Day 104, Year 7: Anticipation
Date: Monday, February 20, 2012
Weather: Mostly Sunny, Temps in the 40’s F
Location: Brewer Fiddler’s Cove Marina, N Falmouth, MA

Tomorrow is the day of Mark’s first chemo treatment. We don’t actually know
anyone who has gone through chemo for colon cancer, but we have read
everything we can find on the topic and we have talked to the oncologists at
length. Still, there is no way to know what it will really be like.
Everyone’s body reacts differently, but considering that, we like the
oncologists’ versions best. Both the oncologist in Boston and the one here
on the Cape have told Mark that he might be a bit tired right after the
treatment, but that he should be able to function normally. Because of one
of the drugs, he should not drink or eat things that are cold, but for Mark
that is not a big deal. I have to have COLD water to drink. Mark never
has. He prefers water at room temperature. He probably won’t be drinking
beer for a while, but if he did, drinking that at room temperature wouldn’t
be a problem for him either. Not being able to eat ice cream might bother
him more, but he will survive six months without it. A bigger problem might
be that he loses his appetite, but somehow I can’t imagine that happening to
Mark. We’ll just have to wait and see. Mark is ready to get this started
so we can stop anticipating and start dealing with the actual effects.

We started our day by walking up to the clubhouse to take showers. There is
also a laundry room there that I have never used, but I thought I’d give it
a try this morning. There was a sign that said to turn on the water for the
laundry and to be sure and turn it off when the laundry was done. But the
water switch would only turn slightly. Both Mark and I thought maybe that
was normal, so I proceeded to put the clothes in and push the start button.
Nothing happened. The water in the adjacent laundry sink was running, so I
had Mark go back to the boat and get a bucket. I filled the tub with water
and then it started working normally. I had to stay close-by and refill the
tub for the rinse, but at least I got the laundry done. Mark spent his
morning in the cockpit ‘sunroom’ reading while I worked on the computer
below. In the early afternoon, I heard Mark exclaim that his phone had
stopped working. It was in his shirt pocket and heated up so that he had to
take it out quickly. After that, it wouldn’t turn on. So Mark immediately
removed the battery and headed to town to the AT&T store and to do some
shopping for essentials. His phone is once again functional after they
replaced the battery with a new one, but no one is sure why the battery
heated up and died. If it happened due to some problem in the phone, it
will probably happen again. A better scenario would be that it was just a
bad battery. Mark is very much attached to his Android phone and I don’t
know what he would do without it. So I sure hope it was just a bad battery.

Heather came over this afternoon and we spent some time planning the
Goldstone 2012 garden. The ‘garden’ is slowly expanding to include various
areas in the front and back yards, so it was fun to have the time to share
ideas. I’m hoping to be able to use Windbird’s winter cover as a spring
greenhouse to give some of the garden seeds an early start. I have always
loved gardening, so helping Heather and Jed with their garden is such a
delight for me.