ALMOST THERE

Hallo All,

Seems my "sneaky feeling" re more delays may turn out to be right, but from an unexpected corner: this time its me!  Last week went to Kings to sign consent forms for transplant - which required a brave heart let me tell you - not easy reading!  Had a routine blood test, only to discover that my counts had dropped quite considerably. So was required to undergo a further bone marrow test - just to check I have not already relapsed. You guys know the routine by now... lots of swearing and searing pain. Over reasonably quickly. Sore back for a day or two. I think I have had eleven in total since 2010.  Holey bones.  check this out...

The initial result was encouraging with no blast cells seen on the aspirate (thats blood from the bone marrow).  However will not be given the all clear until tomorrow (Friday) when the results from the actual bone marrow are known.  Meantime, last weekend I developed a large and unsightly "boil-on-the-bum" (as opposed to boil-in-the-bag) - I like to think I could get away with telling people it is on my lower back, but its fairly and squarely on my left hand buttock.  Oh lord, here starts the end of my dignity for the next few months.  I have been put on a high dose of antibiotics and given special dressings (hard to put on staring back-to-front in a mirror, with de-frosting shoulders to boot).  Further blood tests saw the counts going up again at the end of last week - hurrah! And then dropping back down again yesterday - boo!  Talk about a roller coaster ride. I am just hoping that low counts are due to antibiotics and nothing more sinister. Rock n' roll.

Good news, if I can call it such (to be honest, terrifying news) - is that cords have now undergone all virology testing and have passed with flying colours. So, as I tip-tap on here, there is a metal box, stored in liquid nitrogen, being loaded onto a plane somewhere out west. Idaho sounds romantic. Kentucky rhymes with Lucky. Who knows what state they are coming from.  But we all know where they are going to.  And lets hope the trip will be worth it.  I guess I will never know the donors.  But I wonder about them.  Have they started to crawl yet, cut their first teeth, spoken their first word?  Perhaps they can already build wooden play bricks one on top of the other,  bang saucepan lids loud on the kitchen floor and turn pages of a bedtime story.  I wonder if they like Where the Wild Things Are.  I feel like Max sometimes. Sailing away to some unknown land full of roaring stamping beasts with terrible claws and terrible teeth.  I hope I manage to contain them as well as Max did. And make it home safely for supper.

Whoops, that was a bit of a wander...

So, providing bone marrow is ok, and antibiotics do the trick, I should be on the starting blocks again. Hickman line goes in on Monday. My room is allocated on Tuesday. First chemo administered on Wednesday. But there have been many false starts to this treatment, so until I am actually in hospital nothing is certain.  Luigi comes home tomorrow. Thats for sure.

Skyfall was great. Loved all the London stuff - Vauxhall Bridge, MI6 building, Aston Martin in a Peckham lock-up. Bronze exhibition was fascinating.  The big highly decorative statues don't really do it for me. Horse and sun chariot was exquisite - circa 1400 bc. Amazing. My west country visit was cancelled.  Lots of rain put pay to that. Wet railway lines and too many ducks paddling on the highway.  Sad not to wander down to Watchet Harbour and catch a whisper of Atlantic breeze coming up the Bristol Channel.  Instead, I have been working in studio. Seeing near friends, calling distant ones.  Emails and texts flying in and out.  Dusting down and catching up. Gathering hugs by the bear load. Thanks to so many of you for your tenderness, caring and wonderful generosity.  If love and support was all I needed to get through these next few months, I would fly - no, I would warp-speed through (tempted to make a Mr Spock reference. But I won't).

Last night was another ice-white moon and diamond cut stars.  At midnight, I hung out of my bedroom window and breathed it all in. Down and deep. Wrapped myself in indigo blue. A bird was singing. A single note cutting through the dark cold air.

Back soon. tch xx