'Tis the season to be jolly ...

I have just come from the first performance of our school nativity play. All was well until the fourth song (a gentle number called ‘Sleep Little Child’) during which an argument broke out between two of the shepherds. One had noticed the other making rude gestures and felt it right to put his hand up and report the incident. However the offending shepherd was clearly reserving the right to be offensive … after all, he was doing it to HIS mum. He may well be tending sheep on a hillside far away next time. Anyway, we are winding down to a quiet end of term and all seems to have gone well. In fact, there hasn’t been a single complaint about the festivities this year and the post-concert collection was double last year’s! As one Teaching Assistant who lives locally put it, “Apparently you aren’t top of the parents’ hit list anymore.” Could the community have given me a nicer gift?

I have just had my second bone-strengthening infusion and am taking hefty doses of painkillers in readiness for the side effects. So far, I feel fine. I met with a consultant last week who looked at the whole issue of when to administer the radiotherapy and when to start the new chemo regime. The decision is to wait for now and to review the situation after Christmas. At the start of December I noticed that a tumour beneath my scar tissue, which had shrunk away during previous treatment, was in fact making a dramatic return. It came back quickly, over the period of a fortnight, which was all a bit alarming. Again, in spite of this, the consultant’s decision was to wait until it grew larger and became more problematic before tackling it with this new chemo regime as the new regime brings serious problems of its own. However, over this past week it has shrunk away again, leaving no evidence on the surface of the skin. In fact the hardness beneath the skin also seems tangibly reduced. Big relief all round and unusual to have a tumour shrink when not on any form of chemo. (Note to those of you who are pray-ers … keep going, keep going.)

So – have a great Christmas. We wish you and your families well and hope that you manage to rest and celebrate in equal measure. 2008 has been a good year for us, much better than we anticipated 12 months ago, and we are hugely grateful for your thoughts, contact, friendship and support. It has made a big difference.

Lastly, my Living Room Poetry tour is carrying right on, so I look forward to seeing you at a poetry reading in 2009. (There is a strong hint within that last statement, so I’ll await your invitations ...)

Flu

Well … there have been a few developments since last we spoke. The good news is that my kidneys, on further inspection, seem to be coping okay. I am having a renal scan tomorrow to confirm this, but hopefully the need for stents will be postponed for now. However, I started the bone strengthening injections last week and have to say that, to my surprise, the side-effects were worse than those of the chemo! As always there is a list of potential problems, but the main side effect is the onslaught of flu symptoms. Now, all women know and accept that men get flu much more severely than they do … and quite regularly too. However, even by men’s standards this wasn’t good. A lot of joint pain, which made moving around very difficult, and painkillers had to be taken during the night in order to get some sleep. That said, today things are pretty much back to normal and so all I need to do is factor this in ... plan for lazy days (no problem there) and stash up on codeine tablets. I didn’t realise until this first infusion, but I will be on these indefinitely, every four weeks. Better get used to it, I suppose.
I think I will be having the radiotherapy blast to my bones in the near future. I am seeing my doctor tomorrow and no doubt he will be able to fill me in.

At school we are on the final rush to Christmas. I can't believe it! Parties, nativities, a visiting theatre production ... complaints about parties, nativities, a visiting theatre production. Ooooh I love it!
















Futures

Allowed the privacy of a side ward
to let the doctor’s words settle,
dig in,
draw blood.

Instead, you came to mind.

The evening before High School
and we are plotting our futures,
heading home on the park’s straight path
to roomy blazers broad on hangers,
pressed shirts next to new ties.

We didn’t foresee the misty bend
on the Crieff road.
You, at 24 - gone in an instant (the police assured).
Me, now- dying in slow motion,
examining the kerb, wall, ditch
and road markings you missed,
that tore past you
as fast as childhood.

for Ian Douglas Mitchell
1964 - 1988

Which Do You Want First?

Mary and I met with our Consultant yesterday to discuss the results of the scans and blood tests. Not great news, I'm afraid, although there are certainly some positives. The bad news is that the main site of the disease (bones and soft tissue in my pelvis) has been completely untouched by 6 months of chemo. In fact there has been slight spread, which explains the high CEA levels and increased pain. Added to our sadness at this is the fact that there is now nothing more they can do to tackle the disease in that area. Also, the main tumour is pressing on the tubes that drain my kidneys and my kidneys are slightly swollen and not functioning properly. I am going to need a small op to reduce the pressure on them, probably in the next week or so.
The good news is that the small tumours on my lungs and scar tissue have gone from the scans. Great! But ... they will be back. Chemo very much reduces them but doesn't remove them completely. Nevertheless, gone for now.

