Agenthood and Submissionville: thanks

Saturday, 27 December 2014

My Cancerversary

Today is my one year cancerversary: twelve months to the day I learned I had cancer.

What do you think I'm going to tell you today? the consultant surgeon asked at 2.30pm a year ago, a nurse by his side. My heart slipped a little closer to my stomach.

During the mammogram and ultra sound tests a week earlier, a couple of comments about the lump (which I'd satisfactorily convinced myself prior to the appointment was the innocuous result of hormones) made me nervous. I asked the radiographer what he was looking for. The mammogram suggests pre-cancer, he said. Pre-cancer, I considered, I like the sound of 'pre'. Yes, he said 'pre' is good.

I left the tests to enjoy Christmas, knowing I'd be returning on the 27^th December for the results. Then they'd tell me whether I had no cancer or pre-cancer. Or so I thought.

I'd learnt about pre-cancer over the festive period. I didn't go near the internet - am way to cautious to trust my sanity to Mr Google - but instead consulted with my wonderful friend who, rather fortuitously for me, happens to be an oncologist in breast cancer. Pre-cancer wasn’t to be taken lightly, I was told. Dependent on the extent of these cells at the first abnormal stage, a mastectomy might be necessary, together with hormone therapy, perhaps, even a dose or two of radiotherapy. But no chemo and, crucially, no risk of death at this pre-cancerous stage. If there's a sentence containing 'cancer' as well as, 'no risk of death', it's hard to feel anything but relief.

I looked at the surgeon and the nurse and I think I smiled. It was OK, I'd prepared for this and the way he'd phrased the question made me certain. You're going to tell me I have pre-cancer, I finally answered. The surgeon and the nurse continued their gaze, not even a twitch from either of them until the surgeon said, I'm afraid it's much worse than that.

February: 8 inches cut off my hair

And thus I trot towards 2015 with three operations, chemotherapy and radiotherapy behind me and with much more optimism about the future than I had last New Year's Eve. Nonetheless, I'm celebrating my cancerversary small; just poking a superstitious toe into the festivities. No parties this year, just gratitude for the brilliance of modern medicine and for the love which has helped me step over the pebbles. Some people have to deal with cancer and other crises on their own and I can't begin to imagine how hard that must be. Being with my family around the gold star-bedecked table, clutching a tiddly wink cracker, brought me to tears this Christmas and not just because I burnt the pigs in blankets. I'm lucky to be here and my cancerversary is a time to give thanks for that.

September: first re-growth

Next year I hope to celebrate two years clear, then three and four and onto five. Five years is a milestone I pray to reach and a significant goal in the life of Grade 3 breast cancer. That's when we can really believe it's finished: every last stray cell gone, no new little blighters gaining strength and preparing to strike. December 27^th 2018 is going to be one heck of a party.

Meanwhile, I shall keep thanking my lucky stars for no signs of recurrence or secondaries. I shall keep checking - you must too, because early detection is your biggest weapon against cancer. Do it on the same day every month and then you won't forget. Boys! Enough sniggering at the back, you know you have to check yourself too, right?

2014: not all bad by any means...

And most of all I shall keep having fun because none of us know where our life is headed. In the inimitable words of the Cold Feet opening credits: Life's a journey, travel it well.

Please raise your glass with me for my cancerversary and here's to a happy and healthy 2015 for all of us!

Tuesday, 10 April 2012

Lucky Seven

Jane Rusbridge, author of the beautifully crafted, The Devil’s Music, who’s looking forward to the publication of her second novel, Rook, this August, (pre-ordered, of course) has kindly included me in her Lucky Seven list. You can find Jane on Twitter @JaneRusbridge and see her over at her gorgeous website http://www.janerusbridge.co.uk.

Lucky Seven is a bit of blogging fun where we extract seven lines from page seven or 77 of our Work In Progress and pray that at least one section will standalone as a piece of text. Then we challenge seven other writers to do the same.

The instructions for Lucky 7 are:

Go to page 7 or 77 in your current manuscript
Go to line 7
Post on your blog the next 7 lines, or sentences, as they are – no cheating!
Tag 7 other authors to do the same

My extract is taken from Glass Houses, my first completed manuscript which, after too many re-writes to count, is now in Submissionville again. Sprinkles of fairy dust are always much appreciated.

