Spring and the Trial Moon

Sunday gratefuls:  Ghosts. Shadow. Liminal times and places. Dawn. Dusk. Holywells. Doorways. The Shadow Line. Near death.

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Torah

Kavannah: Netzach. Perseverance. Trial begins on Wednesday. I need netzach as I enter this latest round of treatment.

Tarot: paused

One brief shining: My body heals. Slowly. Stomach flighty, keeping me awake last night. Even so. Gradual changes. Gut inching toward normal. Less resistance to food. Coffee feels too far. Sensitivity. Two days ago. Felt good. Less so now. Forward. Backward.

Illness. Health. Mind scanning the body, the original imaging technique. Elbows ache. That sore on my left big toe. G.I. tract signaling caution. Bland foods. Reminds me with twitches in my stomach. A few back pains.

Maybe I should say, the mind/body scanning itself. Reporting to my conscious self and, always, to the subtle engineer crafting changes to endocrine levels, heartbeats. Kate used to say that the wonder was not that the body, on occasion, got sick. The real wonder? That it worked so well almost all the time.

When did you last consider your breath? In. Slight pause. Out. slight pause. No conscious mind at work. The body. Heartbeats.

How about my eye? Taking in light and, like Plato’s cave, projecting an image of this computer screen onto my occipital lobe. I act like the screen is real though I’m responding to light processed through my retina and onto the brain which interprets the message. Mediated at least twice removed from what Kant called the ding an sich, the thing-in-itself.

Or, my cancer. Known only to me through indistinct images of radioactive uptake. Affecting my life, yet unseen.

Our whole lives we move and breathe and have our becoming in this vessel of flesh. My body. My self. Evolution.

I am unique. This splotchy skin, road mapped with blue vessels against pale white. That scar on my left hand from a careless day breaking bottles at Pipe Creek.

No less me.

Turned away at the border station on the Ambassador Bridge. Guilty of long hair in 1967.

When I was born in Duncan, Oklahoma, my body/mind breathed air for the first time. Uniqueness elaborated. Marked by life. Again and again.

When an old man dies, a library burns to the ground. Yes. Just so. A life gone, a life of experiences, knowledge, wisdom housed in the library that is our body.

When Kate died, I mourned her as my lover, my best friend. I also realized how stunningly inefficient death is.

Her medical knowledge and experience. Gone. Her many skills: cook, quilter. Just. Gone.

This self, this body/mind of mine, my carriage will fail. Whether soon or late. Until then, I notice my stomach. And await its return.

Notice.
The carriage has changed.
Again.

Spring and the Moon of Liberation (4% waning crescent)

Wednesday gratefuls: Rich. Housekeeper. Fruit. Bagel w/ avocado. Tara. Marilyn. Jamie. Joanne. Laurie. Susan. Ron.

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe:  Rich

Kavannah: Simcha. Joy.  I have such joy with my friends at CBE.

Tarot: paused

One brief shining: Rich came in the morning. Fruit, bagels, breakfast burritos. And washed my dishes. On his birthday. #64. He made me a bagel with avocado and a side of blueberries, blackberries, strawberries, and melon. A very sweet guy.

Tara came in the afternoon. Helped get my lower level ready for our MVP meeting. (see picture above) She fussed and stacked, moved this and that. We chatted. The Democratic Socialists called with an opportunity to leave a message for Senator Hickenlooper about two votes today in the Senate. I did.

Marilyn came a little early, bringing me a generous portion of spaghetti Bolognese for meals this week. As folks began to trickle in, Rabbi Jamie sent me a text: Oh, no. I just realized we’re meeting at your house! I’ll be there in thirty minutes. He’s just back from his sabbatical.

Joanne came with Susan Marcus. She has to go backwards down stairs due to arthritic knees. Many helped her down. She’s a living treasure at CBE and treated like one.

Laurie came. She had a story about cycling with her two kids. In the mountains. She’s quite the athlete, nearing 63, and still riding the mountain roads. Her son rode ahead of her on a steep hill. She got up behind me, trying to decide whether to pass him or not. Once before she had and he was embarrassed.

