For Kim

I'd like to tell you a little about my friend Kim (pictured above with her very good friend, Marco).
Kim died yesterday from secondary (metastatic is the formal term) cancers, which popped up just after she had celebrated five years of good health after treatment for breast cancer.
Metastatic breast cancer was one of the things we had in common.  She was also a former journalist, an extreme cat lover and had been romantially involved with my brother (oh no, that's not something we had in common, because that would be terribly wrong).
Kim was an utter hoot, the master of the one-liner.  She spent a lot of time online, developing a pool of genuine friends any of us would envy.  She had more than 800 friends on Facebook and on hearing of her death, these people flooded the site with their condolences.  Genuine, caring friends (many of whom she had met in person) who, if not for being scattered all around the globe, would have flocked to attend her funeral in Dunedin in a couple of days.
Kim had an operation to remove a cancerous brain tumour last summer, just a little after I'd had the same operation.  The operations left us both a bit 'wonky', especially in typing, and I remember her puzzlement when one of my messages to her ended in the words, "lots of lobe."
While she was open, funny and upbeat to her friends, she also suffered anxious times, sad times and loneliness.  Her health declined very quickly this week, minimising her pain and suffering. 
Cancer is a stink disease and I implore anyone reading this to put their own health at the top of their 'to do' list and have regular checks.  Yes it's boring, expensive and sometimes unpleasant, but cancer is all of those things, and more.
Kim lead an on-line singalong among her friends each Monday morning.  If feeling sick, she'd just "la la laa" so people could chose their own song.  Many of her friends were older than her, so she'd chose classic songs everyone knew.
I'm choosing Coldplay's "Scientist" for my singalong for her.  God bless, dear Kim.

"Nobody said it was easy
It's such a shame for us to part
Nobody said it was easy
No-one ever said it would
be this hard..."

With this online photo, Kim wrote, "it was early morning and I was on Skype to a friend in Peru, when I realised how damn good my hair looked.  So what's a girl to do?"

Fiji holiday

  Lured by a sunset, a swim-up bar, cocktails and the knowledge that no-one knew us for miles around, my sister Marnie and I took up the microphone at the resort karaoke night.  We selected 'Imagine' by John Lennon.  Now, we can both sing a wee bit, but the backing music was set at a low register.  "Imagine there's no Heaven," we growled.  Halfway through, I whispered that we could be mistaken for lady-boys.  Marnie went up an octave instantly, squeaking and wardling a few lines.  There were no calls for an encore.  Undeterred, Fern and I belted out Abba's Fernando.  "More," shouted an Aussie fellow.  Think he was drunk.
  Fiji was gorgeous, the all-girls' trip a gift from family. The girls and I set off with Aunty Marnie and cousin Genevieve on a Sunday afternoon.  Marnie had heard that meat was diificult to come by and perishingly expensive and because we intended to cook in our room some of the 7 nights we were there, she was loaded up with sausages, bacon, beef roast and mince.  I also had 'snacky' things.
  Fijian customs got a bit sticky over the pork products, but the officer offered to refrigerate the bacon and sausages until we left a week later, for $5.  Was this a rip-off?  We never found out, because we'd forgotten about them when we came home.  Sorry Marnie, I know we've embraced the bacon and let it go, but it will remain a quirky memory forever.
  In Nadi's main street where are windows are barred, even in shops only selling soft drinks, an old Fijian man with a bent back and feet that looked like they had been installed the wrong way around, wanted to be my mate.  All Blacks, he beamed, as it was just a few days after the Rugby 7s. Oh, and by the way, he added, he'd do a good deal on sulus for us (light wraps).  We got sulus at the market but visited James' shop to look at t-shirts.  There, he whipped out two dark sticks (and by now, folks who have visited Fiji may be beginning to nod), asked our names and engraved them, with the date.  Then asked for $20.  Why did I not see this coming?  My friend Mairi had guarded me against exactly this.  But I showed James he had not picked on a fool.  I only gave him $15.
  Prices in supermarkets were fearsome.  A King Size block of Cadbury chocolate, $12  (around $9-$10 NZ), bagful of dried pasta $7, little tub of yoghurt $5, packet of crackers $5. No fresh milk available, only long-life.  Our favourite taxi driver, Baba, asked if we would like him to take us to the airport for our flight out.  Then, head hung, he asked if we had any excess food we planned to throw out.  "Me and my villagers would be most grateful for anything." Well, we hardly ate for the last couple of days.  "Baba needs that," I'd tell the girls as they reached for jam.
  Come dawn on the day of departure, Baba and his van were not waiting.  Instead, he had sent a friend with a van to collect us and explain Baba's vehicle had broken down.  I handed over the large bag of goodies and asked the driver if he could get them to Baba.  He smiled a large, slow smile.
  So many memorable moments.  Gen and Sophie getting stuck in to some water volleyball and Gen's resultant sunburn;  the girls and I deciding to try out the sea temp in front of the resort, unaware it was just moments before the resort's daily fish-feeding activity.  No wonder the little buggers were so nibbly.  Sophie, Fern and Claire having the courage to take part in a guided, outer-reef snorkel trip well off-shore, and seeing two reef sharks cruising beneath them.  From the safety of the boat, I was intimidated. What lucky girls.  On a submarine-type trip over the corals a small zebra fish kept peeping in the windows at us, returning with a 'friend' and later, three tiny kids! When the girls asked their snorkelling guide if he ever saw "Nemo"  (clown fish), they all dived down and the guide tickled an anenome and out swam five Nemos!
  I was amused by young male resort staff who obviously tired of smiling sweetly and greeting everyone with a cheery, "bula!"  Several times, as young Claire approached, they would smile and lunge towards her, fiercely shouting "Bula!".(There's a photo below of one young man doing just that)  This mostly made her cackle and spoiled the effect.  Great way to fulfil the requirements of your contract and have fun.
  What delightful people, with so little in the way of material possessions.  We returned home with a special lesson from those with so little, yet so much, to give.  Relax, enjoy, sing, laugh and dance. 