So what happens next? I am to have a single dose of radiotherapy to the affected bones and some bone strengthening injections to try and lock calcium in and thus reduce the tumours' progress. I am also having two blood tests a week to monitor my kidney function. When they deteriorate to a certain level I will be whipped into hospital to have stents fitted into the said tubes, but not before I have gorged a couple of buckets of valium! The much dreaded next chemo regime will start when the tumours in my lungs and elsewhere reappear. So ... watch this space.

We are well supported up here (and of course by your good selves) so we are coping surprisingly well. Daily life is still more or less completely normal, and we are very grateful for that. Yes, even for the usual spate of irrational school parents' concerns which this week have focused on the potential drug dangers of the school 'litter pick'. Yes, even for the £60 fine and 3 points on my license for a moment of unwise overtaking on the A59 last Wednesday!

Can anyone lend me a bike?

One Of Those Days ...

Days like this arrive from time to time. It got off to a bad start when I just nipped into school for 20 minutes before heading off to the hopsital for the second last chemo infusion. Whenever I mentor new headteacher I always give the warning "Beware any letter with a handwritten address on the envelope." Of course, there was one waiting for me ... A very angry parent demanding that one of my staff apologise to her child for a list of alleged offences. Of course, none of them were true! It is the slow lesson that can take parents years to understand ... sometimes, children exaggerate, and (steady ... ) don't tell the whole truth. I suppose we all have rose-tinted glasses when it comes to our children. I remember teaching a boy in the early 90s who, if he had been any slower, would have been getting watered twice a week. When I suggested to his mum that he was struggling with learning she just said, "Don't let him fool you ..." Hmmmm

Anyway, even worse was the news on arrival at York District Hospital that my Consultant wanted to see me straight away. My CEA level (tumour marker) has tripled in the last three weeks and is now at the all time high of 224. In a nut shell, the Consultant suspects that the disease is now successfully dominating the chemo. An urgent scan has been requested and it looks likely that I will be transferred to another chemo regime (a worse one ...) that has to be given in Leeds. Any problems will necessitate an admission to hospital in Leeds also, as York is not set up to cope with the sort of problems this regime can cause. So there we go - difficult territory. For those of you who are pray-ers, the big hope is that my CEA level plummets over the next three weeks. I was hospital last week for 4 days with an infection and it is JUST possible (though unlikely) that this has caused the hike in the CEA level. Anyway, certainly worth praying for.

As I left the hopsital, dosed to the nines with chemo, calcium, magnesium and glucose, I managed to settle on the fact that things could still be worse. It was then that I saw the parking ticket on my car windscreen ...

Thanks for visiting the blog.

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Three-Quarters Through

Just a quick blog ... I have just reached the 3/4 point of the treatment. Things are still okay on the whole. I am working full time and coping so far; in fact school seems quiet, too quiet! Last year I became the first Headteacher in the city to have had his Harvest Festival sale of produce picketed by a group of parents, because it was raising money for Unicef and as we all know charity begins at home! This year, however, we raised £90 for the Seeds For Africa appeal. Hmmm. Acceptance at last? Anyway, day to day life is pretty normal on the whole. Martha has been playing a few concerts with the Ayrshire Fiddlers, one of which was at a village ceilidh. It was a full affair, with children dancing up and down the hall. Joel, predictably, was in his element. Unfortunatley his frantic impromptu movement continued during the slow lament written to commemorate the death of a lifeboat crew in the Pentland Firth. People were very forgiving.

In terms of my general health, the only problem I have is with my left side. It has felt for some time that I am nursing what feels like a torn ligament or muscular strain at the top of my leg. However, it turns out I have a bone tumour high on my pelvic bone, and that this has begun to interfere with the soft tissue around it. A bit sobering. On good days I can walk slowly and reasonably normally. On bad days I am genuinely considering swallowing my pride and getting a stick. It comes and goes, but I am back on the painkillers I'm afraid. Let's hope the last two chemo doses do something to reduce the bulk. My other problem areas are still feeling much better. I will leave you with a couple of photos of the weanes.

