Sam's BFF left Saturday night on the red-eye. What a week those two had, lots of fish and several bear encounters. Here's a link to a video of one, at about the 4.5 minute mark is when things start getting exciting. Lucky me chose to stay at the campground, so I missed the entire thing, thank goodness.
This is a black bear we saw our first night at the Russian River. The grizzly encounter was our last night there. OHMIGOSH is about all I can say.
During the week while I surveyed logging roads and did other fun work things, Sam and Brian hung out, fished, went to Seward, and basically seemed to have a good time overall. It definitely was good for both of them to spend quality time together.
The week prior Sam had his 2nd chemo treatment of Alimta and carboplatin. We did deal with the fatigue factor during the week and Sam was pretty darn grumpy at times, but we all survived. Sam spent a good deal of time explaining to Brian where he is at in his thought process regarding how he wants to be cared for when the time comes he is no longer able to care for himself. Needless to say, because Brian is not with Sam constantly and Sam is adamant about his way of thinking, there were some tense moments between them. It took some time for Brian to wrap his mind around where Sam currently is in his cancer journey and for Sam to relax and not be so insistent about making certain he got his point across, but in the end I think both realized no matter what, they are and always will be best friends and brothers. It was very sad to say good-bye to him.
Sam's doing pretty good although late last night he did tell me his fingers and hands are swollen. He experienced shortness of breath quite often over the last few days as well as feeling cold all over, too. From what I understand, these are all typical symptoms of lung cancer patients regardless of whether or not they are on chemo.
This last week we both celebrated our birthdays, another milestone we did not know if he would make or not, so they were true celebrations. The end of the month will be our 8th anniversary and since next week is board meeting week at work, we will probably celebrate over the weekend, either before or after, or perhaps both!
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| Wildfire-induced haze darkens the Alaskan sky above the Susitna river. July 19, 2012 Loren Holmes photo |
Alaska's sunsets are magnificent right now due to fires in Siberia and other east Asia countries. We tried to take some sunset photos but none turned out, so I borrowed this one from the Alaska Dispatch. Enjoy!
Ciao!
