Death Comedy Hour

June 10, 7:30 a.m.
I wake and it is dark. I reach out, open the curtain and see twinkling, shimmering, golden light through the stand of old pine trees. It is just dawn.

My eyes are heavy from a dream-filled sleep. Feels like I've been busy throughout the night with various characters and unexpected plot twists. I want to get up even though it's still an hour and half until Frank's first medication dose of the day. Instead, I lay still. Listening. Thinking.

It's been furiously hot these past forty eight hours. We retreat into the house each day by 11 a.m., with blinds down, curtains drawn, windows closed. While it spikes to 40c outside, it remains 24c inside our darkened cave. It's been too hot to cook. For the last two days we have lived on our first strawberry harvest, salad from the garden, sourdough bread with butter and jam, hot dogs, ice cream sandwiches. We have drunk 4 litres of lemonade so far. By nightfall, the inside of the house reaches 28 c.

It is cool and fresh this morning and the sun feels softer, less likely to burn a hole through the ground. I open all the windows again. The birds are back with their morning symphony of calls, songs, trills and screeches. I make coffee, grab my old Scottish mohair blanket (the one I bought at my favourite shop when I lived in Perthshire), and sit outside as the world wakes up. The big ginger dog that lives up the road starts to bark at his usual time. Rhubarb sleeps with Frank these days but she hears me and is now at the kitchen door. She scratches at the glass and I let her out. Good morning, baby girl! I missed you. She leans against me, snout in the air, listening, smelling; discerning who came through the property last night while we all slept soundly. Deer? Raccoon? Porcupine? Fox? Perhaps Bear? Yesterday I noticed a neighbour's garbage bin had been toppled over, the lid ripped off. A mess of plastic bottles, yogurt containers, slimy bags lay at the very edge of the road. Rhubarb will tell us soon enough if the bears are back. It's almost time for them to make an appearance.

It has been a blissfully slow week, made so by the heat and the absence of any medical appointments for Frank. Stage four cancer keeps a dying person busy. Blood tests. CT scans, appointments with the urologist, GP, VON, palliative care, cardiologist. Not to mention the weekly trips into town for medication pickup. I no longer carry his list of medications wherever I go. It's deeply etched into my neural pathways. I have memorized every name of every pill, the dosage, the schedule of when he takes them (7 am, 2 pm, 7 pm, 10 pm), the different combinations, possible side effects. I carry a naloxen overdose prevention kit with me if we are out because sudden reactive toxicity is a possible response to the amount of pain medication he is on. I've practiced injecting myself with an empty needle so that if it does happen I will be calm and gentle. 

I give him his various cocktails of 27 medications every single day without fail. Without a deviation of even 15 minutes. It is a regime of narcotics, cancer treatment medication and various other concoctions to stabilize his major organ functions. Frank is convinced this regimented time table is keeping him alive and pain free. He takes all of them without a complaint. He becomes obsessed with his blood test results. Asks me to check the various levels and what it means, how they compare to last months' results. It is a very fine tightrope that we walk every day.

I organize appointments, advocate when his needs are not being met, refill his medication once and sometimes twice a week at the pharmacy, meet with doctors, nurses, medical technicians, take copious notes at appointments so I can remind him (and myself) of what happened. I can't mess any of it up. 

And in between it all, I try to stay present to life. It is hard work sometimes. I knit, write, garden, cook healthy food, bake bread, speak with my children and grandchildren daily, care for my dog and cats, spend time whenever I can with my beautiful friend T, check-in with my elderly parents.

And all the while Frank's frail body, riddled with cancer cells, continues to function. His cognition slowly, slowly declines from both the cancer and the narcotics. Yet every day he rises, reads the newspapers, gets dressed, carefully walks his 2,000 steps whether in sunshine or rain, stacks some wood and sleeps deeply each afternoon. He does not deviate from this schedule..

I'm not dead yet! he replies when a friend calls and asks how he's doing. It shakes them into silence. But it's Frank's protest against this disease that wants to topple him. Sometimes he'll answer sardonically, dryly, The casket's been put away for a while. Or he'll say, I'm just circling the drain (my favourite!). And the other response, I'm only half dead right now! Death humour, he calls it. He makes me laugh every time because I know what a kick he gets out of it. Being outrageous is one of his superpowers and he uses it well.

You're actually denying a dying man a second ice cream sandwich? he protests when I refuse his request for another. Of course not! I just wanted to hear you cry, I say, playing into his game.

All deals are still on until the casket closes, he answers when someone asks if he's still selling old cars. There's a two-for-one special at the crematorium, he tells his oldest friend, B. Wanna split it with me? he asks. You're half crazy!! B replies and they laugh together until tears stream down their faces. I love to watch these interactions. It is Frank being Frank, a beautiful mischievous soul with a  quick and wicked sense of humour.

Why don't you just make me a pill sandwich, he says when I hand him his cocktail of 19 medications at 2 p.m. It'll save on lunch meat. I bend over in two, laughing so hard at this ridiculous but somewhat practical thought. Where do you get all these crazy lines? I ask. Do you just make them up in your sleep? Nah, he says, I've got a lifetime subscription to the Death Comedy Hour. But it's running out soon!

I love him deeply for this. The continual levity that he brings into this heartbreaking life will be one of his many legacies. But I know deep down inside, these days weigh heavily on him. How could they not? He is tired of the poking and prodding, the never-ending questions, the exhaustion that comes after his medical appointments. The nurses and doctors are charmed by him. He is always polite, friendly, even when tired or feeling unwell.  But it's his earthy, rough-around-the-edges authenticity that beguiles them. He is a paradox: a tender, vulnerable, dying man who still has the ability to disarm, both strangers and friends, with his beautiful smile and shock of white hair; his sly humour, twinkly blue eyes and dogged confidence. 

This thought makes me smile. I consider going back to bed; just another hour, I think. But the sun is now fully risen and it is time to get on with things. The day begins, once again.

Edinburgh, 2022