I had a glorious Mother’s Day. There was a lot of chocolate at the beginning of it. I was shaking after a bit, and it wasn’t steroid withdrawal. You gotta do what you gotta do. I ate all the chocolate. My double cappuccino was decaf. Thank you J, Young J, Young A, for making it a perfect day.

It became a less perfect day when we headed out to the campsite where the kids will be going to day camp this summer, for an open house, and after 90 minutes Young J’s seasonal allergies flared to crisis mode. I’d been having such a good time with Young A (they split the group by age), watching him run around with kids he knew from school and kids he didn’t know yet. I introduced myself to the proprietor of a cafe chain that J and I very much enjoy, and praised his decaf beans effusively. (His kid is going to same camp.)

When we reunited with J and Young J, my heart sank and my head started hurting and it was all referred pain. Isn’t that what it’s called? I was in physical pain for my son. I never had seasonal allergies. J did, as a kid, and keeps insisting to Young J that he just keep his hands behind his back and not rub his eyes. That isn’t exactly working, or comforting. I wish I could do some kind of voodoo shit, squirt breastmilk in his eye (none left), find some magic herb that would make it all better. He’s got continual nosebleeds from the antihistamines we give him, drying him out. I’ve got to do better. My week is pretty wide open. I will fix this for you, Young J. Because I’ve got the cancer in the brain under good control, actually. And I looked at the Weather Channel’s seasonal allergy forecast for the next three days and it makes me want to keep you home from school and under the shower constantly. My poor, sweet love.

In other, happier news we celebrated J’s grandfather’s 103rd birthday yesterday, and the celebrations keep getting more and more over-the-top awesome. I think he was exhausted by it, but we certainly had fun. Our family wrote him a song cataloging events from the year he was born (yes, we mentioned the Titanic in passing). J’s cousin’s family went over the top with a gifting to all in attendance of foods that have been around since 1912. I couldn’t believe the variety. From Morton’s Salt to Hellman’s Mayo to Goo Goo Clusters (which they ordered specially from Nashville) to Life Savers to jellied cranberry sauce. It was a panoply of 103-year-old treats. I wondered if the SunMaid raisin girl and the Morton Salt Girl maybe knew each other.

Also my brother G announced a project yesterday which will earn him his own blog post this week. It’s something awesome, generous, and will be very exciting to the people involved. More to come when I figure out how to write about it anonymously!

To give a new reader the sense of the range of this blog, I’ll leave you with a few cultural tidbits to chew over.

I thought of this Emily Dickinson poem tonight. And I like that I thought of it. If you are the type of reader to read a line like “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” and start freaking out because the person who suggested you read it has cancer in the brain right now – then perhaps it is not for you. If you like to think metaphorically, enjoy.

And now I’ll leave you with two YouTube supercuts as bookends to my state of mind just over three weeks ago, contrasted with my current state of mind.

April 15:

May 10:

It’s been that kind of time. I have no doubt things will continue along the Owen Wilson/WOW path. Because that’s immunotherapy for you.

The other day I ran into my neighbor R who’d been in the dark about my entire ordeal for the past two years, and she was the perfect person to tell this story to. She was jaw-droppingly amazed by what I had to tell her about my treatment plan. So, I think, still, am I.

PS I briefly considered tonight getting some cheap business cards printed up because giving out the address of this blog is getting tiresome. Some phones autocorrect it to “lillies”. I need to move it over to my newly registered domain (thanks and smooches to J), but I did for a second think of using this free design: