I’m in Marfa, Texas and I’m having a bowl of green tea ice cream. I arrived here Wednesday evening after an eventful day of travel (more on that in a minute) In the meantime, what have I been doing since that bloody long post? Well, I haven’t been watching the World Cup, but I enlarged a bed of flowers, bid goodbye to David, Pete, Buddy and two hermit crabs on Saturday morning (they were driving out to Marfa ahead of me with a U-Haul trailer in tow), dined with Mary and Raleigh on three different occasions, tried Pastis from Paris and Compari, walked, watched a couple of movies, read a very good and long novel, painted my dining room acid green, worked and worked on a soon-to-be-posted blog about cancer, drove to Boston for two different appointments, and then was picked up at seven a.m. sharp on Wednesday by my neighbor June for a ride to the airport.
On Monday I had exchanged some emails with my friend Brian, who lives with his girlfriend Jennifer in Baltimore. I had discovered that I had a three hour layover in Baltimore. I’d queried Brian, a former commercial pilot, for advice as to where one might get some fine fast food in the Baltimore Airport. Our correspondence went like this:
Brian:Hmm, fast food? Bleck. Protein bars? Better, but…What airline?What time?Do you like crab cakes?Linnea:southwest, arrive at 11:40, depart 3:00, love crab cakes.
When I got off the plane in Baltimore, Brian was there with two hot Maryland crab cakes and all the fixings. What a guy! Almost better yet, he hung out with me until my connecting flight boarded and we had a chance to catch up on a whole bunch of stuff.
On the next leg of the flight I sat next to a fascinating young man (hi Robin). I slept for the first hour or so, but then we began to chat and he made numbers, of all things, come alive for me. Robin, who is getting an advanced degree in mechanical engineering, might want to become a teacher and I hope he does, because I’m sure he could inspire a love of learning in his students.
Once more short flight and I was in El Paso, where David was waiting with yet another little picnic meal. I was feeling pretty well taken care of at this point. And then we hopped in his truck for the three hour drive to Marfa, where Peter and Buddy were waiting. I saw both some violent thunderstorms as well as a beautiful sunset before I drifted off to sleep again.
The last two days have involved unpacking the U-Haul as well as hitting a few of my favorite Marfa hangouts (Marfa Book Co., Pizza Foundation, Get and Go and the local thrift store). And now it’s time to go make dinner.
And I’m all caught up.
life and breath: outliving lung cancer 
HAVE FUN IN MARFA! HOPE TO SEE YOU ALL WHEN WE COME TO MEREDITH IN AUGUST!
Hi Linnea:
missed one post, thinking of you more, and more of you.
Happy with World Cup quarter finals, with roots in #1 Spain I loved the Spanish domination, do you know that the #2 Netherlands were part of the Spanish Kingdom?, they needed an Eight years war to split over taxes and Protestant ideas.
Every summer they return to Spain and enjoy the beaches with the #4 Germans.
The #2 little Uruguay was amazing, defeating Africa and giving a hard time to Germany. The human side was very touching. Men cry in the finals, Diego Forlan the Golden Ball winner from Uruguay became a professional soccer player to pay for large medical bills after her sister was paralyzed in a car accident that killed her boyfriend.
Love the magical old mill retreat and the picture of Jemesii over your lovely painting of a younger her, I would like to see repeats with 3, 4, 5 older Jemesii’s in one photo.
Funny atheist with protestant work ethic, worked too hard and choose a needed vacation in siesta country (ex Spain). Bloody work is a 4 letter word for me after years of 8 to 5, rush hours, dead lines, bosses, etc., a voluntary life sentence.
Is like a punishment for the original sin, masochist laugh at God enjoying work.
I do enjoy creative work and admire Linnea’s energy, is like the ant and the grasshopper in one person.
Fatal attraction? going from the land of the Northern lights to “Giant” land ghost lights.
Say привет to Marfa (Pryvet, Hello, Hola) Russian name town, in Presidio (Spanish for Prison), with history of Chemical mortars battalions (Texan weapons of mass destruction). Weather better than in Toronto, dryer 100F in July and cooler nights, try an scoop of Chihuahuan “dessert” with a Margarita, I prefer the CAmpari on the rocks.
Toronto is a tourist destination in summer, recently circus for the populace was the Pride parade over 1,000,000 visitors, tall ships races, Indy Honda races, Queen visit and the worst the G20 with 1 billion wasted in Toronto, see a local terrorist with police
Jazz festivals are on now and Caribbean carnival soon.
A club had a cancer blast dance celebration, my wife is a cancer born in 1945, I worry going to be married to a senior citizen from July 20, no treatment available.
My CT scan shows stable cancer. Good news? Depends. After 2 months with Tarceva, tired and itchy I was not expecting much anyway. Cancer lottery has better chances.
“As a second/third-line treatment, Tarceva has shown to help some patients live longer. In a large study in people with advanced NSCLC who have not taken Tarceva before and whose cancer has grown or spread after at least 1 prior chemotherapy regimen: 31% (about 1 in 3 patients) who took Tarceva was still living one year later versus 22% (about 1 in 5 patients) who took a placebo (sugar pill) was still living 1 year later. Patients who took Tarceva had a median overall survival time of 6.7 months versus patients who took placebo (sugar pill) had a median overall survival time of 4.7 months.”
Note:
forget above numbers, 5 years with NSCLC Spanish with English wife are tough cookies.
Tarceva cost the system around $100 per day. Prior chemotherapy damaged my nerves, now I get crams and pain in the right chest and arm affecting my sleep and qualify of life, I am on 6 to 8 Tylenol 3 with Codeine per day.
So I choose to stop it and can enjoy trips and the sun again, I was told to avoid the sun like a vampire. We did bone scan and is OK. Did ultrasound, going to do MRI and Chest X-ray and see. My oncologist thinks that we can use my 5 year old biopsy to check for ALK mutation and crizotinib treatment, odds 5 to 10%, I think that we need a new one.
I am using the mouse with my left hand, my wife is my right hand now. Is this correct?
In Spanish we put words in phrases in a reverse order.
Sounds like my right hand is my wife now.
Guillermo, Although I’m sure the World Cup is a wonderful thing, now that it is over some of my friends and family have free time again. Glad your scans are stable and respect whatever decisions you make regarding treatment. I’m certain you get more out of one day in the sun than most people get out of three (compression lifestyle?).
You did your homework on Marfa. The story is that the wife of a railroad executive chose the name for the town. She was reading Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov and Marfa was a character. There was indeed a large military presence here (now it’s Border Patrol) but the old buildings have been put to peaceful use as permanent installation spaces for art.
The left hand is better (just another way in which I am in the minority). Linnea