Back to the simple life part 2

So in my previous post I spoke about my wifes unhappiness about living in such a small village because she is a city girl at heart, as it turns out my assumption as to why she was unhappy wasnt entirely accurate.

Her biggest issue is the simple fact that there are no grocery stores here and no entertainment either other than the bar, her point being is that you have to drive for 30 minutes to the nearest city to get groceries or to have a family night/day out or to do pretty much anything, which as she says isnt so bad during the summer, but is not a good or safe thing in the winter as the roads are often closed for days at a time.

She actually does enjoy the country life, its just the severe lack of everything out here that makes her not so keen on living out here, having to drive 30 minutes (often in snowstorms and blizzards)down an icy highway to get to work and back is not a pleasant experience for her (or anyone really).

The thing is Pense is a bedroom community, people live here and work elsewhere, there really is next to nothing here, yet when we went to Maryfield (my home town) , it to is a small village but it has a proper grocery store,a small restaurant,a movie theater,and a pool hall/bar/hotel, it also has a school that goes all the way to grade 12 ,unlike here where the school only goes to grade 8.
Maryfield also has a spring and fall fair, and a mid summer antique farm show that draws farmers and visitors for miles around,they have a library,fitness center,2 retirement homes,a gas station,hardware store and a few little family shops that sell crafts and such, and Maryfield retains its young people, meaning most kids who grow up there end up returning later in life to raise their families.

My wifes point is she would like to live there as there are things to do there, there are even job opportunities there,unlike here in Pense that has non of that. Her major sticking point is the fact if we moved to Maryfield we wouldnt have to travel so much, especially in winter.

She makes a good argument, I am home sick for my hometown, most of my pleasant childhood memories are of there in Maryfield, the problem is , it will take me another 7.5 years to pay off the property we have here in Pense, even if I were to sell now, we wouldnt have much money in pocket to start over as most would go to the bank to pay off the loan.

Theres that and the other fact, we have alot of shit!, a camper, a pair of off road bikes, 3 vehicles, I have a 30x30 work shop full of tools,then theres the contents of a 3 bedroom house and a utility trailer, the tractor the lawn tractor, the tillers etc. Sure I could sell most of it off and start over, but the chances of getting the money invested in these things back are slim.

Even our son says hes up for a move and wouldnt mind starting over in Maryfield, my little family planted the seeds of change in my head, made some valid arguments for leaving here to move to Maryfield, tugged on my emotional heart strings, and made me thankful that they didnt say they wanted to move to a city..... hard to resist their desires, and so I am giving it serious thought.

So thats where we are at, I will keep you posted on this, and yall will be the first to know if I decide to say screw it and move my family down to Maryfield, after all, if you have learned anything about me through these blogs, you know that I am all about Family and keeping them happy at any cost.

Butch
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When life Beats you down……… Video

Sometimes Life just Beats you down to your breaking point and beyond, it’s those times when humor comes in handy, I’ve always sung this little song for years when I need a little relief from life or people or events that beat me down, it’s a catchy little tune and speaks volumes, and there is no foul language involved.

I hope this at least brings a smile to you and perhaps even a chuckle once you realize what it is the song implies.





Remember folks, Express your love often, Never take tomorrow for granted, and be kind to others.

Butch
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A typical day in the Life of Butch …

I speak often with great fondness about the little village I live in , I talk about how peaceful it is, how friendly and supportive it is, a great place to live…and it’s all that and oh so much more, it’s like a little slice of a Utopian oasis hidden out in the middle of nowhere Saskatchewan, it is *My* Utopia , it’s not for everyone, and that fact comes painfully clear come spring… see what I didn’t say about my village is , every spring we are up to our asses in mud…. there is only 1 paved road here, Mainstreet , all other streets and driveways are made of clay base and gravel … if I had to describe this place in 1 sentence to a visitor in spring this is what I’d say…. we have a church,school, arena,general store, bar/hotel…and we have Mud… Lord do we ever have Mud!! … that about sums up my village.

Now every spring my backyard floods , I am talking you can hop in my canoe and paddle around the yard flood (seriously ) so I was up at 7:30 am this morning, in my pajamas and rubbers (rain boots for those that don’t speak Canadian) standing in 2 feet of water setting up both water pumps (I borrowed a second pump from my neighbour) in hindsight perhaps I should have had a couple cups of coffee to wake up and clear my brain before setting up the pumps… Because…. Like a dumb ass that I can be , the pumps are electric , so I am standing in 2 feet of water with 2 plugged in and very live extension cords squeezed between my thighs as I primed the pumps , holding a metal 2 gallon pail.

I couldn’t put the power cords down in the water or …. well I would have killed every frog within a 150 foot radius and taken myself out in the process , remember I’d only been awake for about 10 minutes, no coffee and not thinking, so what to do, the pumps are now running , I fill the bucket with water so it won’t float away and gingerly balance the power cords on it and wade back to the house …. ( I’m not the sharpest tack in the box when I first wake up) I later went out and replaced the bucket with a couple sawhorses and tacked a nail on either side of the power cords so they don’t slip off into the water.

