I’m always surprised when I hear Suzanne say “I’m on borrowed time”. We could be chatting in the car, watching the tube, or just out on the front porch swing when she makes that statement. Each time she says it, I hear a sense of mortality in her voice as well as gratitude about the fact that she is still here with me. So what does it mean when we say ‘Borrowed Time”? An online definition said it was to…
It’s hard to believe that it has been two years since Suzanne’s life-saving / altering surgery, and one year since she finished her clinical trial. For those of you who are new, Suzanne chose to participate in a clinical trial after her cancer surgery. The trial is called PATHway, used a drug called KYTRUDA and she will have follow-up appointments for one more year. This visit was her first to the new Rush Medical Center cancer facility on campus, the…
It was inevitable, figuring out how to take a big trip where all of Suzanne’s nourishment needed for two weeks had to be packed in suitcases. That’s what faced us for our winter trip we booked through Travel Discoveries II where we traveled on an eleven-day cruise through the Panama Canal and the southern Caribbean Sea with Norwegian Cruise Lines. Off to a rocky start, we made it through Chicago TSA unscathed but didn’t know the process in Panama. Then,…
I don’t know about you, but there is something about doing puzzles that seem to give my mind a break from all the hustle & bustle around me. A cup of tea and a half-hour break from the action seems to do the soul some good. For me, a puzzle is a combination of Where’s Waldo, shape perception, and math. I like to pick up a piece and look at the picture to find the exact location of that piece….
By now, you all know that numbers are my thing. I love working with numbers, accounting, statistics, measurements, and more. In my former life in the Park and Recreation industry, putting together the budget for the department was just plain fun. So a new important number popped up today for me, thirty-four. In January of 1989, George Bush was sworn in as President, Phil Collins’s song “Another Day in Paradise” was popular, Tiramisu was a trendy food item, Mcdonald’s actually…
A couple of months ago, I dropped Suzanne off at a Hobby Lobby as I ran over to Menards in Champaign. Back to pick her up, she looked puzzled, so I asked the reason. She said, “I ask a clerk where I could find a sex book, but she didn’t seem to understand”. Looking at her with excitement in my eyes, I shared that I didn’t think Hobby Lobby was the right place to look for that item, then repeated…
Some Christmas card letters are epic novels, some Christmas cards are just signed, some with photos, a piece of candy, or just a brief note about the year a loved one had. I told myself that this year, I was going to start to send Christmas Cards out again. Obviously, I told myself that too late as my bout with influenza took over the past few weeks and it appears, this is going to be the best I can do….
The Christmas season brings out cherished memories with friends and family. One of the most cherished periods of my life was publishing my dad’s WWII diary back in 2012-15. As a tribute to him, I put together a video of how he spent Christmas each year he was overseas. Now, watching this video every year brings a smile to my face as I remember him and our journey together. So here is my annual posting of Christmas for a WWII…
Since Suzanne’s diagnosis 735 days ago, my total focus has been on her health. Setting up appointments, driving her anywhere she needed to be, additional ears to be sure what has been said, sitting with her through treatments, and doing what I can to be sure she was getting the best care possible. It has been a long road and yesterday that road took a turn, it was my turn. Let me set the stage. When we went to Las…
Typically, I’m pretty much in charge of planning where we go on vacation, the sites we see and the activities we participate in. There are two exceptions, The Louisville Livestock show and the National Finals Rodeo (NFR) in Las Vegas; those two are non-negotiable. So we were off on the big bird to LAS. Day 1 – Right off the bat there was drama. A snowstorm in our Minneapolis connecting flight had us worried but after forty-five minutes of de-icing…