Then, I thought. Screw it. One pedal after another and I zipped past him. She thought about it this way: He might be embarrassed right now, but later he’ll remember the moment his 63 year old mom passed him. Otherwise we’ll be riding together, go home, and there will be no memory of it.

How do we learn best? When emotion and learning engage at the same time. That’s the big take away from talmud torah.

We had a great discussion. A first things part of our conversation. Can deep study/learning be seen as a middah? A character trait which mussar teaches us to either magnify or decrease. Doesn’t seem like it. It’s not the same as say patience or joy or honor. Clear character traits.

Yet. In order to engage mussar, we first have to study. A sine qua non. I suggested studiousness as the character trait. With an important addenda. Talmud torah is studiousness with heart, a studiousness that begins with the understanding we may be transformed by what we learn.

This is not the analytical study of sacred texts. No. It is the deep engagement of self with material that matters. It is learning with heart. Just as Laurie’s 28 year-old son created a memory of Mom passing on by, so do those of us who study with heart create not only lasting memories, but changed selves.

Quiet.

My heart opens.

I see.

Spring and the Moon of Liberation

Monday gratefuls: Accepting our own power. Prostate cancer, my teacher. Purple Iris for Kate. Stargaze Lilies and Gladiolus.

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe:

Tarot: paused

One brief shining:

I would write a paragraph, then fall asleep. I wrote on on both days, but never finished more than you can see above. Frustrating. Maybe a little better sleep last night. We’ll find out if I can finish this

This has been tough. The constipation made everything harder physically. The lost phone bathed in Gen Z shame? Grandpop. How could you lose your phone.  I walked along the hallway of a Dr’s office. A woman and a man coming my way asked if I could see them. No. That much pressure on my back made me even more tired. Stand up, drop your chin to your chest. Feel the muscles in your lower back. Yeah.

In regard to this problem. I’m trying to distinguish between prostate cancer in my bones and aches and pain related to my five bulging discs. Still unsure. I also get pain in my right lower back from a torn labrum. Steroid injection for that next Tuesday.

Life seems to keep lobbing grenades over my threshold. So far I pick them up, throw them back. I’ve Miralaxed my way past the constipation. Used Google to find my phone. However, I wake up around midnight, then sleep fitfully the rest of the night.  No red alert. No sirens. Pain. Impaired communication. Sleep a fond memory.

I know from experience with Kate that these asides can be as damaging as a major disease. Why? Because they can reduce resilience.

Too, exhaustion like I’m still experiencing can leave the body more open to invaders. Colds. Flu. Covid. Work out? No thanks.

The frustrating thing is this. When I’ve gotten some spunk back, I go upstairs to cook. My head drops. My back ouches. I get right back in touch with my fragility. That’s dispiriting,

However. The well of my resilience has depth. Maybe not in the acute phase of a new challenge. Right after that though I begin to sort through a fresh problem list. See what I already know. Investigate my resources. Who might be available to take me to RMCC on Wednesday. Or, to Panorama on Tuesday? What do I need to know about constipation?

A direct outgrowth of this turn? I’m evaluating how a house keeper might help me conserve my energy, focus on things that matter.

Aching. Tired.

Seeking.

Ah. Water from the well.

Spring and the Moon of Liberation

Artemis:  Miles from earth 205,372. Miles from moon 75,496. As of 4:45 am, April 5th, 2026.

Shabbat gratefuls: Luke and the phone. Tramadol. Miralax. Shadow outside. Shadow inside. Artemis II. Ruth and David.

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Moon

Kavannah: Hakarat Hatov.  Gratitude.  “Who is rich? Those who rejoice in their own portion.” Pirkei Avot (4:1)

Tarot: paused

All I got today

Spring and the Moon of Liberation

Shabbat gratefuls: Shadow beside me. Artemis mine. Artemis II. Exploration. Living. Ruth at 20. David. Gabe. Jesse. Cancer.

