Everyone that completes the proton treatment is offered the opportunity to say how the treatment was for them for the benefit of those starting the process. I think that 6 other guys completed their procedures today. This is what I said:
If God isn’t in this place, he has to be pretty darn close. With the care and attitude of everyone here; the techs, the office staff, and basically everyone, they’re the best. They made a difficult situation very doable and they were always very professional. Thank you.
Isn’t Psalms the book of thanksgiving? Don’t worry what I have to say it’s only slightly longer! Not really.
If I seem a little giddy it’s because it’s my very last day. Since this is my last day, yes, you can imagine….my sphincter muscle is doing flip-flops it‘s so excited..
Before I started this journey I didn’t even know I had a prostate.
But, now that I think about it, I know just the day the biology instructor was talking about it. It was the day that he pulled a cadaver out of a drawer and said something like, “Today we’re going to learn internal body parts by taking them out and replacing them from Max here, our resident cadaver.” I remember raising my hand and saying “Excuse me, but I’m feeling a little queasy, I don’t want to end up prostrate on the floor, I think I need to go weigh myself.”
I distinctly remember the scale didn’t work very well, and I didn’t come back until the next day. Yes, I’m sure that was the day he said something about where a prostate is at.
After the doctor was done with my prostate biopsy and I was walking out bow-legged after the procedure, I was sure I would never forget where my prostate was located. I, like you, probably looked like a drunken cowboy who had just got off his horse when I walked out of his office.
A “digital exam” doesn’t quite tell the entire story. You can bet, when the doctor says “pucker up” you ain’t gonna get a kiss.
Call me a pansy, but I really think that they should put you out for things like this, since they do it for a colonoscopy.
Or, at least offer you the option of laughing gas, because it sure isn’t a laughing matter to begin with, and you should at least be able to end up that way.
By the way, I’m getting a great tan. Unfortunately it’s only about the size of my prostate and it’s only on each hip.
In closing, the only thing lacking here is a T-shirt to remember the experience. Something like, “The end is always near with proton therapy.” I’m sure the techs could come up with a million great sayings. Thank you.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
My 45th and last proton treatment is tomorrow!
I’ve endeavored to acknowledge all the kindnesses I have received since being here receiving proton treatment for prostate cancer. If I haven’t, please consider this as a general ‘Thank you” to all that took the time to show your care, concern, compassion, support, and empathy. You’ve exhibited the ‘Golden Rule.’ I hope I can return the gestures.
Thanks for all the well-wishes, cards, books, magazines, e-mails, letters, cookies, and phone calls. It made my time down here much more enjoyable and helped to pass the time. Oddly enough, depression is a possible side-effect of this type of therapy. Just about the time I’d be feeling down someone would always manage to pick my spirits up. It forever changes how I will deal with others that are dealing with a life-threatening experience, especially when they’re away from family.
Having treatment at a hospital is a real wake-up call to the frailty of life, especially having treatments in the evening when the only entrance that’s open makes me walk by body bags of people that, for whatever reason, completed their experience here. It’s a sobering experience and forced me to be more introspective. Also, hearing the helicopters delivering trauma patients is a constant reminder that someone always has it worse than me.
I’m just glad that the time here is almost over, and I can go back to my real life.
Thanks again,
Jim
Thanks for all the well-wishes, cards, books, magazines, e-mails, letters, cookies, and phone calls. It made my time down here much more enjoyable and helped to pass the time. Oddly enough, depression is a possible side-effect of this type of therapy. Just about the time I’d be feeling down someone would always manage to pick my spirits up. It forever changes how I will deal with others that are dealing with a life-threatening experience, especially when they’re away from family.
Having treatment at a hospital is a real wake-up call to the frailty of life, especially having treatments in the evening when the only entrance that’s open makes me walk by body bags of people that, for whatever reason, completed their experience here. It’s a sobering experience and forced me to be more introspective. Also, hearing the helicopters delivering trauma patients is a constant reminder that someone always has it worse than me.
I’m just glad that the time here is almost over, and I can go back to my real life.
Thanks again,
Jim
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Full really does mean Full this week!
Oh, great! I go to Death Valley National Park last week, pay my $20, and this week they’re opening the park up to free admission. In fact, they’re opening all the National Parks up to free admittance. Maybe I’ll NEED to go to Joshua Tree National Park again.
Since it really is my last weekend here I wanted to do something that I’ve been putting off. When Sandi was here we drove over to Palm Springs and drove up to the Palm Springs Tram. We didn’t go up as we hadn’t prepared for the cooler weather at the top of the mountain. Then we drove over to Joshua Tree National Park where even though it is a desert environment it was cold and snowed on us. The huge rocks, seemingly out of place were amazing.
Geologists believe that the rocks now on the surface were molten many years ago. The rocks developed vertical cracks through ground water percolating down. With a combination of tectonic pressure moving the rocks up ward and the natural weathering of erosion through wind and water the rocks are silent sentinels to the naturals processes of nature. I had to see both places again.
The Palm Springs Tramway goes through 5 biomes starting in a desert biome all the way up to an alpine biome. It was 80* at the bottom and 50* at the top. I went prepared with long pants, hoodie, heavy jacket but was overdressed for the temperature at the top. It was a beautiful clear day with end of the season snow at the top. The area reminded me of a number of places; Lassen Park, south end of the GO Road, Hooper Peak. You could really see and feel the coming of spring and the change of seasons. I walked south down a snow-covered mountain meadow away from the people until I ran out of the tracks of previous people and couldn’t hear any visitors. All I could hear were the sounds of silence, the birds calling out to each other and the squirrels arguing with each other. It was one of those quiet and yet excitingly calming experiences.
I drove to Joshua Tree National Monument and saw that upon entering the park there was a sign posted that said ‘All Campgrounds Full.’ I had hoped that since I had arrived about 3:00 PM there may be some sites still available, but such was not the case. Since the park is a relatively small park with only about 25 miles of roads it’s pretty quick to drive through. I stopped at as many informational signs as I could and got out and walked around at both promising and unpromising spots, all beautiful and intriguing. Driving through all the campgrounds I found out that “All Campgrounds Full” really meant it. I guess other people heard about the ‘Free National Park Week’ too. What do you expect when there are about a zillion people living within a 100 miles of here. The last time we were here there weren’t any flowers blooming as it was too cold. This time there were some small cactuses with red flowers were blooming.
Since it really is my last weekend here I wanted to do something that I’ve been putting off. When Sandi was here we drove over to Palm Springs and drove up to the Palm Springs Tram. We didn’t go up as we hadn’t prepared for the cooler weather at the top of the mountain. Then we drove over to Joshua Tree National Park where even though it is a desert environment it was cold and snowed on us. The huge rocks, seemingly out of place were amazing.
Geologists believe that the rocks now on the surface were molten many years ago. The rocks developed vertical cracks through ground water percolating down. With a combination of tectonic pressure moving the rocks up ward and the natural weathering of erosion through wind and water the rocks are silent sentinels to the naturals processes of nature. I had to see both places again.
The Palm Springs Tramway goes through 5 biomes starting in a desert biome all the way up to an alpine biome. It was 80* at the bottom and 50* at the top. I went prepared with long pants, hoodie, heavy jacket but was overdressed for the temperature at the top. It was a beautiful clear day with end of the season snow at the top. The area reminded me of a number of places; Lassen Park, south end of the GO Road, Hooper Peak. You could really see and feel the coming of spring and the change of seasons. I walked south down a snow-covered mountain meadow away from the people until I ran out of the tracks of previous people and couldn’t hear any visitors. All I could hear were the sounds of silence, the birds calling out to each other and the squirrels arguing with each other. It was one of those quiet and yet excitingly calming experiences.
I drove to Joshua Tree National Monument and saw that upon entering the park there was a sign posted that said ‘All Campgrounds Full.’ I had hoped that since I had arrived about 3:00 PM there may be some sites still available, but such was not the case. Since the park is a relatively small park with only about 25 miles of roads it’s pretty quick to drive through. I stopped at as many informational signs as I could and got out and walked around at both promising and unpromising spots, all beautiful and intriguing. Driving through all the campgrounds I found out that “All Campgrounds Full” really meant it. I guess other people heard about the ‘Free National Park Week’ too. What do you expect when there are about a zillion people living within a 100 miles of here. The last time we were here there weren’t any flowers blooming as it was too cold. This time there were some small cactuses with red flowers were blooming.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
The Valley of Death
Since I had only two weekends left here I wanted to go see Death Valley on one of them. I'd heard that the wildflowers may be in bloom in the early spring. I'd hoped that Sandi and I could have made the trip while she was here, but it’s really too long of a trip for one day. It’s farther than I had thought it was. It’s about a 4-½ hour trip from Loma Linda and about 8-½ hours from Sacramento.
I called Andrew about some things I should see there and what to do since he‘s been there before. The first thing he said was to get a campsite ahead of time. As this was Saturday morning and I was leaving in about 20 minutes there really wasn’t much time left. I got on the Death Valley National Park web site and tried to reserve a spot. No luck. As soon as I arrived there I went to the first campground I saw at Furnace Creek with trees and asked about any tent sites even though the reader board said the campground was full. (“Does Full really mean full?“) The temp was about 70* and the wind was pretty gusty to put it mildly. Standing in front of a sandblaster would be a more apt description. There weren’t any tent sites only one regular campsite with a picnic table. As I was soon to find out, there was a reason it was vacant.
