Days in the City

Dear family and friends,

It was lovely getting back to our place in the City, which looks very good to us. Ricardo, one of the doormen, met me with a hug and kiss and Merwin with a hug. It does make one feel welcome. All the breaking of walls in our apartment to fix water pipes (a job done throughout the building) is just about invisible to Merwin and completely invisible to me. Eunice, rcommended by Jak, another one of the doormen, did a good job of cleaning the place after our almost 3-month absence, since breaking my pubis ramus bone on March 16th. This is the first time we hired a helper for cleaning.

After naps we got ready for the writing group by opening the dining room table, taking out a couple of folding chairs and the like. We were serving pizza, and others were bringing such things as salad (from Barbara's garden, picked that morning), wine from Jay and Joe, and some gorgeous tarts from the bakery down the street from Hedda and Toby. We all read, and as usual we enjoy the variety of writing we all do. It's a loving group. To speed things up (so as not to wear me out), we ate and read at the same time. Merwin had been reading in the library while we were meeting but returned to get some pizza—and then for a FIRST in our group I think, the group invited him to stay, eat and listen. That was lovely.

As my group was leaving, we noticed that our neighbor Chris was coming out of his apartment next door. Their buyer had been approved by the board that evening, so Chris and his wife are moving the remainder of their things out. I asked to see it, and he let me in. Much larger than ours: It has a full kitchen and a tiny bedroom, but a huge living room with the same view we have--but on two sides, not just North. The buyer is a woman who will be using it as a pied-a terre. Our neighbor on the other side, Lena, was happy to see us. I had knocked on her door to let her know we were back when we first arrived.

Then on Thursday after breakfast and some chores in the apartment, we traveled by cab to Mount Sinai. The whole experience took about 3 1/2 exhausting hours, only a little of which was spent waiting, maybe less than a quarter of the time: procedures took up most fo teh time, and chatting about how we were doing. We both had blood work, and I had an EKG and the bone marrow biopsy, followed by a further set of bloods. Everyone who has done this to me (for me?) has done it differently. Dr. Mascarenhas prides himself on his slow pace and his attention to details that will avoid or at least minimize pain. What was most different was that people were walking around the room, Amy the nurse practitioner and coordinator of the trial, called CEP701, seemed to wander in and out. A nurse was around. A male nurse practitioner was in and out. Merwin decided to stay to hold my hand. I was not selected to be part of a study to see what hypnosis could do to minimize the apparent pain of the procedure, but I agreed to answer some questions anyway by two social workers who were on the team. Grand Central Station. I think all this movement and activity minimizes one's attention on the biopsy itself. Finally, we were told we were good to go and could make appointments for the next three weeks. Each session should be much shorter than this one because all I'll need is blood work and the CEP700 dose. Somewhere along the line there will be a scan to see how my spleen is doing. It is already smaller than it was at its greatest.

The worst news of the day was that though I will be finished with prednisone in about a month, the effects can last a year or more. I am sick of this apple-on-a-stick body, and, though many people consider my fat rosy cheeks an improvement, I cannot recognize the image that I see in the mirror.

Many more details of course to record for these last two days, but time to move on.

Wishing you all health, wealth and happiness,

Love,
Bernice