A day without orange juice is like a day that doesn't taste bad

Yesterday I walked around Green Lake with my friends Evonne and Zoe. Zoe and I competed for the coveted Best Head Covering award in the "I'm A Big Baby or I've Got Breast Cancer" category. The competition occured on the sidewalk outside Evonne's car as she was getting Zoe's stroller ready.

I won by a slim margin.

I did okay during the walk. I didn't get wobbly, wasn't in pain, and didn't hurl on all the migratory mergansers in the lake. This was gratifying.

When I ride my bicycle to work, I don't have to think about getting exercise. Seattle is a city of hills, and there's no way for me to get home or work without pedaling up hills. Now that I'm not pedaling, I need to find other ways to exercise. This is too bad, because other than pedaling, I'm sloth-like.

I'm gaining weight because I'm not pedaling. During a lunch break last week, I walked down to the newly-remodeled Starvation Army and bought a bunch of pants and sweaters. The pants are in a size larger than I normally wear. I'm okay with this. I'm 51 years old and know my looks aren't going to get better, they'll just become more settled in and comfy. I also know that as soon as this strange trip is over, I'll be back on my bicycle.

This morning, my orange juice tasted weird. It definitely did not taste like orange juice. It was an odd flavor, kind of off-putting. I was told or read somewhere that some things might taste different as a result of chemotherapy.

Last week I had mouth sores, and anything acidic or spicy hurt my mouth and tongue. This is unfortunate, because pretty much everything I eat is acidic or spicy. I had to give away a grapefruit last week, which broke my heart. And, I make my work week's lunches on Sunday. Typically, it's brown rice, tofu or tempeh and some greens. I usually make the tofu or tempeh pretty spicy, and I'm having a hard time breaking the habit.

On one particularly bad mouth sore day, I had to concentrate to speak correctly. I felt a little like Kramer in "The Jimmy Episode" of Seinfeld.

The first two times that my husband I met with my oncologist in his exam rooms, both rooms had a poster about breast cancer that got our attention. It was well-illustrated. We kiddingly wondered if anyone would notice if we took it.

It had two wheels on the outside edges that turn to show stages of breast cancer and how breast ducts are changed when they become cancerous.

The first time I saw the poster was after I was diagnosed and before surgery. I understood everthing the poster communicated, and appreciated the visual simplicity with which it illustrated the female breast, breast ducts, the chest muscle wall and the complexity of lymph nodes.

During the second visit, after the oncologist left and when we were consulting with the Nursigator, we asked if there was any way we could get a copy of the poster. She said we could borrow the one in the room. Without hesitating, we removed it from the wall and carefully took it home. It now hangs on the outside of our bathroom door and it continues to impress me.