Time away from the routine

For two days I get to escape the routine of driving to the oncology center.  I try to lose myself in basketball games, in car shows on TV, in music, but like a ghost in the night it waits around the corner.  I have this new appendage to my body now and it hangs from my hip. Cancer even forces you to go backward in fashion trends. I have a fanny pack and in that pack I have a chemo pump.  It talks to me every now and then sounding like it is ejecting a DVD from a player.  It sighs and goes back to sleep. If I spring a leak I have an outfit which resembles a hazmat outfit and I must wear it to cleanup the mess. It is that toxic.  It is cumbersome to shower and makes you appreciate your freedoms that much more.  Sleep should come to me easily, at least I thought it would, but its like having a big pad of drawing paper and no pencils.  The littlest memories come back from years ago. Hardly significant, but none the less memories. I've noticed lately that my house breathes at night. It sighs and cracks and pops, and then goes quiet.  I think about the ninety year old lady that lives next door who has macular degeneration and how lonely she must be by herself.  She was the first to welcome us when we moved in.  I remember the days when we first got married and you couldn't put even a piece of paper between us when we slept, it was the touch of love and it reassured us that we were safe from harm. As we age we allow such stupid things to get between us. Things like snoring, and it's to warm,  and on and on.  We become comfortable, we finish each others sentences, we know what food to buy when we shop. Better get those Claussen pickles, no other will do.  I remember our first few months of marriage when I was stationed at MacDill Air Force base in Tampa.  We lived in a one bedroom apartment, second floor, no air conditioning, and only a tiny fan to cool us.  We were dirt poor because Air Force pay seldom makes one financially secure.  My wife worked at a Dairy Queen to make a few extra dollars. We saved our pennies so we would have gas to drive to Clearwater Beach each weekend.  That was our escape from reality.  I hadn't thought about those memories for years but now they seem so much clearer, so much more important, not so trivial any longer.