Last Updated on March 7, 2023 by ADMIN-TOM
My cancer, Lymphoplasmacytic Lymphoma, is a slow to develop and exceedingly rare form of Lymphoma. It’s not, thank goodness, one of those cancers that devastates the body and leaves the poor host to quickly die. When someone famous dies, you may have heard newsreaders say that he/she passed away after a short illness. Your guess is as good as mine as to what the person died of, but it would be a fair bet if you went for an aggressive cancer. Luckily, my cancer is not aggressive.
What my cancer is capable of is making everything about it move slowly, and seemingly all that surrounds my life also moves slowly. I received a telephone call last week, from my Oncologist’s office, telling me my next appointment was on 14th March and that I was getting a week off from my chemotherapy. Great, a week to twiddle my thumbs before the next cycle begins, which lasts for about a month. So, I was looking forward to sitting down and doing a bit of writing on my latest novel, Walking Away from Midnight. Oh, what a forlorn hope that turned out to be.
Monday was devoted to getting a leak in my apartment’s solar water heater fixed. The apartment is for renting out to holidaymakers, though my wife and I are now going to move into the apartment permanently. Either way, the leak needed to be fixed. Eventually, by Tuesday morning, it was fixed, but that meant Monday was spent waiting for phone calls, or visits, from technicians that never materialised.
Today is Tuesday, and Tuesday or Wednesday were supposed to be days to get my scheduled blood tests done. I say scheduled, because the telephone call from the Oncologists’ office I received on Friday was very specific, and whoever I spoke to even told me to write it down that I needed to attend the Evangalismos Lab in Paphos on Tuesday or Wednesday to get my blood tests done. But first I needed to make sure the leak was fixed. So, I drove from Paphos to Kouklia (that’s where the apartment is located) and hey presto, the leak was fixed. The technician didn’t bother to telephone to tell me he had fixed the leak, which would have saved a journey. But as I needed to get my blood tests done it was fine. So, on my way back home I popped into the lab and presented myself for blood tests.
“You are not scheduled for blood tests,” the nice lady in reception said. “Call your Oncologist and ask them what’s going on,” she added. I called the oncologist and was told to wait for a phone call to explain what is happening. That was hours ago, and I’m still waiting.
So, instead of writing a new chapter for my novel, I’m writing a new post for my blog. It’s still writing, but I wish I could have had time to write a chapter for my novel and a blog post.
But that’s life. We don’t always get things to be the way we want them. In fact, it’s a rarity for life to go as smoothly as we want. Ups and downs are meant to be ridden like a roller coaster. Get used to it, and don’t expect those important phone calls to come when you want them to, they never will. It’s Only a Bloody Appointment, after all.
Copyright © Tom Kane 2023