Line 7, page 77 of Glass Houses

Glass Houses is a novel about unlikely heroine, Tori Williams, whose life implodes after sending a text from the M62 motorway. Emerging a notorious public figure, Tori fights her way to a bold and improved existence. It’s just a shame her devoted husband isn’t on board...

After weeks spent recovering from the injuries sustained in the crash, there are rumours that Tori is soon to leave hospital and interest in her has piqued again. The press attention is frenzied and security has been stepped up. Carly is Tori’s loyal daughter and she’s upset by what she’s just overheard staff on the ward saying about her mother’s plight; even they think she should be wheeled straight out of hospital and into the arms of the prison service.

The third security guard, tub-shaped and with the faintest whiff of blonde hair on his head, the remainder on his chin, stood pressed against the closed door to Tori’s room.

He smiled. “Hello you!” Carly felt his eyes settle on her sunken shoulders and her tatty bag which trailed on the floor, hanging on the tips of her fingers by the long strap. “Hot topic,” he said, inclining his ear towards the rest of the ward. “It’ll pass, always does.”

Carly knew what people were saying, of course she did. She read the papers like everybody else. She leapfrogged photographers in her parents’ garden and turned on the radio to find phone-in debates handing out prison sentences like interest-free credit cards.

I was delighted to be given a second Lucky Seven tag by the talented Jan Marshall who I met on Twitter @Jan_Marshall and not only writes but produces cover art for fellow writers. You can learn more about her writing and see some of her designs here: www.designrelated.com.

This time I looked at my second Work In Progress, Misguidance. I will hold my hands up here and admit that I had to cheat as the sections on both page seven and seventy-seven were nothing more than a bunch of notes. The exercise was a reminder that Misguidance is very much a first draft and when I say I’m three-quarters of the way through my second manuscript, I am mindful that ‘manuscript’ is somewhat over-stating it and that ‘scribbles’ might be more accurate.

Still, I’m having great fun. I love this stage where the story is falling on to the page as fast as I can type and rather than break the flow, I quickly write a note to myself that should be ignored at peril – Check! What IS that word? Duplication! Plot hole! I think I must be tired! – and so the list goes on.

So, I hope you’ll forgive the slight deviation from the rules to allow me to jump to line seventeen as the first significant place (with seven in the title, of course) from page seventy-seven of Misguidance where I could find seven concurrent sentences.

Line 17, page 77 of Misguidance

Misguidance is about Evelyn Leonard and her disastrous life. Evelyn has made some big mistakes but was dealt a bad hand and when stranger, Sarah Bentley puts together the full picture, she is able to sympathise. Eventually Sarah creates the perfect opportunity for Evelyn to start to put the record straight.

Sarah and Cari, friend-cum-fellow-amateur-sleuth, are engaged in an awkward conversation with Bill, who has been working at Evelyn’s house following her largely unnoticed death, and who is extremely perturbed to have spotted Sarah ‘trespassing’ in the late Evelyn Leonard’s house.

“I mean it you know,” Sarah said pushing the biscuit tin under Bill’s nose and giving it a shake, “a building career. My parents would have a fit but I’d love a physical job; whistling at men as they walked by, an all year tan...”

“…muscle-bound, perfectly toned body,” Cari interjected, casting her eyes over Bill’s beer induced paunch. She dunked her biscuit into her tea, retrieved it moments before it dissolved.

Bill took another chocolate chip cookie, smiled in place of a thank you and explained that Cari might get a tan building villas in Spain but in this country, was more likely to get piss-wet-through. “Anyway,” he said, leaning back on his chair, hands clasped behind his head and giving his intertwined knuckles a good crack, “I’m not a builder, I’m a joiner and you girls can prattle on all you like about my line of work but I won’t leave this house until I know what you took from Mrs Leonard’s place.”

He leaned back across the table, planted his elbows firmly on top, slurped his tea.

Thanks again to Jane and Jan for thinking of me.

The Next Seven:
The seven writers I have chosen are: