2011-12-08 : John Wayne only had one lung (and now, so does dad!)
I'm sitting in front of my light therapy lamp. Anybody else would have left the room screaming that they'd been blinded but I've gotten used to it over the years, but the thing is BRIGHT WHITE. Speaking of bright white: We have had a whole lot of freezing fog lately. It is kind of scary at night (thank god Larry is driving and not me) if you can barely see anything in front of you. During the day it makes all the evergreen trees look very festive and feathery silver white (yet I'd rather have it just snow because that is even prettier).

So, dad went in for surgery on Tuesday and came out with surgery with only one lung...eek! I knew they might have to remove a good portion of his lung but it turned out that the tumor was the size of a grapefruit and it would have been pointless to leave 1/3 of a lung or less, so he now only has one lung. This totally shocked the hell out of me at first but I read stuff on the internet and it seemed like many people with only one lung lead relatively normal lives once they have recovered from surgery and adjusted to maybe breathing a little different, not being able to be quite as active, etc. Some guy (a two-time cancer survivor and a one-lunger) actually climbed part (or all?) of Mt. Everest. I don't think dad is wanting to do anything like that, obviously. But I feel more hopeful and hopefully he isn't too freaked about it. My brother is there with him, which is good. He said dad was pretty doped up yesterday and sometimes was confused about whether it was day or evening (he ordered breakfast for dinner, for example, but maybe he just WANTED breakfast for dinner). Hopefully he will get better each day. They are probably going to come back and visit dad for Xmas. I would like to as well (and will if dad isn't doing so great) but Larry REALLY doesn't want to..he had taken time off to work on the house since we have enough money to actually dry wall our living room for the first time in 5 years, plus I don't get paid for any time I take off, and I have already taken off so much time this year between our vacation in June, the f'ing trial in Hawaii in August, and then an unexpected week long visit to Idaho in September because Larry's uncle died. My brother isn't asking me to come for Xmas, but I have a feeling he would really like me to, but I just don't know if it is feasible and it costs a hell of a lot to fly 3 people there, etc. I am really torn..my aunts and uncles have never even met Bella, and I'd like to visit my old friend, Simone, but this is horrible timing to go (which makes me sound like a selfish asshole). Larry said maybe we could go in Spring (and the weather would be a hell of lot nicer then, too!)

Oh, speaking of one lungers. John Wayne only had one lung for the last 15 years of his life.