I cleaned up had coffee and Hammy and I went to church, after church I got talking with a friend who invited Hammy and I to go spend some time with him and his family at his cabin in Manitou Beach! … aside from a mini summer vacation (which Hammy and I need) and spending time with a good friend, Manitou Beach is one of only 3 salt water lakes on earth… of course everyone knows of the big one …The Dead Sea ( bet you didn’t know it is not a sea at all, it is a lake) … the second is in Czechoslovakia, and the third is right here in Saskatchewan Canada (Manitou lake) it’s the only saltwater lake in North America , so that’s really awesomely cool!

After church it was back home, feed the kidlet, do the dishes, get the laundry started and then out to change the tires on the Mighty Cavalier , I finally got that lug nut off, actually my neighbour came over with a couple tools and we broke the stupid aluminum cap off the actual lug nut ( why they put those on beats the hell out of me) once we got that cap off ( it was rounded so the tire iron couldn’t get a grip on it) , with a couple curse words and some heavy prying with the tire iron we got the lug nut off, after that escapade my neighbour went home and I jacked up the car and changed the dang tire ( only took a month to get it done) , about that time my dang back went out ( I’m getting old) I quickly decided that the other tire could wait til tomorrow , I’ve gone 1 month without a vehicle, 1 more day won’t kill me.

then it was in to make supper for the kidlet ( with a back that is killing me slowly) , shower and now I’m back in my pajamas just relaxing.

This is a typical day for me, toss in work and my life couldn’t get anymore exciting lol , it’s country living, time means nothing out here, things get done on their own good time, life is slow and quiet here, not fast paced and noisy like the cities, where you gonna go out here? north field or south field? for a change of pace I take the dog for a walk down the grid roads (gravel roads) we go a couple miles then turn around and wander home again, to me this is about as close to Heaven as I can get while living.

Well that’s all I got for tonight folks, so Remember:express your love often, never take tomorrow for granted, and be kind to others.

Butch
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My Wife and our Life with Cancer sorry for the lengthy post

So over all my Wife has been doing well, she has had a few set backs, last Thursday she was physically sick, puking and had a bad head ache, she slept most of the day and was feeling better Friday. I am pretty sure her sickness was due to too much medication, she takes 20mgs of Morphine twice per day as well as 10mgs of Oxycodone twice per day, on top of that she took a 10mg Valium in hopes it would help relax her leg and let her sleep, I think it was just too much for her system.

Her left leg has been really bothering her, the most likely cause is fluid build up (there is a medical term for this, and it is quite common, but since I am writing this offline, I can’t look it up),anyway her leg has been bothering her for almost 2 weeks, I did take her to the Doctor and he gave her a couple Cortisone needles with anaesthetics in her leg, it helped her a little bit and on Tuesday she goes for an ex-ray on her leg, just to be sure it is not cancer.

As for her Lung Cancer, so far it is not bothering her, she still mostly just uses her oxygen at night while sleeping, she rests a lot during the day but says her lungs are not hurting and she has no shortness of breath. She has been off Chemo for 5 months now and seems to be doing well, her CT-Scan happens February 4th , we should know the results by the 6th the latest, I am praying that it hasn’t spread further and hope that the Holistic treatments are working to shrink the tumors.

She has remained in good spirits, which is important, she is a strong willed woman who won’t give up, I am pretty sure the main reason she pulled through when the Doctors said notify the family is quite simply her Son “Hammy” , he is her entire world, she was born to be a Mom and a great Mother she is, she loves him more than life itself and that is what I believe keeps her going.

Yes I am sure she loves me as well, but it’s not the same, nor could it ever be, the Bond between a Mother and child is extremely strong and endures through time, and that bonded love is very different than the love and bonds of a spouse/partner, just as I love her and our Son on different levels, it can never be the same, but despite that difference, I’d do absolutely anything for both of them without question.

I’d do anything to have my Wife live to grow old with me, to be there when our son graduates, to be there when he becomes a Cop, to be there at his wedding, to be there to see our future grand children and to help me spoil them rotten, I’d give my very soul if it meant she lives to be old, as it is, none of this will probably come to fruition with her at my side so all I can do is cherish each day that I have with her, to constantly let her know that I LOVE her and will be okay and that I can raise our son to be the man she always dreamed he’d be, all I can do is be there in the here and now with her, there are no more future plans together, it is all down to just one simple day at a time, and I’ll take that if it means she can be here at my side just a while longer.

February 14th will be our 18th Anniversary, I am quite confident that we BOTH will be here to celebrate that milestone together, this year I can’t afford much in the way of a lavish gift, but I do have my Great Grand Mother’s Ruby and Emerald ring, I am taking it to a Jeweler to see if maybe I can do a partial trade on a small diamond ring or maybe just maybe have it turned into a nice necklace for her, I wish I could do more for her but the damn furnace just took too much even on payments, it’s a formidable bill.

I will make her her absolute favorite dinner and our son has volunteered to be our waiter , he will help make the meal too, then her and I will have a candle light dinner after which I will get down on my knee , giver her the gift and 18 red roses and tell her EXACTLY how much I love her, how much she means to me, how happy she has made me all these years and let her know that I have no regrets.

I honestly don’t know how many more Anniversaries I will have with her so I cherish the one coming up now, that’s pretty much my reality now…. just one day at a time, make no plans for the future and hope and pray for the best, I don’t really like the uncertainty of one day at a time,but really….what choice do I really have?