Thanks for visiting the blog

Back To School

Well, that flew by. I know you all think teachers' holidays are far too long but it's all a matter of perspective. The week in Keswick whizzed by. We still had two days of school left on the Monday and Tuesday, and then on the Wednesday I went with the girls to see Kylie (purely as a means of transport, you understand.) Then, by the time we had spent Thursday trying to glue the outside metal light Joel broke in the Keswick apartment we were renting, it was back to a few weeks of torrential rain in York. Cornwall was good, if damp. We met up with some really good friends and managed a few days on the beach. Peranporth beach is very crowded, but Joel's game of "100 Loud and Noisy Ways of Falling Into A Hole In The Sand" is always good for clearing space. So the Greenbelt Festival followed Cornwall, and after that Dublin, London and ... back to school. You see, shorter than you think.

I have started the next three months of chemo. It has once again been an easier than expected ride. I have managed to work full time this week and so should hopefully be at work more or less throughout the period. I can already sense concerned furrows of the brow, but I promise to take time off if I need to. Martha has started Year 9 and Naomi has just started secondary. (She is prepared to take time off for education between productions, but only just. The Railway Children received huge critical acclaim nationally , but I suppose it's possible this isn't SIMPLY down to her appearances. Joel is back at his own school, which is a great place for him, and he counts off the days at the weekend until he goes back. Lazy, selfish Mary is quite prepared to see us destitute ... I apologise. Mary has stopped working on Fridays which means that her working week is much more manageable and she now has some space (which she well deserves.) So that is more or less how we are at the moment ... getting on with things. The 'white knuckle' moment will come in December when I have an MRI and a CT scan to assess the impact of the treatment. At the moment we are unsure how things have been affected, BUT my tumour markers are slightly down (I heard last week) and my pain levels are still reduced overall. This certainly gives cause for hope, but I just have to keep heading in this direction. It's all very week to week.

I hope you have all had a good summer. I really enjoyed seeing many of you over Greenbelt. Thanks again for checking the blog.

More Chemo

I suppose any compliment has to be taken and treasured these days, and so to be told by the phlebotomist that I have lovely veins was a pleasant start to yesterday's chemo. I seem to be into a fairly standard response in terms of side effects, which is that I have a two-day slump when I come off the steroids and pins and needles in my hands, feet and face for the first week. That said, I have been given magnesium and calcium this time in an effort to combat that and thus far it has reduced the tingling. We are still very grateful for my tolerance of this regime and as a special treat the oncologist has decided to repeat the whole course back to back with the one I have just finished. I will therefore be on treatment until the start of December. Not ideal, but treatment number 3 has started to palliate the symptoms -some tumours have reduced in size (the ones I can feel through the skin) and thus I hope the internal ones have done likewise. I am also completely off painkillers and no longer hobbling, which has to be a good thing.

The school term ended well, thanks to the devotion of my hard working staff who have taken many burdens from me. Even sports day had an eerie calm ... no tears, tantrums, swearing, biting or scratching and their offspring were also very well behaved. So, summer is here and we are off to Cornwall mid August and then I go straight to the Greenbelt Festival. The Greenbelt publicity has described the subject of my workshops as showing how poetry can help us talk about illness, death and dying. Perhaps I should break out the Leonard Cohen albums, bring in the Samaritans and have Schindler's List screened on the back wall! (Actually, looking at one of the poems below, you can't really blame them. I hope I have corrected it in time for the official programme)If you are coming to the festival, it is actually about writing out of any emotional extreme - happy, sad or exciting. Don't be put off!

Enjoy the summer and thanks again for visiting the blog.



Flying In For Lunch


When I last took you onto a plane
you dropped heavy tears,
shrunk from the loud engines
into my arms.
But you have no memory of that,
and this is a first for you.
Taxiing, accelerating, taking off,
rising to where there are no clouds or rain …
I watch it all soak in
like light onto film.

So … we’re flying to Dublin for lunch, I say.
There and back in a day. You laugh, thinking it’s a bit daft.
And you’re right.
So daft, it will become the story you tell
anytime your children ask
if you have ever been
on a plane.

for Martha




Chemo Room


The final step proved too high.
Seven minutes you stood beneath
a fifteen centimetre cliff,
at the edge of the ward,
eyeing the gleam of its floor
as a child might the surface of a deep pool.
We look a similar age.
You might have been someone I knew
beneath the cotton wrap,
behind the hand wiping
fast tears from lashless eyes.
But I tried not to stare,
busying myself in the ritual
we all know -
trickling warm water down skin,
coaxing veins to the surface.

Update ...

On Wednesday I am going in for the third infusion and after that there will only be one more to go, on 30th July. Thus far I have been mercifully spared the many side effects I was promised. The pattern seems to be that I am a bit jaded for a few days after the treatment and I have a very slow day when I come off the steroids but thereafter – fine! I am trying to be sensible, but at times still overdo it a bit and get pretty tired. However, there is no broken skin, or mouth ulcers, or nausea, or vomiting, or exhaustion, or breathing difficulties, or laryngeal spasms … and of course only I could go the extent of shaving my head and then not lose a single hair. What I do have is pins and needles in my hands and face and this is brought on by any slight temperature change … but I am absolutely fine about that. It’s the least of my worries. Thank you for the many prayers that I know have been said.

So, on into summer! During late July and most of August Naomi is involved in the Theatre Royal production of The Railway Children, which is being staged in the National Railway Museum with a real steam locomotive! She is one of Perks’ children and, as you might imagine, is pretty excited about it … you know, just casually hanging about with cast members of The Bill and Life on Mars. As a family we will be spending time in the Lakes and Cornwall, so it is going to be a busy time, but great fun I am sure. I hope your summers are good and that we are all blessed with sunny weather. If you are going to be at the Greenbelt Festival, let me know so that we can meet up. If not, why not? You are missing out on a really good weekend!

The First Of Four

Just a quick update. Thank you for the many texts and messages that I received as I went for the first of my four infusions on Wednesday. There were a lot of old associations and memories flying about on that day from my past chemo (not happy ones I'm afraid)and so sensing that I had a community of supporters out there really made a difference. I was plastered in EMLA cream, which has a numbing effect on the skin, in the hope that having a needle pushed up my vein might be more comfortable. In the end, however, they wouldn't allow it because I wouldn't have known if the needle had gone astray. Oh well, nice try. I will just have to be grown up about it!

I feel okay on day number two, with the help of the steroids and anti-nausea medication. I will struggle more as the treatment progresses, but for the moment all is well and I feel happy to have started it.
I will keep you informed. Thanks again for dialling into the blog and for the ongoing, invaluable support.

Joel

Smoke On The Water

You are wrapped in a fog
that your cold days can’t disperse.
Words huddle together
and burrow through,
arriving soggy,
sliding across your shell
like my hand through your hair -
unnoticed, leaving a trail
that the breeze will erase
as it shakes the night’s weave
of knots and tugs.

But today we hold hands and dance,
jumping as Ritchie’s guitar riff
shakes the windows,
laughter spilling from your open throat.
While the band search for Lake Geneva through smoke,
we crouch beneath the billows,
playing in shallows
as cool and clear
as rain.


For Joel

Here We Go, Here We Go, Here We Go

Well, what a great night I’ve just had! I went to Manchester for the first gig of The Willard Grant Conspiracy’s tour. A great event. Afterwards, my arrival at the railway station coincided with that of about 3000 Rangers fans. On platform 3 I joined a group of about four hundred, all of whom were waiting for the 22.42 to York. Sadly, as it arrived, they got there first and sardined themselves into every carriage. Do you know, I’m not sure that all of them had a ticket! However, despite the fact that I had my seat reservation in my pocket, I thought it best not to issue a challenge …
This happened again at 23.19! Thankfully at 23.52 I managed to get to a carriage early, due to a sudden change of platform; I even got a seat. Once the next batch of football fans had pressed themselves into every available centimetre of the train, we eventually left. In a carriage awash with hot breath, eau de armpit and cider, I wasn’t particularly looking forward to the next ninety minutes. However, some lovely community singing broke out almost immediately. There were several songs although lyrically, the themes were quite limited … someone called ‘Pope’ (must be the poet …) was being given some quite frank advice and there were also some kind offers of food to a man called Bobby Sands. Now, for some people, endless hoarse, raucous bellowing and ranting would be a nightmare. Luckily for me, our regular church pew on a Sunday is quite near the choir and so I quickly found that merely closing my eyes made me feel closer to home.