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Ruth

Kavannah: Hakarat Hatov.  Gratitude.  “Who is rich? Those who rejoice in their own portion.” Pirkei Avot (4:1)

Tarot: paused

One brief shining: Found my phone.  Google led me to Luke’s parking lot. Emailed Luke. He found it.

Like the relief of being added to the Actinium + ARPI arm.

For a month and a half, like late October and November of last year, I’ve had consequential procedures, tests, visits with the oncologist. I get tired during these marathons.

Most of these visits require my body. Bones cannot be scanned without the bones.

Good data. Key decisions demand it. The impact on me? Mine alone.

What if adding exhaustion to an existing disease state drives me into a dark place mentally? As this last flurry of data gathering did. I wrapped this month and a half long process last Monday with an EKG. My old one: expired.

Neither exhaustion nor my cancer drove me into anything.

A barrier lowered.  Old familiars saw their chance.

Shhh, Charlie. Don’t worry about frailty. What? Frailty. Not you. Lassitude. You don’t get around well. You do the best you can.

By evening: the troubling PSA. New metastases. The pull of letting go.

I let them into my consciousness. Thursday the clutter and naysayers began to quiet. A plan existed. The trial. I got what I wanted.

Even so. After my mother died, I not only let the demons in. I set up housekeeping with them. Entertained them with alcohol and anxiety. Oh, the times we had.

I spent most of my twenties in thrall not only to alcohol and tobacco, but to bad choices.

I found my power. Kicked the demons out of the house. They left the house. Not me.

I know those demons lie in wait for my moments of vulnerability. They were there when I spent three days staring at wallpaper patterns. They showed up after Kate died, suggesting drastic changes.

Not gone.

Waiting.

For me.

Spring and the Moon of Liberation

Friday gratefuls: The Trans Lunar Injection Burn. Artemis II moving toward the moon. Clinical trial. Samantha. Arjan, Vincent, Tara, Eleanor

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe:  Artemis II

Kavannah: Wonder. Malchut.  Shadow

Tarot: paused

One brief shining: When my latest PET scan showed a jump in metastases. After my PSA shot up to 92. Not panic. Regret. Sadness. Resignation. A downward trough.

My oncologist, Dr. Buphati, and his team wanted me in a particular arm of the study. After randomization, I am.

I’ve had a year of gliding into scanners and back out. Having bloodwork often. I’m ready to lean into a treatment plan. Act rather than diagnose.

Samantha’s e-mail: “Good news on the study. You were selected for the group receiving Actinium + ARPI. That is the most desirable group to be in btw.”

The universe has thrown me a bone.  The combination of a radioactive attack on my tumors–Actinium–and an androgen pathway receptor inhibitor–ARPI– gives me the best chance of shrinking tumors and getting.some energy back.

Good news and bad news. My clinical trial position could not be better. A high point. A place to start treatment. No matter what the trial does for my cancer, I’ll know I’ve given myself the best chance available.

When I got the PET scan and PSA results. Banged me up pretty good. My cancer was on the move. These results came in the midst of yet more trips for imaging, blood work, consultations. I was tired. Exhausted.

Not the best circumstances to absorb and frame tough information. Didn’t realize until yesterday that melancholy had been dominant. In spite of my efforts. Or, I could say, I took in difficult news and managed it well enough to avoid depression.

Cancer gives me many opportunities to practice resilience. I’m no Zen master. I don’t sit and calm myself. I do assess the context. Will my fatigue make me less able to maintain equilibrium. Yes. Less able to handle things day-to day. Yes. I watch for crankiness, low energy.

Even so. Melancholy fits like a heavy, dark cape. I become more quiet in conversation. I might jump from a 92 PSA to the cemetery. I slow down, thinking is harder. Will the trial help? I shrug.

Living with a chronic, terminal disease means making appointments, traveling from home a lot, making choices about drugs and treatments.

We know neither the day nor the hour. Not for Jesus’s return, but for our own death. I find comfort in not knowing.

Starting the trial.

Actinium drips.

I hope.

Imbolc and the Moon of Liberation

Thursday gratefuls: Morning darkness. Sleep. Jackie and Rhonda. Hep B. The winter that wasn’t. This nation. Which I love.

