June Gloom

Summer break has officially begun, although you'd hardly know it's summer here in Southern California. We're dealing with June Gloom, which seems more gloomy this year than usual. Overcast all day, a slight breeze and chill in the air. Which is fine, really; the scorching heat and relentless sunshine will be here before we know it, so this is but a brief respite before true summer. All this gloom kinda matches my mood of late, anyway. Gloomy, subdued, anxious. Three days now until Michael's surgery, and there are moments throughout the day when I feel like my nerves are digging their way up through my skin. It's gotten to the point where he is reassuring me that everything is going to be okay, and I feel bad because it really should be the other way around.

I've been reading manically to distract myself, and that helps. I'm also determined to make walking a regular part of my routine this summer. It's good for the body and the soul. We live in a pretty hilly neighborhood, and I walk a couple of miles at a brisk pace - it's a decent workout. Gets the blood pumping, the endorphins and sweat flowing . . . and I get to be alone with my thoughts and try and work through the crap in my head.

This is a house I pass, a couple blocks from our humble abode, on my walks:

I covet this house! Doesn't it just have "Family With Six Kids" written all over it?

Anyway, it feels like Michael is trying to cram as much doing into these last few days as possible: in addition to working all week, Sideshow Jefe (the band he's in) played a show the other night, last night his coworkers took him out for a drink after work as a farewell (yesterday was his last day of work; he'll be on leave for several weeks now), today he took Kevin and Joey to Disneyland as an early birthday gift to Joey since he'll likely still be pretty out of commission on Joey's actual birthday coming up.

So, his surgery is scheduled for Tuesday afternoon. He'll be in the hospital for up to a week, and then recuperating for several more weeks after that, and he'll start back up with chemo every other week (eight cycles) three to four weeks after surgery. We still have a long road ahead.