On a serious note, I met with the consultant earlier in the week and I am starting the ‘big guns’ chemo on Wednesday 28th May. It is going to be tough, I fear, but Mary and I are going to try very hard to keep a veneer of normality for the sake of the children. Prayers to this effect, and for me to ‘get away lightly’ with side effects, would be greatly appreciated. The side effects are many and not pleasant, although I will be pointing out to my brothers this weekend that, although I am the first of us to undergo reasonably extensive hair thinning, there still isn’t a grey hair in my head! They are beginning to look as if they are attending an Alistair Darling Convention.

Thanks for visiting the blog and for your support and encouragement. I will, of course, update again when the chemo starts.

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Mixed News

Well, it's mixed news once again. On the positive side, tumours in my lungs appear slightly smaller. On the negative side, the main tumour in my pelvis is larger. The consultant has decided that my current regime has run its course and will be of no further benefit. So, I will be going onto the next 'combination' regime, which is much stronger, as and when there is any further growth in the pelvis. I am back in five weeks to have this checked out. If the pelvic tumour stays as it is, then I will stay off the chemo for now. However, as soon as it changes ... on I go. It is probably worth me upping my gym attendance to try and get as fit as possible in the hope that I might tolerate the new regime more than the doctor anticipates. He thinks it might help.

Mary and I are absorbing this latest news and in the meantime are getting on with things as normal. Little choice really. I have had a radically short haircut so that my children ( at home and at school)get used to me having next to no hair well in advance of the treatment. I think it's safe to say that my daughters hate it! (I'm willing to guess you don't like it either, mum ...) So I guess the next step is to leave photos of Right Said Fred about the house. (Martha stopped me on the stairs the other day as I jogged heartily down wearing shorts and sports vest, on my way to the gym. She eyed me for a moment and said, "I need to tell you dad ... that isn't a good look." Oooooh, she's such a tease!)

Thanks for visiting the blog. Stay in touch.

Be Sure Your Sins Will Find You Out.

I am interviewing for a new Deputy Headteacher on May 2nd and it is an important appointment for obvious reasons. We spent £920 on a national advert and had an astonishing thirty applications! The applicants came to look round, well-versed in the school's recent(highly successful!)Ofsted report and saying very kind things about it. So I am there - talking earnestly, brow furrowed, being modest, explaining the school's vision for future development - and this requires me to bring the small group to my computer to see next year's School Improvement Plan. Now ... the day before, I had changed my screensaver to the one which sends random photographs from the computer slowly across the screen. I was aware of the group staring silently at the computer as I was trying to explain our bid for new Foundation Stage outdoor provision;not one of them seemed to be listening! "Hmmm," I mused. "This lot aren't making the best impression on me!" I turned and followed their gaze. Oh how sad I was to see the screen filled with the photo of Mary and I on 'Children In Need' day, Mary dressed as Maria Von Trapp and me dressed as the Mother Superior. So, I quickly and forcefully said, "Yes, and we like to raise funds for charity ... "
What do you think? Have I got away with it?

Scan results and CEA results on Tuesday. Will Blog again next week.

Update ...

Well, there are new hurdles I'm afraid. My blood test that came back on Wednesday has shown that my CEA level, which had doubled between January and March, has doubled again. It was 17 when I was first diagnosed but is now 100. Not good. The oncologist is holding off putting me on heavy chemo for another three weeks, during which I will be scanned because he is concerned that it is all kicking off (my phrase, not his). I will also have more blood tests at that point. Wouldn't it be good if my scan showed stability and my blood tests revealed a decreasing CEA level? (... prayer hint) I feel okay at the moment - pain levels increasing a little but I am not on the full quota of painkillers yet and day to day life is normal.

Unfortunately, a girl at Martha's school who is in Martha's year has just lost her mum to liver cancer. The penny has dropped with Martha that these things do happen and we have had a few troubled conversations. It is very difficult, trying not to be evasive but also trying to shield her, at least for the moment, from the raw facts. If I go onto the heavier chemo and end up looking like Keith Richards' older brother we might just have to be a little more open about things. Naomi, thankfully, is too caught up with Andrew Lloyd Webber's search for the new Nancy and Oliver to notice much at the moment. As for Joel ... as long as he has Shreddies and Thomas The Tank Engine in his life, everything is okay.

On a positive note, I am off to London tonight to read poetry and I have another reading next weekend up her in Pocklington. It's a great distraction for me, and I love doing them. And, what with a couple of meetings at Betty's tearoom already in the diary for next week, life is looking a bit brighter!

I will let you know the scan results. Thanks for visiting the blog.

The Latest ...

Waitings rooms are not good places, and it is fair to say that Mary and I sat in the Cancer Unit feeling about as comfortable as Heather Mills at a Beatles convention. The news really isn't great, although there are a few positives. The postives are that the tumours on my lungs have decreased in size very slightly and that my liver is also clear. However, the main tumours in my pelvis have been untouched by the chemo. More worrying is the fact that my CEA level is much higher than expected and high enough to cause the oncologist concern. The CEA test measures the level of activity of the disease and so it is reasonable to assume that things are kicking off a bit, and that it is going to take much stronger chemo to contain it. That said, we are going to continue with the current regime (and the painkillers) until either things get too painful, or the tumours spread. At that point, I will go onto the 'combination chemo' which, sadly, is almost inevitably going to cause me problems.

So, what to pray for, for those of you who believe in it? I really want this chemo that I am continuing with to suppress the disease for a good few months. This is unlikely due to my CEA level, but then I guess that's why we are praying for it. If I can get through the summer before they bring out the 'big guns' then there will be a new deputy in place at school, and I am going to feel a lot better when I have to leave work during the treatment (which is likely).

The oncologist asked which parts of life I would want to reserve energy for, in the event of going onto the new treatment. I think he anticipated my reply about being able to get out and about with the family and I am sure he was waiting for me to refer to 'managing to work part-time.' However, he looked bemused when I added, " ... doing poetry readings and getting to Betty's tearoom." Each to their own.

And so I leave you with a photo of Naomi and I taken last summer ... a reminder that we, as a family, have been saved from horribly bleak circumstances in the past (see A Decade Of Naomi, posted on 21.6.07).

Two Poems, Not About Illness!

Brace yourselves for a change in topic ... two poems on the subject of travelling with eyes shut, one about Joel and one about me. You'll be glad to know that the journey during which I travelled with my eyes shut didn't involve me driving...

Tuesday is the big consultation at the hospital ... scan results that will show the effects, if any, of the chemo. I will post an update later this week.

Thanks for checking the blog. Hope you like these ...





Eyes Shut On A Fast Train


Passing open fields,
a wash of sunset soaking
through, bathing my eyes.

Trees, bridges, pylons.
The neon starts to flicker.
A loose connection?

Buildings gather round.
Black sticks beat a fast rhythm.
A pulse starts to race.

A tunnel. (So soon?)
Dark. The staircase to bed. The
last glimpse of a film.





Shadows

Sliding from the dashboard
over your legs, waist, chest.
Hands can’t swat or trap
the black ghosts
rushing for your face.
They won’t hurt me!
Won’t hurt me!

Trying to peel them off
you haul the zip beneath your chin.
But they'll only find your jumper,
T-shirt,
skin.

You strain against the seatbelt,
jerking at every black burst
on clenched eyelids
until, at last, a queue lets me reach
for the travel blind.

Go to sleep,
because our direction will change;
the sun is moving round.

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No Sleep 'Til Kettering ...

Strands of sunshine eventually force their way through the gap between the curtains of my room. Morning. London is quiet, too quiet. It must be early. I get up and look out the window, pleased to see the sun softening the patchwork of tiled Victorian roofs. In the kitchen, teabags are being dropped into cups as a kettle reaches boiling point. I head down the stairs and take my place at the table. Soon Cole appears, clearly having wakened only seconds before. He has never looked less like his promotional photo on the flier. We exchange a glance as we both reach for the Frosties. We know it's the last day of the tour ... Kettering awaits us. Soon we would be driving away from The Smoke, turning our backs on our opening night (twelve hours before, but it felt more like fifteen.) The M1 ... diet Coke ... Ginster's Buffet Bars ... queing for fuel.
For those about to rhyme ... we salute you!
The shortest tours are often the best, in my experience.

This is a quick post just to say a big thank you to my very good friends in Kettering for turning out in droves and supporting us last Saturday at the poetry reading. It was a great experience for Cole, Martin and myself, but perhaps especially for me as it reminded Mary and I of your loyalty and support. Invaluable! Thank you! It will be one of those memories that I look back on for a very long time.