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Teshuvah

Kavannah: Histapkot. Contentment.   Seek what you need, give up what you don’t need.

Tarot: Eight of Bows, Hearthfire.  “(I) celebrate the fact that we endure, survive, thrive and grow with the support and companionship of our chosen tribe.”

One brief shining: Intimidating. No, Ruth said, you can’t be intimidating. She said it with love. Took me aback. My reaction surprised me. I can be intimidating, I replied, drawing my old male identity up. Then I thought, what am I doing?

How Ruth sees me. Maybe how most people see me? If I can’t intimidate, have I lost an essential part of my masculinity? I looked at myself from her perspective: 5’5″. Barely 130 pounds. White hair and age evident. 79. Oh, I get it.

My power has shifted from the muscled man who lifted 150 pound dogs into the car for a vet visit. I’d struggle to lift Shadow, a light 37 pounds. My power has also shifted from the political partisan who would take on anyone, especially Haislet, the ob/gyn who thought of himself a conservative (reactionary) intellectual. I used to treat argument as a blood sport. No quarter. Win or go home.

Again, Ruth. You’re not old; you’re wise. Oh?

I can no longer cut down trees, limb them, buck the rest. I have to pause to rest while planting seeds. Planting seeds in Artemis’ raised beds. Frequent rests.

Cooking demands more of me than I have to give. Standing up for over 15 minutes? Nope.

Bank. Groceries. Gas. Maybe lunch out. Not anymore.

I have one event in me in a day. A doctor’s appointment. A diagnostic procedure. A hair cut. The drive, with my head drop, wears me out. The brace helps.

Easy to forget. Slowed. Way. Down.

In spite of all this I do not feel diminished. When talking with Ruth and David, I showed up. Engaged with Ruth’s enthusiasm, with David’s hesitant vulnerability.

My mind tracks back decades. Emile Durkheim comes to me. That seminary course in the Old Testament. A tender evening with Kate at the Nicollet Island Inn. Brings in new perspectives. That was our 25th. We bought mugs to celebrate. Red for me. Green for her.

My power has shifted. Enhanced by Tara’s visits. Eleanor’s play with Shadow. By breakfast at Primo’s with Marilyn and Irv. By resilience borne of repeated encounters with cancer and death. By life lived in community. In family.

Soft power.

No intimidation necessary.

Imbolc and the Moon of Tides

Wednesday gratefuls: Alan. Jamie. Sky Ridge. Echocardiogram. PET scan. Uber. Tom, 78. 1990. Kate and me. Married. Yesterday.

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: MVP

Kavannah: Groundedness. Yesod.    Yesod is about establishing oneself in reality, refusing to rely on comfortable illusions.

Tarot: Seven of Arrows, Healing.  May it be so.

One brief shining: 36 years ago today Kate and I landed in Rome. Our wedding thank-you notes written on our PanAm flight. Partners already. Ready to mail at the Vatican post office. Which we did the next day. A beginning, a love story, a mutual story decades old.

A true honeymoon. Italian coffee and croissants at the top of the Spanish Steps. Evening meals in a trattoria. Nights exploring our relationship. Further.

Our first, but not our last, trip outside the U.S. Well. Except for those two days in Thunder Bay.

While touring Pompeii, unbeknownst to me, Kate carried, uncomplaining, two two-liter bottles of water. A first glimpse of a trait I learned: Dogged. Stubborn. Stoic.

Those bottles of water were her Joseon Palace. Her back began giving her trouble. As mine did after the Palace in Seoul.

In Florence. The Uffizi. We both loved Primavera. Kate hunted for jewelry. A passion of hers. I found out there.

Venice. We walked on the wooden pathways to stay above the water in St. Mark’s Square. Went to an evening Grand Canal side concert. A classical trio. Our meeting at the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra echoed in Venice.

That first view of the Grand Canal after leaving the train station. We put our luggage down to take it in.