The wind was blowing…hard. I was hoping that as the evening came on the winds would diminish. I decided to go to the Visitor Center to get a map showing the sites nearby. I then drove north along the lake and stopped to walk down to see how salty it really was. I parked the car along the road and walked toward the lake. The closer I got the farther away the lake moved. On the way down I saw that the shore was covered with this crystalline snow-like substance. The ‘lake’ turned out to be salt and borax crystals. It was neat, eerie, and awe-inspiring. Just about every creek, mountain, road, or trail’s name is related to two things, death or heat; Fire Mountain, Sweltering Road, No Water Creek, Skeleton Bend, Inferno Trail. You get the impression that a lot of people have died here.
I continued driving north and stopped at as many monuments and informational turnoffs as I could. There was one called Salt Creek just off the road. There is an actual creek that flows into the valley with a boardwalk along the creek where you can view some small desert pupfish fish that live in the creek. The water is so salty that these are the only types of organisms that can inhabit it. In fact, it is 5 times as salty as the ocean. I didn’t test that, I just believed what the brochure said. It’s kind of amazing as Death Valley is a closed system in that there are not any water outlets that flow to the ocean. They geologists believe that at one point after the Ice Age it was a lake that had an outflow into what we call today the Colorado River. The lake was called Manley Lake. The water that is lost is lost through evaporation and seepage.
One of the places that I wanted to see was the ‘Racetrack.’ That’s where there are rock tracks in the dry lake floor that appear to be from the rocks having been pushed, but no one has ever seen it. Anyway, it looks neat, but it meant driving on a gravel road for 26 miles. The road guidelines recommend that RVs and cars should not take the road. This has made me rethink about what kind of RV to get. I think we should get a van or a pickup capable of carrying a camper. I think that this trip will have to wait for when Sandi is here as I do think it warrants another visit.
Instead, I stopped at Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes. The wind at the dunes was calm, and I hoped that the wind was diminishing back at the campground. I walked out on the dunes and took a bunch of pictures. When I got back to the campground the wind seemed to have picked up. It was on toward dusk so I decided to try to set the tent up. I would wait until the wind died down a little then I would do one step of the process. About the time I got the tent spread out ready to put the poles in the wind came up again. I sat down on the tent and felt like I was on a bucking bronco with the tent flapping around me. When the wind died down again I hurriedly threaded the poles in and managed to get one side up. About that time the wind gusted up again and I felt like a piece of laundry on the clothesline for about 5 minutes until it calmed back down. When it calmed back down I looked like a piece of dirty laundry. I finally got the tent set up and threw everything from the car into the tent in hopes that it wouldn’t blow away and end up in Las Vegas. I would have tied the tent to the car, but I wouldn’t have wanted to wake up in the night after finding out the car had been pulled over on me.
After I had everything in the tent I broke out the camp stove and boiled some water to make some macaroni and cheese. The water had just about reached a boil when a big gust of wind blew it off the stove onto the ground. I finally got some water heated up after rigging up a wind block from the only box I hadn’t put into the tent. It was a long night with the poles of the tent making ditches in the ground from being swept around all night. I managed to wedge myself in between all the boxes, bags, and crates that I had thrown in there. From the outside I’m sure the tent looked like a flattened lumpy tarp with just the shape of my nose outlined all night like a rudder cutting the wind. Now I know how Dorothy from ‘The Wizard of Oz’ must have felt. I even think I saw a dog that looked something like Toto go sailing by.
Sunday morning finally came and the wind was still blowing. I wrapped the tent up and threw it into the back of the car and drove over to the store to buy some coffee. I drove north again stopping at some places I had missed the afternoon before. I ended up at a place called Mosaic Canyon. It is a colorful marble canyon cut by water, dirt, and gravels that have washed down from the peaks above. It’s neat because it is smoothly polished from the action of the rock. There is a place to stop ¼ mile in and then there’s a place to stop 1-½ miles in. I walked up all the way and it was worth every drop of sweat doing it. By the way, I thought of a good money maker or at least a way to pay for traveling. Walk to the end of a trail like this with a case of cold beer. Sell beer for $5 apiece and be everyone’s hero. Win win for everyone!
Anyway, it was a good trip, and I’m glad that I did it. I did manage to collect a few neat rocks. The car probably looked like a dog scratching his bum as I drove down the freeway with the headlights seemingly on permanent high beam.
Did I mention that the wind blows that the wind blows 24/7 at Death Valley?
A link to the pictures. Click on the pic.
I called Andrew about some things I should see there and what to do since he‘s been there before. The first thing he said was to get a campsite ahead of time. As this was Saturday morning and I was leaving in about 20 minutes there really wasn’t much time left. I got on the Death Valley National Park web site and tried to reserve a spot. No luck. As soon as I arrived there I went to the first campground I saw at Furnace Creek with trees and asked about any tent sites even though the reader board said the campground was full. (“Does Full really mean full?“) The temp was about 70* and the wind was pretty gusty to put it mildly. Standing in front of a sandblaster would be a more apt description. There weren’t any tent sites only one regular campsite with a picnic table. As I was soon to find out, there was a reason it was vacant.
