Pinot, Bretzels, and Cathedrals

A narrow alley

The centuries old 6th floor buildings with shuttered windows towered above a nondescript alley, into where she stepped. The evening sun streamed into the space, blinding her before she snapped her sunglasses on. An icy cold wind whistled down the narrow space despite the spring season, whipping at her hair, and tugging at the heavy grey winter coat. Pods tucked into her ears drowned out the urban noise and music filled her head. Her mind floated away on the chords , the bass powering down into her belly and travelling back into the palm of her hands, which she turned upwards, as of a witch capturing the force of nature in the space around her. A step now to a flock of pigeons pecking at discarded crumbs and they sense her, taking to the sky with a beating of the air, poetic and flawless.

She feels invincible having just left the imaging laboratory where she’d undergone the ritual check up, watched as a stranger tugged and pulled at her breasts as if they were simply her hands, manipulating them in between the plates moulding them like clay before they squeezed and squashed her cells and snapped a photo.

An echograph followed, she lay on the bed, bare-waisted, her hands tucked behind her head, like a lady from the red light district, pretending to be coy and demure. For 5 seconds the radiologist had scared her- a gap in the cells over on the left side of her breast, a do-over, but then « c’est rien « , nothing to worry about.

Soon she’ll be with the dermatologist, yet another check-up on her to-do list. Tick the boxes. Check your health. Because you never know.

And yet, despite those check ups, you actually do never know. You can follow the rules and guides every single day of your life, maybe you don’t see that hidden mass manifesting in the recesses of your brain. There’s no test for that. Too little too late – isn’t that the scornful cliche emitted from the snarl of the villain in the story?

Her hands – so strong a minute ago- now fall to her sides. A lull in the music, a deep breath, and now the tears fall down her cheeks. No matter the strength her friends and family think she carries, every single invasive thought renders her a mess of sadness.

She takes 5 minutes, leaning against the grubby grey building, pigeons settling back at her feet where the bread still sits, breathing through the panic attack that come and go at in opportune moments. This will pass for now: each time in preparation for what she doesn’t want to come, but she knows will be inevitable. The articles she’s read, the statistics, they all say the same. The only person who hasn’t is his oncologist. He won’t say anything until after the onslaught of what she imagines will be a debilitating radiotherapy and chemo session over 7 weeks. Only then will he commit to a time frame.

A little more than 2 months has passed since that harried trip to the emergency rooms in February. I wrote earlier about being careful what we wish for, almost as if a ghost has passed through me. Am I living a half-asleep/half awake existence right now? Having Anton at home for the last 3 weeks has finally fallen into a routine for all of us: the girls have taken on new responsibilities- washing clothes and packing away the dry laundry (and nothing gets to lie around for days on end as it used to because of the multitude of new ‘furniture’ in my lounge), packing and unpacking the dishwasher if I’ve done a split shit at work, 5pm walks so that Thandi can get out, of preparing meals that can be eaten from a bowl, the cycle of therapists and nurses popping in, and Anton has not taken his hemiplegia condition lying down. In 3 weeks we’ve gone from needing the wheelchair to get around to him able to walk to the toilet in the middle of the night without any assistance barre a trail of fingers on the walls.

The GinHour walks (sunset, for all intents and purposes) are slow, and one of us stays with Anton, watching him push himself to try harder, do better, be stronger: it’s rewarding and difficult all in one deep breath, while the rest keep an eye on the dog who has a 5 minute zoomie session in the freshly planted fields. She’s a little bitch when it comes to walks and is happiest when we’re all out, impossible to simply leash up as an individual and take her out. (She’s not been out for more than 500metres February 17th).

Anton has come on in leaps and bounds since the surgery rendered him ‘hemiplegic’ and on the occasion I tried to read up on how long this would take to overcome, how long to recover from brain surgery, the snippets I read online were vague and could be anything up to 12 weeks. I’m now making a concerted effort to stop reading up on it, to stop comparing his progress and to simply let it be. Just as we’ve stopped comparing our babies milestones, knowing every one marks time at their own pace, I need to just be patient. And yet, the reality is, we have a disabled family member in our house, so life is going to be a little different.

The end of April officially starts the oncology round of this shitty disease. Anton will go to the university hospital’s cancer centre every work day for a session of radiotherapy at the same time as swallowing a chemotherapy pill every day. At least it won’t be a hour long session attached to a drip for the chemo, and if the effects of the pill are different to the intravenous stuff remains to be seen. The Onco Doc has prescribed laxatives as constipation appears to be the biggest side effect, but there’s anti-nausea, antibiotics and cramp meds in the delivery of meds that arrived last week. We’ll need to have blood draws weekly to keep up with white cell count levels.

He’ll have a break from onco mid June to mid July, and theoretically will then kick off with 6 months of chemotherapy pills every 5th day. This is when we are hoping to return to South Africa for a 2 month holiday, but I’m holding off on buying tickets until we can see how he is affected by the treatment.

After I mentioned to my boss that I was thinking of taking 2 months unpaid leave this summer and having spoken to him ad nauseum about the cancer- it’s aggressive nature and probability we’ll never be rid of it, the company I work for has kindly offered to put me on a severance package as the restaurant I work in has been sold. It’s a scary space to be in- I’ll be getting social benefits and will need to apply for work again when the time comes, at least I can get through the next 4 months without having to worry about 200% of everything.

And at this point, I will glibly retract my nasty words about toxic workplaces. Despite the years of no increases in salary, the complete absence of a bonus, this offer from my employers is extremely generous, plus they have said when I’m ready to return to work, there’s a contract available for me. The years of sweat and toil I’ve given them have not gone unnoticed.

So much of this still doesn’t feel like this is my life. Sometimes I feel like I’ve immersed myself in a movie, but movies don’t render this level of emotion. The Lord knows how much I want him to defy the odds, to be the 15% who get 10 years. My heart needs protecting though, so I hold onto both cups I’ve been offered: the downside of glioblastomas, and that hope springs eternal: we might have a decade ahead of us, while forging my own path as a single mother, a single woman, preparing myself to deal with leaky taps and flat tyres. Figure out life on a single salary eventually, but that’s a topic for another chapter.

Thus, here we are on the brink of more change. If there’s anything you can offer, send Anton a message to check in on him. He can’t go down to the pub for a pint and the rugby anymore, so keep his mind active with your messages and memes and jokes. He is terrible with voice notes, it takes him days to listen to it, so just a WhatsApp or DM anywhere. And I’ll be at home for the next few months, so if you’re around and want to stop by the far reaches of La Rob, the kettle is always hot, the beers are not, and it’s forage season, so who knows what treats of nature are going to be on our plates.

In finishing up today, I realise this is a lot to read- literally and emotionally, when maybe you only came here for an update. It’s my way of working through my emotions: history proves my most creative literary pieces [albeit debatable and egotistic of me to say] have been carved out of a place of grief. I serve the words back to me, mostly, for when the time comes to acknowledge the journey.

On that note, I bid an adieu, with a reminder to “check your tats” and your moles, and your prostate or whatever else we can screen for.

Love and Mammograms,

Me.