The only regret I have is that Hammy has witnessed the pain and suffering Cancer has caused his Mother, that I couldn’t protect him from seeing his Mom at her lowest point, that last spring I had to sit down on the back steps with him and tell him that his Mother may not survive the night, that she may be called to God’s side in Heaven….. I pray for every person reading this, that none of you will ever have to have THAT talk with a child, it is a very gut wrenching soul searing hard thing to do, to look a child in the eyes and tell them that their Mother/Father/Parent may die. That conversation damned near killed me, but it had to be done, he had and still has the right to know the truth and the facts, to not tell him would be to lose his trust completely, to not tell him would be an outright lie even by omission, to not tell him could have made him resentful, it could and probably would have made him HATE for the first time in his life, and could have led to problems with drugs or alcohol. As hard as it was, I had that very conversation with him.

Like me, Our Son is aware of just how serious this could get, it has changed all our lives, not just my wife’s, Cancer is like that, it infects and permeates around and within everyone who is involved with the person who has the actual disease, it takes over everyone’s lives not just the Patient, all you can do is go on living your lives as best as you can knowing the Cancer is still there and probably always will be, you try and work around it but you can never truly avoid it, it’s always there, just silently watching and waiting, you try to remain positive and even ignore the cancer, still it’s in your worst nightmares,it’s in the eyes of your child when he sees his Mom is not feeling well, it’s inside your head as you change the oxygen tanks and help your wife clean herself, it’s always there, even on good days when your wife is happy and bright eyed and has energy to spare, a sudden coughing spell and the blood on her lips Snap you back to the stark reality of Cancer, like an insidious demon from hell it latches onto entire families and slowly, ever so slowly strangles the life out of everyone.

You beg and plead with your God not to take her away from you and the boy, you bargain you say and do anything to buy more time, just one more Day please please please, just one more day, you fall to your knees and beg for strength and mercy to carry on to be strong for your wife, to be strong for your son, you give false hope, not meaning to or wanting to, you tell her that it’s going to be okay, she just has to stay strong and fight the Cancer, that she can do this and that you will be there every step of the way fighting alongside her, you tell her no matter what happens that you will never give up turn away or stop loving her, you bare your very soul for God and the world to see, your heart is permanently tattooed on your shirt sleeve, you are exposed to mental and emotional pain, you weep when someone you don’t even know dies of cancer, you rejoice when someone you don’t even know survives, you spend hundreds of hours researching alternative medicines and therapies that you might try with your wife, you network like crazy searching out those who have fought or are fighting for their lives against this evil vile disease, you do this without ever being asked, you do it out of love and fear, the love you have and want to continue to have with your wife, the fear , the constant fear of losing your soul mate, losing the only woman you have ever truly loved, fear of becoming a single parent and having to pick up the shattered life of a young son and carry on. Through all this turmoil, you learn quickly to appreciate each day that you have as a complete family,you are grateful and thankful each morning that you wake up and she is there at your side, Tomorrows never come when your living with cancer,today is all that matters.

I’ll stop now sorry for the long post, thanks for your time, Remember folks: express your love often,never take tomorrow for granted, and be kind to others.

Butch.
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Life goes on and other Ramblings from the prairies

Lately Mother Nature has been trying to Kill me again , it’s an ongoing battle between her and I , she calls it my come uppance, I call it Karma …. see I used to drive a huge behemoth of a Ford Bronco 4X4 ( full size not the pansy little one ) , yep it was a BEAST , had a 8 inch lift ( which was funny watching my wife trying to climb in to it , I had to lift Hammy in to it ) and had monster 32’s (wheels) on it, Mud Boggin tires not really suited for the highway, anyway it had an Ozone frying 351 Cleveland done to the nuts power plant, and it got a whopping 11 miles to the gallon highway and about 5 miles to the gallon in the city…. yep it was my TOY, my BABY, I had it for 7 years and had about 10 grand in upgrades into it, never thought twice about burning up the Ozone, and I am sure that while goofing off in Jenkins mud pit I contributed heavily to Global warming…. which is why Mother Nature is p!ssed at me and out to kill me!

To say the last couple days have been hot is a drastic understatement !! keep in mind I am from the great white north where it gets cold enough to kill penguins ! … this heat wave is absolutely killing me!! it’s been so hot the Devil himself stuck his head out of a gopher hole and said D@mn ! it’s hotter than Hades up here!! …. I can handle 20 to 23 degrees Celsius with just a mild case of the sweats and about a gallon of ice water every 20 minutes or so , but this!! THIS!! 31.4 Celsius !! (88.52 Fahrenheit) is gonna be the absolute death of me!! too hot too too hot!! and it will eventually get to 35 – 38 – 40 Celsius by mid July ( about 104 Fahrenheit), I am sure Mother Nature is enjoying watching me nearly pass out working in this heat! it’s payback for driving that ozone frying global warming Bronco !!

I’ve been busy outdoors helping a friend get his yard fixed up the way his wife wants it, that right there is a comedy of errors, he has MS and is slower than molasses in January, but I admire him because he doesn’t let it stop him from doing what needs to be done. I have a bad back that likes to crap out at the worst possible moments , that and fibromyalgia makes for a lovely day at the best of times, the 2 of us are in great shape! (NOT) lol , but we muddle through helping each other and we get things done eventually.

