A Milestone Day, June 1

We got a letter telling us that my oncologist, Dr. Charles Henderson, is going to retire at the end of June, so we scheduled an appointment to see him on June 1.  No medical need for the appointment--we just wanted to see him one last time and thank him for all he's done over the past 7+ years.  You may recall that he is also a head/neck cancer survivor who started his treatments five years before mine, and also had many of the same side effects--though he managed to avoid having a jaw resection.  Lucky bastard.

He did his usual exam and we chatted for a few minutes before he said there was no need for any further follow ups.  He declared me "fully healed" of the MEC cancer from 2009, and therefore no need to continue my visits to his office, or to see his replacement.  While that was not really news to us, it was nice to know that the case was closed on my cancer in his mind and Terry and I both felt a relief, just the same.

Dr. Henderson is also a patient of Dr. Roser, my jaw surgeon at Emory.  In fact, Dr. Henderson gave me the original referral to Dr. Roser--which says a lot with the doctors being in different medical groups.

So, that visit gave us some nice closure to my time with Dr. Henderson, and gave us a little milestone to celebrate.  But we had a bigger milestone to celebrate on June 1.  10 years ago on that date Terry and I got married on Roatan, in Honduras.

The ceremony took place on a deck above a dock at the house we rented for the week, and was attended by some new-found friends in Roatan and my good friend (and former brother in-law)-turned-Best Man, Craig, who dived with me that week.

 

We didn't know if we'd get all the legal stuff done in time to get married that week, so didn't tell Craig he'd be doing Best Man duty until after he arrived.  After the ceremony he gave a us a toast (from precise memory!) with Shakespeare's 116th Sonnet that dropped everybody's jaw (including mine, when I had one). 

 Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
     If this be error and upon me proved,
     I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Craig was not our only guest there.  We had invited Jeff and Deb Rupp to join us on the trip but they were unable to make it.  So, while they were there in spirit, we brought them along in another embodiment. You can see them here enjoying some cake and champagne after the ceremony.

Right--you can't make this shit up...

The added significance of June 1 being our 10th anniversary is our running joke that this is my Personal Best in the staying-married department of life.  None of my three previous marriages saw double digit anniversaries--and two of them added together would barely make it. Depends how you count.

Terry and I looked at the video and some pictures taken at the ceremony, and caught ourselves asking, "Who are those two people?"  Terry looks much the same, but did notice the toll her arthritis  is taking on her hands.  As for me, I don't even remember the physical image of the groom in the photos.  I'm 60 pounds lighter, sans beard, and my thinning hair is totally gray now.  The strange thing is that I also don't know who it is I see in the mirror every day, or in current pictures.  Go figure, and Dr. Henderson, can you refer me to a good shrink?

June 1 offered us a chance to reflect on the past 10 years and all that we've done, accomplished, and battled through as a couple.  The bottom line is something I've said many times here--there are many wonderful things in our lives that have made the fight with the Prairie Dogs, the treatments, and side effects worth it.  I sometimes forget that, like when I'm struggling to chew and swallow the few foods I can eat, or when I can't even try to eat some of my favorite foods, or when Terry reminds me to keep my fibula up so I don't drool out (It'll come to you), or when I mumble a sentence--so we both need the June 1s (and birthdays, etc) in our lives to remind us that we still have much to be thankful for, and much more to look forward to.

Thanks to all of you on Team Mike for helping that happen.

Mike