The Good Loser

I am a sore loser. Bet that was a surprise, yeah?

I won't beat cancer in the long haul, but I can win ugly every day 'till then, by accomplishing most of my goals (say, writing sonnets as blog comments) even if I am on my knees at nightfall.

Even if my skivvies are soiled, and there's blood on the floor.

Anything for the win.

Show me a good loser,

and a loser's all I see,

a goody-two-shoes poser,

and that is not for me.

You've got to fight the good fight,

and if you fail, just smile

Then go out in the dead of night,

catch a small crocodile.

Drag it, snarling, back to camp

and set it in the winner's bath,

drain the oil from washroom lamp

and prepare to laugh

as you hear a scream and splash

before nude hundred-metre dash.

Here's a fitting clip from Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is FAST. I'll be quick 

Skittering across the floor,

pirate-shouts, Avast!

Chihuahuas racing out the door;

short legs, but they move fast,

barking others from their way

as they madly race

to see what on this brand-new day

they are going to face

with hearts aflame and eyes afire;

a monster, maybe or a dragon?

Whatever, dude, it will retire

from Chichi's onslaught, tails a-waggin'!

Behold, there! Under grim duress,

it's the man from UPS!

Four minutes, under Chihuahua supervision.

Sylvia says that victory is ice cream. Can't argue with that.

He's Not Santa God

As for the telly, I only watch Trinity Broadcasting, bar the odd sporting event.

TBN has content that's quite good. Well, mostly.

There's still quite a bit of God repaying you in kind...give us money, and God will bless you with MORE money!

And...God wants you to be well. Illness isn't a physical problem, it's a SPIRITUAL problem (and for a love gift of $100, we'll show you how to activate your angels).

I can understand where these folks are coming from, and I do believe them to be sincere. But they are perilously close to turning God into a vending machine, or, worse, a kind of almighty Santa Claus.

The vending machine analogy makes God into something mechanical...put a penny in the slot, get your desire... but the St. Nick thing is way worse, because it implies that our actions can control God's behaviour.

I think that the reality is quite different.

We give to God, of our material wealth, or of our labour.

We receive strength and grace for the long journey home.

We want to be well, but wellness is not physical. It's peace with divine will, which purpose we know not, but which we choose to accept.

The metastasis in my left humerus has resulted in a fracture (don't ask how, I feel SO stupid!), and I have to move my left arm around with my right. As in, when I lays me down to sleep, I have to use the good arm to position the broken one on a supporting pillow.

But it's OK. The worse it hurts, the more I want to work hard, use my words as I can to soothe the pain in others.

Cancer has made me better than I thought I could ever be.

Cancer makes me want to hug the world.

And that, dear hearts, is recompense enough for all I have given, and lost.

Things may not be going well,

and life's fatally flawed,

but even at the gates of hell,

keep on praising God,

not like it's some mantra

that will help you escape,

rescued by a Santa

in a superhero cape.

Even as the flames lick high,

and you're marshmallow-on-a-stick,

do not pause to wonder why

God ain't like St. Nick...

just know and say before you fall,

"I am Yours, and You are all "

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is RUN. You're kidding, right, with pancreatic cancer? REALLY?

Ah, well.

Every day I got the runs,

and Imodium's my best friend,

for it isn't really fun,

what comes out the other end.

Diet sometimes seems to help

things from getting too darn runny,

but I then I'm giving out a yelp

and there I am, back in the dunny,

if, that is, I am in time

(no, I will not wear Depends!),

and thus the obligation's mine

to wash my briefs, as clean new friends,

and there is grateful thanks that's owed

that this is not a pay commode.

Three minutes. Must be my heart talking. Or something else.

Music from The Beach Boys, with Don't Worry Baby.

Sylvia's all for hugging the world in exchange for ice cream.

 

God's Colouring Book

There's a scene in one of the Star Wars movies where our heroes are stuck in a watery trash compactor, and Luke Skywalker says that it could be worse.

There's a beast-bellow from the muck, and Han Solo says, "It's worse."

