An Ordinary Day!

This is the view from my Home Care Unit, rain or sunshine, day and night! I somehow find it beautiful as you can see, the first layer is indoor, then the second layer which is right outside of my house and in front of the window, and then the street view and the houses opposite to ours. Then, all these change through day and night, under sunshine, clouds or rain. Not too often, you can see someone walk pass or a car drive through. I can also see who is coming and leaving my house. It's lively and quite peaceful!

The guests of the house, Grace and Eddie left last mid-night. Easter holidays end and the kids return to school (starting Tuesday). Esther needs to work today. This should have left me taking care of myself during most time of the day. However, my sister, Irene, won't let me doing so, she reported to the Home Care Unit at 9:00am sharp and stay until 5:30pm. She made me many fresh juices, the lunch, vacuum cleaned my whole house among other minor tasks. Joined by my mom in lunch time, we then end up sitting around the dining table talking about the family history for a couple of hours, covering from 1944 (the year before Second World War is over and when my father arrived in Hong Kong) all the way to 1970 (the year when I was admitted to my primary school). I won't bother to repeat any of those tales here as I know you may not find them interesting. Though, for Irene and me, it's extremely interesting as some of the details we learn it the first time while some other details, there are variations from what we learnt from our father (who left us 13 years ago)!

It's rather normal that constipation is one of the side effects of chemotherapy (actually more precisely, it's the side effect of an anti-nausea and anti-vomiting drug, Ondansetron, which is intended to manage nausea and vomiting, i.e. the normal side effect of the chemotherapy drug, Cisplatin) and in additional to the pain management drug, morphine, which side effect is also constipation. Following the clear guidelines, I have taken in a lot of fluids during the day. Though I still cannot have my poo-poo in the past 1.5 days. So I need to work hard for this today, starting in the morning, e.g. more exercise (in the bed as well as getting up and walking around the house), some tricks that I learn from my mom (as she also suffered from constipation since her colon surgery 17 years ago), meditation (a state of mind to convince my body to cooperate with me to do poo-poo for me), managed breathing (in deep, out deep, in synchronization of the bowel movement), and from time to time, gentle massage on the abdominal cavity, etc. I do hope you don't need to do all these in your life time, but just in case you do need to do it, the key is to do it with great relaxation, do it like you are handling the easiest task on earth. As long as you have the whole day for it, why rush and why push yourself so hard. I know "enjoy it" will be harsh words to swallow, but how about "take it as it is". Remember, one way or another, you need to deal with it, as constipation gets you no where (except the hospital). You do have a choice! Believe me you do!

One little trick I also learn this time, which so far, it seems working is about vomiting control. I took the official medication Ondansetron for the first 1.5 day (i.e. 3 tables in 36 hours). Then, I decided to stop taking it last evening. From time to time, sense of vomiting will come and I eat some Chinese sour & salty plums. It actually works quite nicely! Not sure if it's related, it may have also help the constipation issue today. The reason I mentioned this, is everyday life can be an adventure, for those who are willing to explore. Of course, the result we may not be able to control, and it can go both ways. But the process itself at least worth our effort of trying!

I like sunshine, I like cloudy sky and I like rain. I like day and I like night. I like every minutes of my life as it's part of me and no one can take it away from me. I like the feeling of happy as well as feeling of ordinary. ... ... I do enjoy adventure of life and the process of doing so! Life without adventures, what else do you plan to enjoy? Yeah, adventures can be challenging, but then it's still a lot of fun in it, especially when you reach the other side of the shore. Even you failed the challenge, you can still say, without regrets, I did tried ... and it was fun!   

Two Men of Same Birthday! And Two Simple Lifes!

In the above photo, by now, I hope you would recognize me and Esther (in the middle), then on Esther's right is Grace, her sister, and on my left, Eddie, i.e. Grace's husband. In English, it's called Brother-In-Law (some corrected me and say it should be Brother-Out-Law in this case), while I prefer the Chinese way of saying it, i.e. we simply call each other's first name, and address each other as Brothers! What you may find it funny (or even amazed) is that Eddie and  I are of the same birthday (20th April). Now you may want to check around your friends and relatives and see if any of the sisters have married to their husbands who share the same birthday! We don't need to explain everything in life, neither are we capable of doing so. Though, we can certainly enjoy the fun of it, the fun of being part of the unexplained phenomenons in life!

Eddie's purpose of being here, like Grace, is to "come and see me". Also, more important, is to accompany Grace to return home (Hong Kong) as she has been here for more than 3 weeks. While Eddie, her dutiful husband, on the first day of the Easter holidays, to squeeze into a long haul flight coming all the way to be here in Vancouver the very first time for a few days, didn't really see much of the city and going to leave this evening! Lady Grace, you know how lucky you are? This also makes me think what's the (real) meaning of life: Eddie's life is all about his family. He works so hard and sacrifices to keep his family members happy!

Like most people at the same age in Hong Kong, Eddie was not given the opportunity to receive advanced education. They need to work extremely hard, and to work from bottom up, and be loyal, dedicated and great integrity to earn his today's senior management position. Of course, it also depends on who you are working for and repeated strikes of luck, careful choices and decisions, you then are able to swim through the ups and downs and survived various challenges and uncertainties in the past 3.5 decades. Then, their biggest achievements are that they raised a couple of kids, and a saving that can keep their retirement self-sustainable, with (social) respect! Eddie spends most of his time working at the office, as well the homework, i.e. the works that he see needed fixes at home. His biggest enjoyment is his walks at the back hill of where he lives and once a week, a dim-sum tea session with Grace and the kids. He has planned for his retirement in about 4 years' time and he seems satisfied with it. Life can be so simple! 

The Chinese philosophy guided that "If you expect little, less you will be dissatisfied! If you expect nothing, then you will never be dissatisfied!" (Save the debates of who is in-charge of life and whether life should be lived pessimistically or optimistically!) I agreed and echoed that there is a lot of merits if we can "Keep Life Simple!" Keeping life simple doesn't equates to a dumb life, as our life can still be filled with joy and fun. However, if we can keep it simple (or at least less complex), our mind is at greater ease and peace! Even when we are among life crisis and challenges, if we can simply take them as our daily life (or part of the process that we have to go through), we seek immediate agreement with the situation and "live with it", we then feel the solidness of ourself's own existence.

Life is full of joy and fun! Life is simple! Life is simpler than you think it is!