The wind was blowing…hard. I was hoping that as the evening came on the winds would diminish. I decided to go to the Visitor Center to get a map showing the sites nearby. I then drove north along the lake and stopped to walk down to see how salty it really was. I parked the car along the road and walked toward the lake. The closer I got the farther away the lake moved. On the way down I saw that the shore was covered with this crystalline snow-like substance. The ‘lake’ turned out to be salt and borax crystals. It was neat, eerie, and awe-inspiring. Just about every creek, mountain, road, or trail’s name is related to two things, death or heat; Fire Mountain, Sweltering Road, No Water Creek, Skeleton Bend, Inferno Trail. You get the impression that a lot of people have died here.
I continued driving north and stopped at as many monuments and informational turnoffs as I could. There was one called Salt Creek just off the road. There is an actual creek that flows into the valley with a boardwalk along the creek where you can view some small desert pupfish fish that live in the creek. The water is so salty that these are the only types of organisms that can inhabit it. In fact, it is 5 times as salty as the ocean. I didn’t test that, I just believed what the brochure said. It’s kind of amazing as Death Valley is a closed system in that there are not any water outlets that flow to the ocean. They geologists believe that at one point after the Ice Age it was a lake that had an outflow into what we call today the Colorado River. The lake was called Manley Lake. The water that is lost is lost through evaporation and seepage.
One of the places that I wanted to see was the ‘Racetrack.’ That’s where there are rock tracks in the dry lake floor that appear to be from the rocks having been pushed, but no one has ever seen it. Anyway, it looks neat, but it meant driving on a gravel road for 26 miles. The road guidelines recommend that RVs and cars should not take the road. This has made me rethink about what kind of RV to get. I think we should get a van or a pickup capable of carrying a camper. I think that this trip will have to wait for when Sandi is here as I do think it warrants another visit.
Instead, I stopped at Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes. The wind at the dunes was calm, and I hoped that the wind was diminishing back at the campground. I walked out on the dunes and took a bunch of pictures. When I got back to the campground the wind seemed to have picked up. It was on toward dusk so I decided to try to set the tent up. I would wait until the wind died down a little then I would do one step of the process. About the time I got the tent spread out ready to put the poles in the wind came up again. I sat down on the tent and felt like I was on a bucking bronco with the tent flapping around me. When the wind died down again I hurriedly threaded the poles in and managed to get one side up. About that time the wind gusted up again and I felt like a piece of laundry on the clothesline for about 5 minutes until it calmed back down. When it calmed back down I looked like a piece of dirty laundry. I finally got the tent set up and threw everything from the car into the tent in hopes that it wouldn’t blow away and end up in Las Vegas. I would have tied the tent to the car, but I wouldn’t have wanted to wake up in the night after finding out the car had been pulled over on me.
After I had everything in the tent I broke out the camp stove and boiled some water to make some macaroni and cheese. The water had just about reached a boil when a big gust of wind blew it off the stove onto the ground. I finally got some water heated up after rigging up a wind block from the only box I hadn’t put into the tent. It was a long night with the poles of the tent making ditches in the ground from being swept around all night. I managed to wedge myself in between all the boxes, bags, and crates that I had thrown in there. From the outside I’m sure the tent looked like a flattened lumpy tarp with just the shape of my nose outlined all night like a rudder cutting the wind. Now I know how Dorothy from ‘The Wizard of Oz’ must have felt. I even think I saw a dog that looked something like Toto go sailing by.
Sunday morning finally came and the wind was still blowing. I wrapped the tent up and threw it into the back of the car and drove over to the store to buy some coffee. I drove north again stopping at some places I had missed the afternoon before. I ended up at a place called Mosaic Canyon. It is a colorful marble canyon cut by water, dirt, and gravels that have washed down from the peaks above. It’s neat because it is smoothly polished from the action of the rock. There is a place to stop ¼ mile in and then there’s a place to stop 1-½ miles in. I walked up all the way and it was worth every drop of sweat doing it. By the way, I thought of a good money maker or at least a way to pay for traveling. Walk to the end of a trail like this with a case of cold beer. Sell beer for $5 apiece and be everyone’s hero. Win win for everyone!
Anyway, it was a good trip, and I’m glad that I did it. I did manage to collect a few neat rocks. The car probably looked like a dog scratching his bum as I drove down the freeway with the headlights seemingly on permanent high beam.
Did I mention that the wind blows that the wind blows 24/7 at Death Valley?
A link to the pictures. Click on the pic.
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| 4-11-10 Death Valley |
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