And then a slimy tentacle pulls Luke underwater, and the fun begins.

Yeah, it's worse. My voice is taken, and there's another metastasis, this one on my left humerus, which, when, you think about it, my being right-handed, is really kinda funny. Geddit?

Seriously, I can't raise my arm above waist level, and trying to put on a shirt is... interesting.

But I can still count it all joy. Yes, it hurts, yes, it's limiting, but there's something of a liberation in the pain, and in this durance vile. I can see beyond what used to be so important, so very solid... all of my ambitions and hopes and dreams.

I'm not denigrating them. They were worthwhile, but now I see that the good in them, good I will not see fulfilled in this life, is but the lines in a colouring book, to be filled in by God.

And meanwhile...

 Chihuahuas running this-a-way,

Chihuahuas running that,

with them there is hell to pay,

if you are a cat.

Chihuahuas running kitty down,

oh, kitty-cat is trapped!

And then they imitate the clown,

and kitty now is rapt

to see them bouncing in their play,

rolling, now, and once again,

and kitty cannot see the way

that their waggy tails remain

attached to them, the game all through,

and tries a grab on one or two.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is DENY. Yeah, ok.

I would rather set aside,

and in point of fact deny

that I want to run and hide

from knowing that I'm soon to die.

I lie awake because of pain

that really truly will not stop,

and wonder how my mortal brain

can handle going o'er top

of the bar do ably writ

by poet-friend, Lord Tennyson,

how to smile, and be quit

of an earthly benison,

and letting go my hard-gripped rope

cast my soul upon Christ's hope.

Four minutes fifteen seconds. Maybe there's something to this one.

In respect to the science fiction intro, here's the funniest scene from any SF movie (it's from the underrated 'Star Trek Beyond').

Sylvia counts ice cream as all joy. Me too.

 

How Dry I Am

Ok, serious week. Two comas (defined as, "You were completely unresponsive.").

And huge setbacks in physical ability, like, hey, breathing.

So I won't be serious here. This is the time to get completely plastered, except that Josephus Daniels might not agree.

He was Secretary of the Navy from 1913 to 1921. He ordained that the Navy should be dry.

Yeah, well. Smuggle the booze past the Jimmy-legs, and let's go.

 Josephus Daniels, nasty man!

Josephus Daniels, why

did you have that evil plan

to keep the Navy dry?

A ship's a floating prison

inhabited by goats,

deserving the derision

of calling vessels 'boats',

and that's why the tradition

that Nelson understands

of granting kind permission

of tots to all the hands...

but, Josephus, you're a bum

for holding back our tot of rum!

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is EXPLORE. Let's explore that.

We have explored the question

of why the Navy's dry

at Daniels' cruel suggestion

that's echoed, my, oh, my

through a pair of global wars

and piping days of peace,

through each swabbie who ignores

this edict, to unease

of harassed division-head

responsible for conduct pure

of his men, but instead

of making double-sure

legality won't come a-cropper,

turns blind eye to the chain-locker.

Five minutes, and it is what it is.

Music from Jimmy Buffett, with Margaritaville.

Sylvia will have some rum-flavoured ice cream, thank you very much. So will I.

For Those Worse Off

I was feeling sorry for myself. It was kind of a bad week. Lots of pain, fatigue, internal bleeding that hasn't stopped yet, and something like a coma on Tuesday.

Then I heard about Bruce Willis. He's been diagnosed with aphasia (a disorder that affects communication, the use of language, and memory), is having cognitive issues, and has retired from acting. There are therapies; there's no cure.

Now, I don't know Mr. Willis personally, but I do think that one sees something of the man in the characters an actor portrays, and it's consistent with what little I've read about him. He's been said to be hard to work with. That's been said about me.

Maybe I should be thinking about people in Ukraine, or about starving African orphans ("Eat your broccoli! There are kids in Sudan who would be thrilled to have your dinner!"). But I don't know them. They're an abstraction.

And I don't know anyone personally who's got cancer, or something like it.