So anyway , we are almost done his yard, when I am done at his house, I come home and work in my own yard, usually in my veggie garden, I am at war with the weeds, and I fear the weeds are currently winning , everything is coming up now except my corn, cucumbers, and pumpkins , hopefully those start popping up in the next week or so.

I am seriously toying with the idea of leaving my part time job at my other friends bar/hotel, heck I only make $10 an hour there and only work on average 4 hours a night 3 or 4 nights per week, the tips are good though, not often a Cook gets tips but I do, $50 here $50 there , but it’s not really the money that’s an issue ( I still run my yard maintenance business, and haul scrap so it ain’t like I’m sitting on my @ss doing nothing) I am semi retired…. by that I mean I only work as much as I want/need too, and I always have a couple irons in the fire, the only time I actually sit on my @ss and do next to nothing is winter ( at minus 45 I ain’t stepping out for nothing or nobody) …. why would i be entertaining the idea of leaving the bar/hotel….. because it’s summer and that kitchen is wicked hot, and it’s not so fun anymore, my friend keeps adding to my job list and those 4 hours are starting to stretch into 5 and 6 hours , it’s just not worth it to me to be away from my son for that long almost every night now, so i haven’t been answering my phone when my friend calls, and I won’t until I decide 1 way or the other what it is I want to do.

I got into the scrap business with another friend, he has a 5 ton tilt deck truck, so I invested and became a partner , I don’t own half of his business, but enough to earn a 6040 split ( he gets 60 I get 40) it generates a nice little income for me and I am learning new things so it is fun for me.

perhaps my greatest iron in the fire is , and this is so simple it’s ridiculous, I build large wooden construction waste bins , and rent them out to the local construction companies that come out here to build/renovate houses ( way cheaper than renting a big metal loras bin) and I haul it away with my friends 5 ton truck , and replace it with an empty one, the scrap wood they throw into it , I take out and what I can’t use for various small projects, I cut up into 1 foot lengths and sell it off for firewood! very little ends up in the landfill, most of it ends up in the village folks fire pits , I don’t just supply this village, I also supply 4 others , same goes with my yard maintenance business, I do 4 other communities not just my own.

I like being my own boss, I pick and choose my hours, work at my own pace and am always keeping a weathered eye on the horizon for new ventures . I am by no means rich and at times live paycheck to paycheck, most times with all my irons in the fires, I generate enough to take the winter off and enjoy my days at home.

I save money where I can , I bought an old 100+ year old home that was a fixer upper for less money than most spent on a down payment for a new huge Mcmansion home , I drive older cars, and do a lot of horse trading ( bartering) for things I need or want , my furniture is used , but nice, and I have some antiques as well as home made stuff , I chose quite simply to pursue life and personal happiness over monetary gain , I do plan on eventually going completely off the grid, I want to install solar panels and 2 small wind turbines on my house and generate my own power, I will stay hooked to the corporate power for only one reason…. to put electricity back onto the grid ( they actually pay you for doing that) I won’t make millions or even thousands doing that, but even if I get a check for $50 or $100 per month from the power company…. well thats $50 or $100 extra a month I didn’t have before!

I know I have a nice shiney new high efficiency furnace , but eventually i want to turn that off too for good, just keep it as a back up, I’d like to upgrade my little wood burning fireplace to a high efficiency pellet fireplace, heat the whole house with that ( my house is under 900 square feet split level) replace the gas water heater ( it’s a rental) with an electric which will be powered via solar/wind … most likely a rental again, because if it craps out it gets replaced free and is not my problem. The only area I’d have trouble stepping off the grid is the water supply, yes I have about a 20,000 gallon cistern , but that hasn’t been used for anything in about 50 years , except for spuds, I put potatoes down there for cold storage , I would have to make sure it didn’t leak before even attempting to use it for water, then there’s the issue of …where do i get the water? …. digging a well in the village is frowned upon big time. course I could fill it with rainwater and meltwater and use it for the toilet , run it through some filters and it could be hooked up to supply the entire bathroom , the garden and for watering the lawn etc. and just use the village water for drinking that would cut my water bill down to next to nothing. ( I will have to ponder this awhile)

So anyway my kidlet is off on a 3 day camping trip with his school , so it is just me , the 4 cats and the dog for the next few days, which means for 3 days I don’t have to wait for him to get off the computer , I have a laptop up in my bedroom, but we only have 1 wireless turbo stick .

So that’s all for tonight, Remember Folks:express your love often, never take tomorrow for granted, and be kind to others.

Butch
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Then and now just thoughts on life

I have been reading a few blogs, actually many blogs from around the world, it really hits home when I read that LGBTQ folks in places outside Canada do not have the same rights and freedoms that I now take for granted.
We didn’t always have equality here, back in the 1980’s and early 1990’s I was there marching along side everyone else striving for equality and justice for all regardless of sexual orientation or gender.

It truly saddens me when I read of other countries that deny basic human rights and freedoms to LGBTQ folks, it saddens me even more when they use Religion as an excuse to discriminate against others, they can hide behind their Bibles, but it is just a front for Homophobia.

