An "A" From Dr. LungLady

Life marches on…with you or without you…..life continues.  Our journey, while often a bit circuitous and bumpy, is at a good spot.

We went to see Marty’s lung doc and she gave Marty an “A”.  Marty swears to this minute she got an A+.  She was always a grade ho’.

It’s been months since we have seen Providence Hospital.  It hasn’t been a year but the last time we were there we were watching the Super Bowl, and its football season again (yeah).  

Better than that, better than not seeing Great and Wise on a bi-weekly basis, Marty feels good.  Sure there are fatigue issues, salivary duct issues, various snot and phlegm issues, but no major infections, nothing that has required emergency rooms or hospitals or antibiotics.  

It’s almost been good enough so I can breathe deep and lose those anxiety meds, naw; let’s not get crazy, I still need the tension in my life so I can feel normal.

Marty and I have been to countless movies, been to birthdays, celebrated her birthday in a big way and hung out at the lake for days on end.  We have sung songs, been to a wedding, laughed at each other and the oddities of our life.  We have seen our children and their children on a regular basis and celebrated their special days and their successes.

Said children, who are really adults now, though it’s hard for me to see that, are doing great.  They are all gainfully employed, well married and healthy with their own health insurance.  On the whole they like their chosen vocations get along with their mates and are living independently and oh, our baby daughter is pregnant with her 2^nd child and our 4^th grandchild.  Our cup truly runneth over and we have a big cup.  

Our grandkids are beginning to be functioning people and are starting various level of school and generally eager to go.  They are terminally cute, exceedingly smart and all three are what one might call precocious.  We like precocious in our family.

My parents are doing great, going and blowing and doing their thing.  We just celebrated their 86^th birthdays, sorry Mom; the word is out on your age.  They are healthy, able to do what they want to do, and in a word amazing, and in another word, inspiring.

I know, I know, this is starting to sound like your basic Christmas letter, my kids and my grandkids and even my parents are better than yours, nanna, nanna, boo, boo.  Sorry about that, this is short, deal with it.

There was a time in our most recent journey where it was hard to find the bright spots, where life seemed to be closing in on us and it felt like the aftermath of Marty’s strokes was oppressive and so over powering we could not live a rewarding life.

Marty is better, I am better at my job, we are both more accepting and so grateful for the hours, days and months of good health and favor.  

We used to have one of those kitschy signs in our kitchen that read, “When Momma ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.”  For us it should be, “When Momma feels good, we all feel good.”  

Today, Momma feels good, hey; she got an A from Dr. LungLady.

Pictures

Marty will be 60 this year on August 23.  Ten years ago 60 seemed a sure thing.  Nine years ago, after the first stroke 60 seemed possible but for the first time I had doubts.  Eight years ago after the 2^nd stroke, 60, for Marty, seemed doubtful.  

Marty will hit 60 in August and we are going to have a party.  We are going to have a big party to celebrate something amazing, a life continued.  I asked Marty if she wanted a party, she said she didn’t, I said too bad, this is a big deal.  She is on board now and helping with the guest list.

I’m not a party planner but I have picked a date (real hard in that Marty’s birthday lands on a Saturday), a venue, some food and I’m working on an invite list….you’re all invited….all of you.

I’m putting together a pictorial history of Marty for this thing and I’ve had a big time going through old and new photos.  I apparently used to be thinner.  The funny thing is I never thought it so, I always thought I was a bit chunky.  Not so.

Marty never thought she was very pretty but in looking at our photos she was wrong.  I look at all of these old pictures and I see who she once was and when stacked together with current photos you see the evolution, you clearly see the youth, the beauty, the years and the disease.

There’s the picture of the two year old Marty which looks remarkably like our two year old grand-daughter Emma.  There’s the picture of 2^nd grade Marty with the pixie hair cut and the 18 year old hot Marty with the short skirt.  The picture of Marty with her hair pulled back wearing my gray sweater sitting in front of a pile of books really takes me back to when we met.

The picture of Marty with a three day old Matt just blew me away.  I forgot about the photograph and I’m not sure I realized how beautiful it was.  There’s a picture of Marty with a one year Erin, a picture of Marty with Becky, a best friend,  in the desert outside of Las Vegas and several pictures of her with her chin resting in her right hand, a gesture that is and will always be a quintessential  Marty look.

There is a picture of Marty standing between our children with very short hair, with very little make-up; a scant five months after the first stroke almost took her life.  But, there she is standing there victoriously.  It shows a completely different life from the picture taken of her four months earlier, standing, a full head of hair, standing in the kitchen of friends, seemingly healthy and happy without any thought of what was to come.  Our lives shifted massively in the eight short months between photographs.

There are the whole family pictures, the holiday pictures, the snow skiing pictures, pictures in Spain, in London, with babies, with grandparents, all of the images running in a string of time.  All of them separately show a woman, all of them together show a story, a story of a life well lived, a story of a life well loved, a story of a full life, but most importantly a story that continues in spite of life itself.

I see in the pictures that separate what was normal and what is normal today.  I see in the pictures the fragility of life, I see in the pictures a woman who never thought she was very pretty but was and is actually beautiful in so many ways.   

It’s really a hell of a story, August 23^rd, be there.