So, an actor. There's an illusion of familiarity that perhaps bespeaks something deeper. I don't know what it is, and couldn't define it if I did. But it's something that's true.

And so, I'm really, really sorry. And I am humbled; yes, I have cancer, yes, I am exhausted, in pain, and incontinent, but there are worse things in life, and Bruce Willis' family is going through that right now.

I thank God for the blessings in my life, with all my heart. 

I know that it seems terrible,

and it's all unjust;

but, my friend, be careful,

for one day you must

stand before the Throne of Grace,

relive your whole life through,

and here you will come face to face

with those worse off than you,

and tell God what you did and thought;

did you help with gentle care?

All the times when you could not,

did you hold them up in prayer,

or did you leave love on the shelf

and feel sorry for yourself?

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is COFFEE. Oh, joy.

Coffee used to be my thing,

I would drink eighteen cups a day,

never knowing it would bring

a time when there'd be hell to pay,

when I had gone out on a stroll

(do not smile, this isn't funny!),

and as guts began to roll

I was too far from a dunny,

but I did not want to soil

my pants, and let alone my pride,

so I bent to task and toil

that with God's grace I might hide

the subsequent wild anal blast

from all those who might have passed.

Five minutes flat. Deal with it.

Here's one of Bruce Willis' best, and most understated scenes, from RED 2.

Sylvia would share her ice cream with Mr. Willis, if she could.

 

Of This Life And The Next

I was watching Steven Furtik yesterday, and at one point he invited everyone who's afraid of snakes to raise a hand.

Then he said, "OK, now all of you with your hands raised, turn to your neighbour who didn't raise his hand, and ask him how it feels to be stupid."

Before cancer, I was afraid of it. Not so much of dying, because I lived an idiotically risky life, but of the pain, the weariness, the lost future, the shame of things like... sorry... incontinence.

Colour me stupid, but there was no reason for fear. The benefits have so far outweighed everything else!

I can touch the preciousness in each day, now, the clean scent of a fresh spring day, the magic white wonderland of a late snowfall, the songbird who picked up on the neighbour listening to "YMCA"...

And God is with me, in spirit and truth, through it all.

The joy, you see, comes from Him. Yes, there's pain and weariness and all that, but those are of this earth, this life. Temporal, and temporary.

It's not an "eyes fixed on Heaven" thing; it's a different quality of experience. And though the earthly experience still has the ability to hurt, it can't harm unless I allow it. The joy is deeper, richer, and while it doesn't banish the other, it makes what might have been intolerable something which can be borne.

 I am where the monsters are,

on mine own blood I choke.

It's all gone a bit to far,

it's beyond a joke,

and I should cower in dismay

in fear of what's ahead,

but somehow on this shattered day

I find something past dread,

for trial has given painful birth

to joy at last unflawed,

to show pain is of fallen earth,

but delight's been born in God,

and from this revelation's sprung

that laughter's Heaven's native tongue.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is SPRING, but since I have 'sprung' in the thirteenth line of the sonnet above, I will let it go like that. It says what I needed to say.

Oh, very well, a haiku.

He gave His life at winter's end

that spring might return to life

our Friend.

Have a good laugh, with Sylvia and the Village People. In The Navy! 

 

It's Fishy

Humour keeps me young, or at least immature (Barb vigourously nods head).

I long to play a bass guitar,
it is my fondest wish,

but among my questions are

how do you tune a fish,

and when one is playing scales

where does one begin?

All the way back at the tail,

or right up by a fin?

Because the stage is very warm,

and one needs a solid bridge,

the sensible pre-concert form

is to keep it in the fridge.

In my art I'll build my skill

and one day play 'longside Vince Gill.

Music, of course, from Brad Paisley, with I'm Gonna Miss Her.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is EASY, and I am too ill to do more than say that the only easy day was yesterday.

But..how about a haiku?

Was it easy

to roll away the stone

and let in the scent of spring?

Fish and chips and ice cream... Sylvia says Yummy!