All this makes me glad to be a Canadian, my generation and those before me do know and understand the fight it took to get us to where we are at now, sadly the younger generations have no idea about their history, ask any youngun about Stone Wall and most will gaze back at you blankly (yes even up in Canada we know about Stone Wall)

So anyway our collective histories from around the globe, those who still struggle and fight for equality and those who are blessed to have found their equality kind of made me start thinking of my life, not just the distant past , but currently and a wee bit into the future, it got me thinking about how I view others and how we are viewed, about how we live our lives now.

Back in the day when I was still fighting for my rights and wanting to be treated as an equal to everyone else, I was “out and proud” I mean I pretty much advertised my sexuality, I showed disdain for anyone who objected to me being queer, I owned the word queer and every time someone yelled Queer at me , I’d yell Damn Right and Proud right back, I made no bones about it at work either, personally I think my employers were both amused and frightened of me hahaha

Now I am here , 2014, I have my rights freedoms and equality, I am legally married to the woman of my dreams, together we are raising a kid, and really my life has become for the lack of a better term…. normal!
My life and family quite literally mirror your average heterosexual family and I am not sure if I should be happy about that or worried? I mean I and millions of others got exactly what we fought for…. equality, now what?

I mean 10 to 15 years ago I took nothing for granted and I always stood out from the crowds, now I blend in and pretty much take everything in life for granted, I live in a country where being anything other than heterosexual is considered perfectly normal, we are your typical family next door and people in this village of 500 folks treat us as such, I wonder if they would have done the same oh let’s say 20 years ago?

Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the country I live in , but I wonder is this it? all that fighting and protesting and educating for this? what was I expecting? I got exactly what I wanted and still wonder …is this it?

My fight is pretty much over, I fit in now and have all my human rights and equality, however that doesn’t mean I can stop being active and grow complacent, the LGB folks may have won, but the Trans gendered folks haven’t yet won, are we as a society just going to leave these folks to fight on their own? or are we all willing to take a stand and fight for EVERYONE, no person left behind.

The suicide attempts and successes are among the highest in the Trans gendered community, a staggering 46% will attempt to end their lives, and even if just one succeeds, that’s too many, everyone straight and gay, feminist or not must rally and come together to help the Transgendered community gain their rights and freedoms.
if we sit back and do nothing to help, we are then by our very nature no better than those who objectify and oppress the Transgendered community.

for those of you who now take your rights and freedoms for granted, don’t ever forget your roots, and do not allow the trans gendered to be oppressed, we are all one , united we stand and united we fall , just think about it sometime, your actions and words may just mean the difference between life and death for someone else, like wise, your inaction may have dire consequences for someone.

I’ll step off my soap box now, I didn’t mean to have the blog post turn out the way it did, it started off as a simple way back when and now post , then sort of took on a life of it’s own.

Remember folks, express your love often, never take tomorrow for granted and be kind to others

Butch
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The simple side of life

Happy Independence Day to everyone in the USA !! God Bless you,may you once again become a world leader and champion of all that is Right and Just.

Canada Day was July 1st, being that we live out in the countryside I purchased and fired off fireworks, of course they werent as good as the professional fireworks in the cities, but hey, they were pretty and there were no major mishaps,fires or unwanted mayhem.

Today was a day of getting back to basics,remembering where we were and where we are now, today was a day to get back to the simple country living that we have come to enjoy for the past 6 odd years or so.
Keep in mind that my Wife is a city gal, born and raised in Calgary Alberta,she has lived in the big city for 32 years of her life,try to picture the culture shock and general shock of leaving a big noisy fast paced city of 1.2 million people and moving to the outskirts of a small village with less than 500 people,where the only noise is cows mooing or coyotes howling! there is a small bar here, always dead except for friday nights when all the rowdy young farm boys come to town to drink gamble and swap stories about who has the biggest baddest truck in these here parts, the village also has a gas station which doubles as the local liquor store,convenience store,and greyhound bus stop ( though the bus rarely stops here), there is also a post office( mail arrives around 10:30am and gets sorted sometime before 4pm (closing time), there is an Anglican church,a hockey rink with a small curling rink attached, and a school that goes from kinder-garden to grade 8 (the kids have to bus it to the city to attend high school) and thats about it.

My wife misses the city life,she misses the transit system,she misses the large crowds and multiple shopping stores and malls,and after 6 years out here in the country she is still blind to all the beauty and freedom and safety that comes with living out here, I know if I ever hit the lottery or sold our property she would demand to move back to the stinking crime ridden big city.

I am hurt, wounded,and now uncertain of my future,our sons future, I am saddened by the fact that we live in an almost paradise and my wife is blind to it and doesnt want to be here at all, yes the winters here in Saskatchewan are brutal, minus 40 degrees and over 6 feet of snow are the normal here in winter, and they are long winters too, 6 months straight, last winter it was 7 months straight! even I get fed up with the winters, but I always stop and think we usually get 6 months of hot summer too so it balances out.

