Up and at 'em folks...
And a hearty good morning to all..and sundry. (You know who you are.)...

First:..
Thank you to all who have left comments..It is so very much appreciated.

Second:
As most of you are aware, I have taken a sabbatical to write a book.
The book is still a work in progress, but I have finally managed to approach the year 1800. Not bad at all I figure, given that I started in Beringia at the end of the last ice age. 10,000 years (give or take), is not a bad year's work.
At the moment, the book and everything else is on hold.

Last November, my youngest sister, (actually my baby as our mother developed metatastic breast cancer before she was aged 2), was diagnosed with stage 3 adenocarcinoma. As you can imagine, the past 4 months have been an emotional seesaw alternating between extreme hope and dark despair. She's a fighter, my kid, and we six sibs are in this all together. One for all and all for one. The way it has been our entire life.
Then my stepmother, (my Mom's first cousin), fell in January, broke her hip, and died after a 10 day hospitilization. Since she had never accepted that 6 children were part of the package she agreed to when she married my father, we have spent the past 3 months negotiating a separation, with the estate executor,  of Mom and Dad's effects from hers.
Not, as you can no doubt imagine, an especially serene experience. 

Today ends it with the return of Mom's and Dad's wee bits and bobs. Nothing of much monetary value, just things which were passed down through parents, grandparents and great grandparents. Postcards, letters, bibles, hymnals, as well as gifts to them from we children.

It is done.

The wonderful thing is that all my sibs, including my youngest sister will be arriving next week for a full 5 days, from points right across Canada, and staying here. We will all be together again once more under one roof.
We are taking this one small window of opportunity between the RAD/Chemo and Maggie's upcoming lung resection in May to all be united once more, and share lots of laughter, and I predict, not a few tears.

Such is the circle of life.

I haven't forgotten you, my friends, and I will return as soon as it is possible to do so.
At the moment everything is on hold as I spend hours on the phone and firing off/answering emails to my sister. I'm her life consultant at the moment, as I have spent the past 50 years specializing in acute and palliative health care.

I miss you one and all...
And..
I will be back.

Heather.

Tags: Family Death Renewal