Noli me tangere

The cancer card has expired here in Ann Arbor. The situation here just makes me sad but I need to respect the privacy of the principals although again, I am not getting any breaks here. None at all.
I read a lot, especially in the middle of the night to erase negative thoughts. Lots of Anita Shreve novels lately, Life of Pi, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, etc. Last night I was reading parts from one of those Chicken Soup books, you know-the inevitable triumphs from impossible situations. Even realizing how emotionally manipulative these vignettes are, I still was reduced to blubbering but some of that was out of self pity. Poor me, poor me. Nobody likes me. Everybody hates me. think I'm gonna eat some worms.

During the day, I am on the computer. One of my favorite blogs is Cancer Bitch (http://cancerbitch.blogspot.com/) who refers to herself in the 3rd person. She is a year out of treatment and is doing fine but rode that cancer roller coaster with style and sarcasm. Perhaps I should start referring to myself in the 3rd person as redundantly, Cancer Crab.

The Asiatic and tiger lilies have a distinct order of blooming: first the pinks, then the deep reds, then the oranges and finally the yellows. I'm right in the middle of reds, the oranges are just starting to open. The white and pink star gazer lilies I had have perished in my incompetent hands. Some of the calla lilies I got for my birthday are in bloom.

 My day lilies are about to bloom also.

I ran 106 miles during the month of June. This works out to be about 3 lbs of fat. I think of pounds of butter stacked up-same density. It was cool this morning facilitating my long run. I turned in the opposite direction of talkative lady. I saw one car the whole time I was out there. An added bonus, too cool for bugs. I am covered with bites. Either there are more bugs this year or I heal more slowly from their attacks. They seem to find my cancer blood tasty. In the past, mosquitoes would rarely land on me.

Today I go to orientation for parents at Naomi's community college. She herself is on some wild goose chase with that boyfriend.

Tougher than cancer

What is harder to deal with than cancer sometimes is dealing with a rage filled teenager who completely lacks common sense. Sometimes I just don't know how to handle her. She spent the day at the beach. She has fair skin but she thinks it is very important to have a tan and will fry herself despite lots of warnings.


I am very tired. Usually I recover quickly from my runs but I didn't yesterday. I tried to go for a walk with a friend in the heat yesterday but after a mile and after being attacked by numerous deerflies, I asked if we just not do this that day. Today I took a nap in the middle of the day though I was able to run this morning. I am looking forward to cooler temps next week.

I did go out to lunch today with my son Josh who is 27. I hadn't been alone with him to talk in a while so that was nice. If only Naomi could be as easy to deal with as him.

My raspberries are ripening in the hot sun. I went to look at the berry plants that have invaded my hosta section and was surprised to find out that they are not raspberries at all but wild blackberries (fruit looks completely different though the leaves are similar) Not sure how they all got there all at once. Birds must be a vector somehow.

I haven't seen my little hummer in a week and unless microbunny turned into macrobunny, he's gone. Even the chimney swifts are gone

Never too late

I was out early on my 10K run this morning on Warren Road, a scenic beauty road that is tree lined and runs by several farms. I rarely see a car on it much less people but today I found a woman walking her dog (Sweetie-a shih-tese, Maltese-shih tzu). She wanted to talk but said if I didn't want to interrupt my run, she'd understand. Oh great, more criticism but no, she wondered if I knew what had happened to 'walking lady', so named as she spends the entire day walking while smoking. She is dark brown from the constant sun with long blonde hair and if she weighs 70 lbs, I'd be surprised. I said I had seen here about a week ago but she must have cut down her walking considerably as I rarely see her. Anyway Sweetie's owner told me about all the marathons she's run and she didn't start running until her 70s. How old are you now? Well how old do I look? Well I would have said 70 but you made it sound like you were 70 many years ago. I'm 85.

Although it still is toasty here, the low humidity made my run tolerable.

Much to Naomi's chagrin, Dontae changed his mind about wanting to come here. She just left him at his mom's apartment, too mad to say anything to him.

My little pretties

More beautiful cards compliments of Lesa, a breast cancer survivor from Plymouth, MA (LittleLifePreservers)who is on a one woman mission to brighten the lives of women in treatment with her artistic, homemade cards. So much appreciated by yours truly!

Some zinnias and cosmos after the 2 inch rain

My hen and chick turning into a rooster in my rock garden

Poppies (California self sowing type)-I have bad luck with traditional poppies but these grow all by themselves

Lots of rain at the end of the day and the humidity dropped with it-finally. I went out after the storms to survey the damage-lots of water logged plants. My poor little blue bells was covered with slugs. After killing those disgusting creatures, I put the pot in a slug-free zone. Hard to save the begonias in the ground from their nasty, slimy appetites.