Overall it is like a personal utopia here that Ive spent 6 years building for my wife and son, you wont see deer or moose in your yard in the middle of the city, you dont hear the coyotes sing their lonesome songs,nor hear the bull frogs and crickets, you cant tame down a raccoon in the city and have your morning coffee out on the deck wearing nothing but a tee shirt and boxers without a neighbor bitching, in the city you can only have as many hobbies/toys as your garage or parking space will allow, here in the country we have all kinds of toys, a camper, 3 vehicles, a pair of off road bikes a snowmobile etc, good luck using half that crap in the city never mind trying to park it all, here you can walk for miles and breathe fresh flower scented air, the folks are friendly and actually stop and talk to you, try leaving your car, garage and house unlocked over night or while your out in the city, cant do it or youd be robbed blind, here you can and we often do as do most others in the village.

Here in the country you can sit out and watch the stars and actually see them, all of them, cant do that in the city,the bright lights blind the stars,thunder storms are awesome out here in the country,scary and invigorating at the same time, most of the storms are lost in the cities, hard to watch the lightening show when theres a hundred story skyscraper blocking your view.

here our kid is free to roam where ever he pleases,everyone knows him and if he gets into mischief ,we know about it before he gets home and can deal with it, cant let your kid have that kind of freedom in the city, no shootings stabbings robbery in the country, all that and more in the city.

Im hurt because we have worked hard to get ourselves out here so our son could be free and so we could get away from the crime found in the cities, I dont wish to give what we have up just to have multiple shopping options, we can drive to the city for a day of shopping without having to actually live there.

I am pretty sure I would whither up and eventually die of a broken heart if I had to move back to a city, our son feels the same, yet my wife doesnt seem to care, she wants the city and is not happy here at all, I am caught between a rock and a hard place, and hope that her and I can resolve this, the negativity is killing me.


guess thats all for now

Butch
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Despite the Cancer life has to go on

My Wife has been feeling really good lately, all last week and this week so far she has been almost back to her happy former self, she can’t work or go for her long walks but she does go outside and sit on the deck we built together last summer, she putters around the house doing light house keeping, she is back to cooking suppers for Hammy (our son) and I, and gosh let me tell you….my Wife really knows her way around a kitchen! that girl can cook!

This may sound mundane to you the reader, but these simple things that we all take for granted are a very big accomplishment for my Wife, just 4 short months ago we found out she had stage 4 lung cancer, the prognosis wasn’t good, we were told to make final arrangements quickly as she only had 3 to 6 months to live.

We are now on the 4th month, and after 2 rounds of Chemo her health as improved….well okay I am sure her health hasn’t improved, it’s her quality of life that has improved, needless to say we do NOT take tomorrow for granted, we cherish each day, good or bad and pray for just 1 more day together.

Tomorrow she goes back to the Cancer center to be evaluated and booked in, by Friday they will have a bed ready and she will go in for her 3rd and final round of Chemo, after that they want to give her a CT Scan to see what the Chemo has done (if anything) , if it has done what they hope it has, the Doctors will figure out the next step, if that step is more Chemo or surgery we just don’t know yet, and we won’t know until after that CT Scan.

So now that my Wife has been feeling better and is able to be on her own for a couple hours, I have been playing catch up on my spring chores, such as digging my 1 ton work van out of my sisters yard where I parked it last fall, the ground went soft with the spring melt and hence, the van sank right up to it’s bumpers! I did get it out after a half day of digging and pulling with the Kubota (tractor), had to jump start the van as the winter killed the battery. After that I came home dusted off my Wife’s little red car and put the battery charger on it for a couple hours, battery is charged but the serpentine belt broke, so that is on my “to do” list, replace the belt.

Life has to go on despite the Cancer, I have been stealing an hour here and an hour there to putter in the flower gardens, I have been planting giant sunflowers (well hopefully they will be giants when they grow) , I have a great fondness for sunflowers, why I do not know, I have a wide variety of seeds to plant yet,

I enjoy gardening, both flower and veggie gardening, as does my Wife, this year it’s all me doing the seeding and her telling me what goes where exactly, I don’t mind, she always has been and always will be “The Boss” , I am not too prideful or too Butch to admit that my Wife is indeed the Boss, even while sick she runs the house, she manages the budgets and lets me know what bill needs to be paid, she makes out the shopping list and I follow it faithfully, she lets me know when Hammy needs new clothes etc, as I said she is the Boss, she is an organized person who likes lists and budgets, I am more of a just “wing it” kind of person.

I never once attempted to take any sort of control of the house away from her, even when she is so sick she can’t get out of bed, instead I just pick up where she left off and take care of things and when she starts feeling better I hand over the reigns back to her.

anyway, it is late, thank you for letting me ramble (blogging is therapy for me), remember to express your love often, and never take tomorrow for granted. Peace be with you all

Butch
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You have to take the bad with the good and not let life get you down

So basically , if it wasn’t for bad luck I’d have no luck at all…. this is the story of my life so I have learned to always try to find something good in a bad situation.

For instance, our son had a brain tumor last year and had surgery to remove it, yep that’s pretty bad, but the good news is, he survived and one year later is almost back to 100% normal (what ever normal is)

This last February my wife was diagnosed with stage 4 (end stage) Lung Cancer, that’s really bad…. the good news is that it’s going on 8 months and she is still alive and doing remarkably well (the chemo has helped greatly)

After those 2 major life events you’d think anything and everything else would be irrelevant or just peanuts, normally I would agree and leave it at that. How ever life and time keeps marching on, problems arise in day to day living that present their own set of challenges.

