I Think I Found the Cloud

First, the really good news: I’m out! I’m out of the hospital and on the road to recovery at home.

Sorry for the long delay before I write this update, but I’ve been waiting to see if my head would clear a little more. It doesn’t look like it will in the next few days (thanks to some very effective pain killing medication) so I’m going to give this a try. I just can’t wait any longer. It's understandable if some of this update doesn’t “esnesynaekam” to you. Just ignore that part.

Surgery finished, body all stitched up and stapled in the right places and minus several cancerous lymph nodes, I’m hoping it’s all the cancerous lymph nodes that are gone. But we won’t know that for sure until we talk to Dr. Granger, the surgeon who did the excavating. That will be on March 20^th at which time he will remove the 38 staples that are neatly decorating that part of my body.

I didn’t realize before I agreed to all this (as if I had a choice?) that I was actually signing up for body piercings. This thought only recently occurred to me, but I wonder if I now have some new tattoos down there too? I may or may not let you know later. Pictures are always optional.

Actually we have a lot of confidence in Dr. Granger and the other healthcare professionals that have been involved in caring for me. So we’re also confident that “all the bad stuff is gone” as my grandson Isaac puts it. The reports from the pathologist as well as from the PET and CT scans will all be available on the 20^th.

But about that cloud… Just after I got out of surgery around 5 PM on February 26^th Sharyn sent a short email to a few close friends to let them know that it was over, that I was out of the operating room and assured them that I was now breathing on my own (always a bright spot in a person’s day if you’ve already made plans for summer holidays). She told them I was now resting peacefully on cloud morphine. My friend Barry responded with a quick text message, “Sleep well on the cloud.” So I did.

It was Barry’s greeting that over the next five days in the hospital caused me to reflect a little on clouds.

I’m very familiar with use of “the cloud” in the context of computer technology. In fact all my personal and work data files as well as all my backups are in the cloud. I don’t know all the intricacies of how the technology works, but I’m a dedicated and grateful user of it.

From personal experience I know quite a bit about clouds that have silver linings behind them. The dark ones that leave me feeling like there’s no hope for a good outcome. Until at last I’m able to adjust my perspective (“perspectacles” as someone put it) and I discover that there is hope for a brighter, more positive outcome. What a marvelous view from the top of that cloud!

And I have some very recent experience with the kind of cloud resulting from the medicinal (i.e. legal) use of painkilling medication of the morphine and oxycodone variety.

And “cloud nine.” You’ve heard the term “cloud nine” to describe the place you are when you experience a feeling of pure bliss, where everything is going your way? Life is good right then. Cloud morphine produces similar feelings.

Now did you know that the origin of the term “cloud nine” has its roots in the original word for morphine? In the ancient Greek language, steeped in mythology, the word from which we now derive “morphine” is the same word used to describe a rather uncommon phenomenon where on a hot day in the Mediterranean, a series of nine cumulous clouds would line themselves up. Separated from any other cloud formation. Always just nine. The ancient Greeks used to consider this a sign that great personal fortune would soon be a part of their very near future. Interesting, huh? This relationship between cloud nine and cloud morphine? Both of them resulting in a very comforting, hopeful feeling. (Now if you believe anything I’ve just detailed in this paragraph about the relationship between cloud nine and morphine, then please contact me soon. I have a bridge that I’d like to sell you. London Bridge or Golden Gate. Your choice.)

There is a similarity between each of these kinds of clouds that I’ve described and it’s this. I don’t really know how they work, but I know they work. I can use the internet cloud to store all my computer data files without understanding how it works. I am able to enjoy the excitement and hope of peace that comes from discovering the silver lining behind the dark clouds without understanding how that works. And I can enjoy the relief from pain that’s brought on by the use of painkilling medication without understanding exactly how it’s interacting with my brain and body to be effective.

From each of these clouds I can gain new perspective. Take, for example, cloud morphine. From there it makes perfect sense:

• When my friend Chris explains that the initials DNA stand for the National Dyslexic Association.
• That my crazy aunt (I wrote about her in a previous blog update on January 10^th) should insist that there is a silver cloud behind every lining.
• That my uncle who lived on Vancouver Island with my crazy aunt (remember, he was the one who was deaf in one ear and couldn’t hear out of the other, most likely because of who he lived with) insisted that it was the Pacific Ocean on the left side of the island and the Atlantic on the right.
• When my six year old grandson, over whom I have never had any influence in the matter of really appreciating cats, told us one day when we were cleaning up from a chicken dinner and I had observed that perhaps we needed a dog to take care of the scraps, “You know what a dog’s favorite food is? Cats! Trust me.” Hmmm. Who would have known?

I appreciate all the advice and recommendations for clean living that I’ve received over the past few months. For example, the evening before my surgery last week I received an emailed recommendation for a cure and prevention from cancer. Apparently I should be drinking “golden milk” every day. I hadn’t heard of this remedy before. This stuff is made from a combination of turmeric, black pepper, almond milk and other strange ingredients probably only grown hydroponically or sold in dark street corners.

I responded to the well-wisher that I really appreciated his intent, but that it now was too late. I already had cancer. Furthermore (this part I only thought to myself) I have never in my life drunk this stuff. And that fact, I could just as authoritatively conclude, provides empirical evidence that not drinking golden milk has kept me cancer free for over 63 years. How can you beat that?

So now it’s just a matter of waiting…

• For my body to heal itself from the wounds of several surgeries, and continue to marvel in God’s creation of a body that just heals itself.
• For continued rebuilding of the flesh in the part of the lower leg wound where the skin graft didn’t take.
• For the rest and the peace that God continues to give me throughout this experience.
• For God’s grace which I don’t deserve. At all.
• For the good reports that I am confident will come from the tests that have been done.
• I’m okay with waiting.

Just like with some of the clouds that I mentioned earlier, I don’t always understand how stuff works, how the grace of God works, how peace comes to me in times of being surrounded by black clouds. But I’ll enjoy it all.

And rest.

Selah

LATE BREAKING NEWS! At the very moment I was writing this, Dr. Granger himself called me with the news that the pathology report had come in just a few minutes earlier. During the surgery he removed 20 lymph nodes in total and all 20 are clear! No malignancies in any of them. I love that kind of news. God is good and this is a marvelous answer to many people’s prayers.