Too tired to run today though I did go to the gym to lift weights and do the elipitical trainer. As the fat (ever so slowly) dissolves, I can see more and more of my latent muscles. Still would like to see more hair but six weeks ago, it was only a mm or so and I had no eyebrows or eyelashes. Now I have a full set of eyelashes and very furry brows. Have to figure out how to tame them other than plucking out the outliers. My 'haircut" looks like that of a typical 5th grade boy circa 1964. It has been almost a year since my last real haircut-right before I went to Italy.

Naomi has been running around like a maniac trying to clean up portions of the house Dontae might visit. Ha! He allegedly is a neat-nik and she is NOT. He is coming over tonight. I am surprised she hasn't gotten around to lecturing me on what I can and can not say. I am just so embarassing.

Running advice

I am not a graceful person. I can't even run right. The kids all have requested at various times in the past that I don't run anywhere near their school (which was 2 miles down from where I worked)where I could be seen as I swing my arms in a ridiculous manner. The only time I didn't run this way is while I was recovering from the broken arm. To beat the heat this morning, I got up at 6 and soon was slowly chugging up the hill on the bike path when a walker stopped me. Excuse me, can I speak to you for a moment? Sure. Who told you to swing your arms that way? Sorry that's just the way I run. I ran off pissed that I didn't come up with something better than that.

She had a very annoyed look on her face. She was fat and around 40. It is doubtful that she's run a day in her life. I don't know why this bothered me. Maybe if I stuck around, she could tell me my hair style was unflattering too. You know, if you can't say anything nice, don't say it at all.

I had stopped because I assumed she wanted directions. People get confused between dhu Varen and Warren which are just a mile apart and the signs are often missing. Or they are trying to get on the Freeway, which they can see but no they will just have to turn around and get on 2 miles away. Sorry, I didn't plan the roads here.

I've often gotten running advice though people have always been nice about it. My favorite was at the end of a triathlon (running is the last event) and a man said that he knows that he really shouldn't tell me how to run as I had been ahead of him and I must have been a hell of a swimmer (no-I'm a crappy swimmer but a fairly good bike rider)but I could be much more efficient if only....yeah, yeah, yeah.

Despite how early it was, the heat was even more oppressive than the other days and I struggled to finish. A big storm system just went through that hopefully will cool everything down.

After the run, on to the dentist to get my crown placed. The assistant said there was a 95% chance I didn't need anesthesia. Well guess what, I am that 5% person. She put in banana flavored numbing oil to prepare for the Novocaine leaving a banana taste in my mouth for the next few hours. Hate bananas.

The Y approved my reduced fee scholarship so I can continue my workouts for the next 6 months. Yippy!

Did an IKEA run with my friend Martha this afternoon. She had never been.

Sauna

The heat index was forecasted to rise to 107 today so as soon as I rolled out of bed, I tried to get a run in. I went just in the neighborhood as it is fairly shady minus all the trees we lost to ash borer disease. But the disadvantage of running before you wash your face and put on make-up is that for sure you'll run into people you know that want to talk. So I ran into 2 separate people who wanted to know how I was doing but I guess they assumed I must be doing fine as I was running. When Cancerfest first started, someone came up to me and said that they thought they heard I had cancer but since they saw me running, they must have heard wrong. I actually felt better running today vs yesterday but maybe because the sun wasn't on me the whole time. Not much relief in sight here with the heat.

Steve went to transfer Naomi's records from the pediatrician to the 'big girl' doctor but was stumped when they needed her signature as she is 'an adult'. Have they met Naomi? But Naomi certainly was out of place among the crying babies and toddlers asking about birth control to a person who believes in arranged marriages.

The repair bill to fix our dehumidifer equals the cost of a new one. Our air conditioner works only if you hit it the right way. Ugh.

Our LiveStrong class now is sending e-mails to each other every day. I guess we all need support. Off to Happy Hour with Brenda>

watching my flowers grow

My first tiger lily

I am not sure what these are called-Hot cat? Catsia? This is the first year I grew them

The first of the 3 callas to bloom. In a few days, all three plants should be covered with blooms

I shared an office with a man many years ago who every morning would greet me I can't wait for tomorrow. I usually would ignore this (along with requests to pull his finger) until I couldn't stand the badgering and then I would finally ask, Why's that? Because everyday I just keep getting better looking.
If only...

So each day I should be getting more hair and getting smaller. Progress remains at a glacial pace.

What does progress are my flowers with new blooms appearing every day. This week is very hot and humid, which is not good for my running. I did do around 5 miles this morning but the last half was painful. No cooler temps in the near future either.