For instance, Last month I obtained a 2006 chevy aveo that my wife dubbed “Ladybug” (I traded a big Butch van for this), I drove the new car for 2 weeks then the computer went wonky and the new car suddenly doesn’t run so well and has been getting repairs as time and finances allow over the last few weeks, The good news : my old car (a 91 cavalier) runs great and I have been able to stay on the road (good thing too cause we live 30 miles from the nearest city)

Yesterday I had to drive out to Dallas Valley (a kids camp) and pick up our son, no problem it’s only 200 kilometers round trip, now the grid road that leads to Dallas Valley from the highway was so rough and pot holed that it snapped my muffler right off the old car…good news, Today I bought a new muffler , bad news, it cost me $160.00 for the muffler, clamps and hangers, the good news…. my neighbor is going to help install the new muffler tomorrow free of charge .

Last week I did something stupid (read the Bone Head award post) , I lost my temper and destroyed my laptop , that was bad, my friend Cheryl came to the rescue and loaned me her old net book until I can scrape together the cash to buy another laptop, that is a good thing, at least I can Blog and get around the web slowly but hey it’s better than nothing, then today, my sister Bonnie phones me, she has a friend that owns a rent a center in the city, her friend can get me a refurbished laptop super cheap! so of course I jump on that, next Wednesday, I pick up my new laptop, and it only cost me $80 (yes you read that right)

It’s all a matter of perspective, no matter the adversity big or small, if you dwell on the negative aspects of said adversity then you will remain angry and unhappy and frustrated, I try to find the positive in every negative and always remind myself….it could be worse.

Yes there are days when I just want to say screw it, or to hell with life and all it’s miserable failings, but then I stop and think of all the crap and hardship that I have been through in my 47 years on earth (including my own Mother trying to kill me when I was just 2 years old) and I say to myself, I’ve made it this far, I can go further, lets wait and see what tomorrow brings.

I also stop and think, I live in North America , Canada to be specific, compared to the shit going down in the Middle East and over in the Ukraine , and the Ebola outbreak in Africa, I have it pretty easy over here, suddenly my problems don’t seem so huge and out of control.

Things happen beyond my control multiple times per day, month in and month out, instead of letting those things wear me down I look at them as adventures, life is an adventure, I can either roll with it, good or bad, or I can get stuck in a rut doomed to replay one bad thing after another and slowly let it drive me crazy.

Monty Python put out a song many many years ago called “Always look on the brighter side of life” I often hum it to myself just as a reminder that things are going to be okay, when I am really down I belt out the Monty Python’s “Lumber Jack” song at the top of my lungs, this serves 3 purposes, #1 it makes me feel better, #2 it makes my wife laugh hysterically, #3 it embarrasses the Hell out of our son “Hammy” because I can’t sing to save my life, I sounded like a wounded animal in heat when I sing !

I do suffer from Manic Depression, and yes I do take medication for it, Risperdone and Mirtazapine , but even when I am really down I just keep looking forward, I’ve tried to end my life a few times in the distant past, now I know my warning signs and I keep looking ahead , I keep a weathered eye on the horizon and look to see what tomorrow will bring, Do I have my depression under control, for the most part yes I do, I have learned that I can live and function with severe depression, I have learned to force myself to interact with people, especially when I am at my lowest, I have learned to tell others ( a close and trusted friend) when I am not doing so good, I have learned to tell myself, this is the depression talking, life truly isn’t that bad. I have learned to reach out and not just ask for help for myself but to try and help others in the process, I have learned not to let depression control my life. I have learned to blog and just put it out there as a form of therapy but perhaps it may help someone somewhere not feel so alone.

So I have learned to take the bad with the good, and to find the good in the bad, sometimes I have to really reach for the good, but it is in fact there just waiting to be found.



Guess that’s all for tonight folks, remember to express your love often,never take tomorrow for granted, and be kind to others.

Butch
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Cancer Treatments Alternatives and my Wife life in general so far

So I took my wife to the Cancer Centre today for her check up, the Oncologist did a routine check up on her and is amazed that she is doing so well, in fact he said it is a Bloody Miracle that not only is she alive, but is doing so well! I discussed the use of Curcumin (Turmeric extract) as a cancer treatment as well as Hemp oil, The oncologist said by law he can’t recommend the use of these 2 compounds, but off the record he said that both are good for killing cancer cells and shrinking tumours,but I didn’t hear it from him.

Then it was off to our Family Doctor for prescription refills, he had read today’s oncology report and he too said my wife is experiencing a Miraculous Recovery!!……… That word…. Recovery!! dare I believe? …. I am cautiously optimistic and will remain so until I see the results of the CT Scan that happens at the end of January, her next appointment with the Oncologist happens February 11th, but we will know the results of the CT Scan long before that through our family doctor….we shall see.

