Sat Morn

Dad has clearly entered that 7-10-day-after-chemo period where he feels, and is, the most wiped-out. For the past couple of days Dad has continued to struggle with a fever and its effects, especially chills and sweats. The fever seems to be due both to the sinus infection and to the daily transfusions he's been getting, to which his body often reacts as a foreign substance. One "bag" of platelets may have blood cells from five different donors, some of which will be less closely matched to Dad than others. It is the classic cancer scenario, isn't it? Battling the host of baby or pseudo- "cancers" caused not by the actual cancer but, precisely, by our best efforts against it. Medicines levied against medicines, the side-effects shuffle. That which we hope will cure us may yet kill us.

Dad has continued to struggle with headaches from the sinusitis, and his nights have been difficult, while he sleeps through most of the day. I spoke with him briefly last night and he sounded, to be frank, utterly low and exhausted. But his characteristic pragmatism, and courage, remained. Not a trace of complaint. In fact, Mom has said that it is sometimes hard for her and the nurses to know what Dad needs, because he doesn't complain. At its best, suffering is this sort of refining fire, in which the incidental and inessential are burned off, and the essentials of character emerge hardened, clarified, and in relief.