Thanks also to St. Luke's, Holloway for a great evening on the Friday night. Again, kind people with encouraging words. Let's hope we can do it again sometime.

I think I might accidentally have just written a poem that isn't about illness. I am a bit taken aback myself. When I get it right, I'll post it on the blog, just to give us all a break ...

44 and not counting ...

Birthday Celebrations


I am just about to finish the third chemo cycle out of four. (The routine is for me to have chemo for two weeks and then to have a week’s break so that my body can recover; this happens four times.) My visits to the hospital have been quite encouraging and blood tests suggest that my kidney and liver function is normal and also that my white blood cell count is high enough for me to fight off infection. I have to say that to the surprise of many (including myself) I am feeling really well. The skin on my hands and feet has started to peel a bit (lovely image, I know) but other than that … fine! What is even more encouraging is that I have now been completely off pain-killers for over a week. Until I started chemo I was absolutely dependant on them, so it is a good result indeed. So what is the reward for my stamina and resilience? Well, the doctors have decided to increase my period of chemo from three months to six if I remain well until mid-march, which is when the fourth cycle ends. We still face the harsh reality of the disease being in my pelvis, lungs and bones and I guess that has prompted the decision. Anyway, if this very tolerable chemo regime slows the cancer’s progress, then we are happy and very grateful. A scan in March will confirm the effect of the treatment

And so to family news. I’m sure it will surprise none of you that Mary is in the village panto. She is playing the part of a degenerate buffoon … something she has been able to observe at close quarters for almost twenty years. Naomi and Martha are also in it which leaves Joel and I free for a quick visit to Scotland this weekend. On the national theme, Scottish poet Ronnie Kerr and I enjoyed two readings in and around York last weekend. They were well supported by kind people who had nice things to say. A big ‘thank you’ to them. The tour continues with Cole Moreton and Martin Wroe, and we are visiting St. Luke’s Church, Holloway, London on 15th February and Christ The King Church, Kettering on 16th February. I have a reading in Paris later on in March (he dropped casually … you see I really will go anywhere, even after the weekend’s rugby) and two booked for April ...Bristol and Northwood, London.

Well I will bid you farewell on this first day of Lent. Have you given anything up? On the radio this morning a bishop was suggesting that rather than giving something up (negative overtones and all that) we should consider taking something up instead. Good advice, and so I have started shoplifting.

Thanks as always for visiting the blog and for your support.

Almost Half Way ...

Belated New Year wishes! I hope that you had a good celebration wherever you were at the time and that the return to normal life has been bearable for you. We had a great time over the season, with my brother Simon coming down from Scotland and my brother Phil and family coming over from Paris. We are all back to school now and reminding ourselves every morning that the nights are getting shorter.

This is just a brief post to update you on the chemo. Many of you have been kind enough to email and enquire. I will be half-way through the pill taking on Friday, and then there will be a week's break from the pills which will take me to half way through the whole treatment. For those of you who have been praying that I get away lightly in terms of the long list of side-effects, keep going! It's working. I can honestly say that, other than tiring quickly in certain circumstances, I am free from any side-effects. (This is all against the back-drop of the hopsital recommending that I stop taking the chemo three days before Christmas so that I had energy to enjoy the day with the children ... ie. it is surprising.)

So what's ahead? I am really looking forward to doing some 'living room' poetry readings with some very talented friends. Two readings booked for York, one for London, one for Kettering and another due to be booked for London later in March. They are great fun to do and very cathartic for me, so if you haven't invited me to read in your living room ... why?! As well as that, Mary and I are escaping to the Lake District for another child-free weekend away. Oh joy! Kind brother Phil is heading over to look after our cherubs. He is seriously building up treasure in heaven. Talking of which, Joel has just started saying "Oh dear," at the top of the stairs which means that he has done something regrettable that will probably cause his mother and I to be perturbed for an hour or two ... like last Wednesday when he somehow managed to empty a bathful of water onto the bathroom floor and through our kitchen ceiling. When I made it up the stairs and was treading water in the bathroom, looking him in the eye as he sat in the empty bath, he furrowed his brow and said, "Cold ... "
Yep, live and learn, son.