this, especially when it is Cape Cod sand.
The sand came from the Thanksgiving day walk which Akemi and I took on the beach in Falmouth,
Massachusetts. Akemi snapped this and other
photographic momentos of another relaxing, enjoyable holiday at the Cape with
the extended Green clan.
She and I returned to Boston to honor some other Thanksgiving
weekend traditions we’ve developed beginning with her freshman year. There’s the
40%-off-everything-in-the-Cambridge-Ann-Taylor-store-sale, Saturday dinner with her
friends in Harvard Square, church in her Cambridge University Ward, and a Sunday
home-cooked dinner, this year with a lemon cake for her birthday.
For me, the trip also included my third visit to
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. I expected
Dr. Treon to be pleased about the results of this past year’s treatment, and he
did not disappoint. What I am getting
my head around is that treatment at this stage is not just about beating the
Waldenstrom’s back; it’s also about keeping it at bay. He’s therefore recommending I continue the
maintenance Rituxan regime another year, to spring 2014. Big sigh; I was hoping to be “done” for a while.
Until there’s a cure, the best I can hope for is ongoing treatment which
forestalls a relapse.
I came home with another visit’s worth of notes on
new drugs coming out of clinical trials and more positive reinforcement in
living well the immune-compromised life.
I came home to substantial progress with the bathroom
reconstruction. Like the sand clinging
to the bottom of my shoe as a reminder of a cherished good time, I’m focusing on the prospect of more Rituxan and
drywall dust not as much as annoyances, but as promises of good things to
come.
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