I’m getting there. Incrementally. By next week I should be raring to go for the next dose. Fingers and toes crossed.

I don’t know what I’m so impatient about – I’m halfway through my doses of ipi. Once they are done, I will have a twelve week wait until my next scan. Twelve. Weeks. I can predict a return to violent nail-biting, stress-eating, or perhaps, if I’m able to rise above and feeling up to it, a return to the gym to keep myself from going insane.

It’s a time of transformations for me – personally, but also professionally. After leaving my library job to stay home with my kid (now kids) seven years ago, I didn’t think it would be a huge deal to slide right back in to a similar job. I laugh at that notion now. Ruefully. I’ve applied to countless jobs, had very few interviews, and no happy endings. This may be the end of the road for me, as far as full-time librarianship.

A few weeks ago, a friend dropped an opportunity in my lap to do some translation work from Italian for a video production house. I was excited, as I’d been trying forever to figure out how to break into a field that seems to be dominated by very skilled self-promoters who seem to have all these official certifications which I lack. And I’d been hoping to find work I could do from home. And suddenly, here I was, sitting in my living room (not in PJs, I’m not that far gone yet) and doing interesting, fun, PAID work. And they like my work and are sending more and I may be getting a credit in the show. That’s the most satisfying thing to happen for me and my brain in a long time.

Last night I attended a workshop on getting a nonfiction book proposal together – another way for me to open a new channel. I’m pretty happy with this blog so far, but it’s purely situational right now, and there are a number of other topics I hope to take a longer view on as far as cancer goes. A longer view than the one from my navel – which isn’t quite as ripped as the one above… yet.