From Venice a long train ride through the Alps to Vienna. No food on the train. Hungry when we arrived at 10 pm. The concierge at the Hotel Astoria pointed us across the Ringstrasse to a cozy Viennese restaurant. Red checkered tablecloths and wiener schnitzel. Kate loved the spaetzle, a marriage long favorite.

In the Kunsthistorische Kate discovered a favorite artist, Arcimboldo. He of the vegetable portraits. Kate’s love of whimsy surfacing.

In the afternoons when we rested a trio of Bolivian pan pipers played below our balcony.

Mozart’s home town. Salzburg. A restaurant begun in 890 by Irish monks. A tacky tour, which we mistakenly signed up for, of several sites featured in The Sound of Music. The Wedding Church!

Paris. The left bank. The owner of a laundromat where we did our clothes loved our honeymoon glow and gifted us a poster. Which hangs now beside my bed.

London. Bath. A special picnic put in the boot of our rental car. Wicker basket. Table cloth. We ate near the Wookey Hole in Somerset.

Edinburgh. A whole day in bed at the Caledonian. Tired. We’d been following spring north for almost three weeks.

Our final stop on our northward itinerary: Inverness. Long walks in the fog along the River Ness at night. Taking a taxi to see the blooming heather. A tartan mill where one man arranged the spools of wool on a large iron rack so they would come out on the loom a specific tartan. Kate, ever the seamstress and quilter, found his memory astounding.

Back home. 32 years together. Dogs. Kids. Travel. Gardens and bees. Then, the Rocky Mountains.

Life. Together.

Always.

Imbolc and the Moon of Tides

Tuesday gratefuls: Shadow, who sleeps against my leg. Dan Herman. Rich. Alan. Jamie. Ron. Jackie and Rhonda. Clean teeth. No work needed

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe:  Telling the story to myself (aka: a first draft)

Week Kavannah:   Yetziratiut. Creativity.   Revising Superior Wolf, learning from my writing coach. Focus.

Tarot: #18 The Moon on the Water

Beyond the flight of the sacred heron lies the fusion of our ancestral soul with the soul of the Earth.

One brief shining: The Moon on the Water, a major arcana, speaks to my deepening creative journey as I hone what my writing coach calls late stage style, crisper, often in fragments, leaning more on nouns than verbs. Work that reflects my inner moon. A great joy.

Teeth cleaning. Oncologist. Nurse. Social worker. Yes. Social worker. Radiation follow up. CT scan for aortic aneurysm. Three weeks. The steady drip of medical care. This ailment, then that.

When I say, and mean, I’m alone, but not lonely, I don’t count those visits. Though sometimes I do. Maddie. Rachel. Sue Bradshaw, my PCP. Long term. Personal first, professional second. My preference.

Many friends. This cardiologist. That pulmonologist. Keeping us healthy. Reminding us that we’re not. An irony.

A friend of mine, Frank Broderick, turned 93 yesterday. 93. Frank, a man of strong opinions. Anti-Catholic. Pro-indigenous people. Served a long term on the board of the Minneapolis Indian Health Service. He wrote back to birthday greetings, “If I’d known I was going to live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself.” At coffee, rants even now about DeLaSalle High School.

Wondering if the PET scan will trigger a huge co-insurance bill.  I want to stay right here on Shadow Mountain. However. A bad fall. Pneumonia. Could push me out.

Solitude. I live alone. What happens to Shadow? My stuff. All those books. Used to be. The kids might move in. Or. I might move in with them. Unlikely. A son in Korea. Sister in Australia. Brother in Saudi Arabia. Me, by choice, in the Rocky Mountains.

Shock absorbers: far away. Friends become critical, necessary. Tom and Paul, distant yet close. Warms me. Tara, who plans a move, soon, to Costa Rica. Damn it. Alan and Joan, who like Frank is 93. Marilyn and Irv. Luke. Ginny and Janice. Close friends.

Ruth and Gabe. Grandkids already loaded in the cultural missile of higher education.

I love my splendid isolation. On top of Shadow Mountain. The moon of my inner sky illuminating my ancientrail.

Yet.

Feeling a hug from my boy.

Oh.