I found a supplier of Hemp Oil, Old Fashioned Foods carries it in both liquid and capsule form, I am headed there today or tomorrow to pick up a good supply for my wife, I am also in the process of growing some Cannabis plants for her, there are multiple ways to use the Cannabis for cancer, she can eat it, take the buds (the part people usually smoke) and dry them then sprinkle them into salads and other foods, she can juice the leaves along with kale,celery,and other leafy greens or berries and make a smoothie , or I can convert some of the plants into oil, put the oil into capsules and she can then take the oil in pill form a couple times per day.

Cannabis/Hemp has very good cancer fighting and killing properties, if you are interested and have some extra time Google this guy : Rick Simpson , he wrote an article (possibly a book) called Running from the Cure, this guy had cancer and used Cannabis/Hemp to cure himself, he is the Governments and Medical worlds worst enemy as instead of railing against Cannabis and Hemp use he speaks out for it, and explains why the big Pharmaceutical Companies don’t want you to know about the medical applications for Cannabis and Hemp, it not only helps Cancer Patients, but also MS patients, and may help against Alzheimer’s .

Curcumin (turmeric extract) also does much the same as Cannabis and Hemp for Cancer Patients, it too kills cancer cells and helps promote healthy cells, I have also been reading about changing the PH balance in your body, a half teaspoon of baking soda in an 8oz glass of water twice a day is supposed to alter your PH which apparently Cancer doesn’t like and it is supposed to stop cancer from spreading and may even begin to kill the cancer cells….. Now I haven’t fully researched baking soda and the whole business of changing your PH balance so don’t take this blog as Gospel, it is just something I have stumbled across and thought worth mentioning, please by all means look it up and do some homework on it as well.

One of my goals is to find what works for my wife, then start a new page/blog dedicated to alternatives in the fight against Cancer, but before I can even begin to think of doing such thing, I’d better be DAMN SURE that I have my FACTS straight and HAVE living PROOF that it works, I am never going to start a page/blog that gives false hope to people.

I will state though that the benefits of Cannabis,Hemp and Curcumin (turmeric extract) are very well documented and the proof is getting harder and harder for the medical world to refute. So there IS something there, but again, do your research and homework, I do NOT advocate ignoring conventional Cancer treatments nor do I advocate ignoring the medical world, I would say to try Cannabis/hemp oil and Curcumin in combination with what ever treatments your doctor advises, or after exhausting all other medical avenues, I would NEVER just rely on one method in the fight against cancer.

Chemo saved my wife’s life, that is a FACT, it brought her back from the brink of death…literally, so even though Chemo is hard on your body, has major side effects (physically ill, hair loss,compromises the immune system and can cause major depression) I still advocate it’s use, the benefits of it far outweigh the negatives, it can and does slow the cancer, it can and does kill cancer cells and shrinks tumours, it does save lives and extend life,and sometimes can kill the cancer altogether, of course it depends on the type of cancer and the person.

My wife went through 8 rounds of very aggressive Chemo over the course of 8 months, 8 rounds is really pushing the proverbial envelope, most times the doctors will stop after 6 rounds as more than 6 can often do more harm than good, and sometimes be LETHAL to the person receiving the treatment, but with my wife they pushed it to 8 as the Chemo was shrinking the tumours in her lungs, when they reached number 8 the tumours just wouldn’t shrink anymore so they ceased the treatments.

She was sent home on a 2 month break and to recover from such massive doses of Chemo, it was at that moment where I began seriously researching alternative treatments, I knew about Cannabis/Hemp and it’s healing properties, but knowing about it is not enough, I had to research it more and be sure I had the facts as not knowing can do more harm than good, it is also when I stumbled across Curcumin as a treatment as well and began to do research into it’s use. Also I came across a little bit of information that stated that there was a substance in Celery that had anti Cancer properties , I had always thought that Celery was mostly just made up of water, but hey it’s worth a try right? And celery never killed anyone and makes a good snack, it’s healthy too, did you know that you burn more calories eating a celery stalk than what is in the celery itself? … me either!

There is also a very controversial supplement commonly called B-17 (Laetrile/Amygdalin) that supposedly has cancer fighting properties, my Mother In-law insists that her brother cured his bladder cancer with it, and I have heard that in Mexico they use it in liquid form at hospitals on cancer patients, but as I said, I have just heard about it, it’s all hear say to me and unsubstantiated, but my Mother in law sends a couple bottles every so often so my wife takes them , is it helping? … I don’t know, but it isn’t doing her any harm either, you can also use apricot seeds the same way as they contain the same ingredients as the B-17… I have done a little research on B-17 but there is not a lot out there on it.

I can’t say definitively if any of the alternative treatments (the B-17,Curcumin, or Celery and very shortly the Hemp Oil) is doing anything or helping my wife, but know this, the Doctors are perplexed as they can’t figure out why she is still alive, and why she continues to improve, and how is it she has almost a normal life again. We (my wife and I ) also contribute the power of prayer and positive energies people around the world have been sending to her as being a major factor in the life she has now, I am quite sure that it is helping a great deal.

Anyway, I will stop here so I can go to the city and get my wife some Hemp Oil, I hope this entry has provided information and leads to help others in their struggles with Cancer, I don’t know how to drop links into Open Office yet, but until I do, Google is just a mouse click away for you to look up some of the alternatives I’ve mentioned here in this blog.

Remember folks, express your love often,never take tomorrow for granted and be kind to others

Butch
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