Time creeps by

For me, with the demands of work, kids, required house duties, sleep, exercise and the like, time speeds by. I've been heads-down at work lately and only occasionally break to look at the clock on my computer, oftentimes noticing that it's way past time to go home. Dinners are later than usual since everyone has to wait for me to get home and get cooking, so there's never much time between cleanup of the dishes and kitchen to the cleanup of the kids and me in preparation for some sleep.

But for Josh, these several days after treatment, time creeps by. At this, the fifth day after his fourth round, he is able to focus more, but still is very weak and generally not feeling well. He has spent the majority of the last few days alternating between lying in bed and lying on a couch. Last night when I came home from work, I laid down next to him to touch base. His response to my asking what I can do for him, he said, "Can you make time speed up?"

How nice it could be to have a remote control for life like in the Adam Sandler movie, Click, where a fast-forward button gets us through the rough (or just annoying) times of life. Or do so for a loved one struggling.

But part of the beauty of life is that it does include all this creeping of time. The moments where you're relegated to the bed or couch where all you can do is watch and listen as life goes on in front of you. An observer, not a participant.

Soon Josh will be back to his generally happy self: the one who hugs instead of retreats; the one who smiles instead of sighs. He's not the only one looking forward to when he'll come out of this chemo fog and ultimately his sixth and final chemo fog, hopefully in plenty of time to celebrate his 39th birthday on July 20th with flair.