You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

They arrived with cheery smiles, wheelbarrows, shovels, and we had not even a cup of tea to offer.  Undeterred, they began shovelling the ghastly grey sand the earth throws up.  They were members of the "Farmy Army," which my sister misheard as "Barmy Army" so I hissed a correction in case they were offended.
As the three men and one woman trooped into my sister Marnie's Avonside back yard, I noted that one man was trailing another, clutching his mate's elbow.  Peeping out of the window while wrapping and boxing ornaments, I saw this man was plainly blind, his eyes closed. He shovelled.  With sister Mary and family having already done much shovelling on the site, the group soon moved to another property. 
I felt very sad that with no water and no power, I could not whip up a reviving drink.  As well as offering a small thanks, I would have loved to hear their stories.
Just over a week after the devastating Feb 22 earthquake, Christchurch is a city of countless stories.  Some are funny, some heartwarming, some shocking (and I'm thinking of the looters) but most are heartbreaking.  Like many Cantabrians, I know someone who didn't come home for dinner on Feb 22.  Again, I am reminded that life is so often not 'fair' and that every day it is good to smell some roses.
A friend has been smelling the roses and has set up a fan site for Jeremy, the guy that provides sign language services on TV.  Within four days the site has around 16,000 fans! Even the mayor of Christchurch, Bob Parker, pointed out that people think Jeremy is 'hot' and poor Jeremy had to 'sign' his own complement! Then, he had to 'sign' that something was 'buggered.'  Truly, the mind boggles.  Wish I'd seen it.
My Mum said she likes Jeremy.  I didn't want to know if she found him 'hot.' She referred to him as the deaf guy, and was surprised when I pointed out he can't be deaf, on account of him having to hear what to translate.  Sharp, Ma, sharp.

As our thoughts turn again to those heroes involved in the recovery efforts in the city, I think of these words from U2's I Will Follow.

"I was on the inside
when they pulled the four walls down,
I was looking through the window
I was lost, I am found..."

Come on....we can all play this game.  What were the highlights of your summer?
Yes, I know it's still summer but with many of us now back into school or work routines it feels a wee bit nose-to-the-grindstone-ish.  I love having all day to potter about, planning and making meals and prowling about in the garden, but I'm not expecting anyone's sympathy about that!
Personally, my summer started pretty badly but since then I've been counting plenty of blessings!
On my 43rd birthday, arriving in Auckland to be met by David and Elly for a sightseeing tour before heading out to the fabulous U2 concert...what a treat.  Lunch on the foreshore, the lissome Bono, a birthday never to be forgotten!  Thanks so much for such a memorable and generous outing.
I've had so many lovely visitors! Being in Amberley means people can pop in on their way to and from somewhere and use the loo or have a cuppa.  Please, everyone, keep calling in.  If it is before 9am and I am slow to answer the door, it's because I'm dashing to dress.  Don't go, and don't expect high couture.
I've met so many nice new people.  As well as friends and family so willingly carting me and the girls here, there and everywhere, I've had Amberley's volunteer Cancer Society drivers take me places.  I relish the friendships of my neighbours on either side, the Youles and the Rickerbys.  I've spun my washing in their machines when my pump broke, had my lawns mowed, Pepsi's been fed, tasty treats been exchanged, the world sorted over coffee...the very best kinds of neighbours.
We've trekked to The Lakes - and yay!!  I got to drive off-road! - as I've mentioned, and we've had days in town.
Very memorably, Auntie Marnie's Xmas treat to us all was The Big Day Out, where she took me and the girls for a couple of games of 10-pin bowling (awkwardly, we happened to go during Professionals night but we doggedly high-fived if we knocked down a single pin, while around us were long faces from Pro's who failed to score a Strike).  We went to a mall where the girls scoffed icecream and I was treated to a pedicure, eyelash and eyebrown tint, then it was off to the Arts Centre where the girls and Counsin Genevieve made some jewellery at Beads Unlimited.  We capped off the day at a restaurant.  What a fabulous treat.  Thanks, Marnie and Gen.
Also got to spend time with my other NZ-based sister, Mary, who joined us to see the Ron Mueck exhibition.  Were you there in spirit, Trisha?
There were lots of other lovely things, but my fuzzy brain still isn't retaining everything.  Nic Huxford took us to Amberley Beach where five girls piled into the sea fully clothed and had fun.
There was Christmas, of course, hosted so magnificently once again by Sue and Charlie and family, at which the annual tennis matches took place, along with the Booker/Buttle band.  Earlier, the Barrells gathered to feast which took such of the travelling stress out of Christmas Day itself.
Now, plenty to look forward to.  Biggest item on the Exciting Events list is the wedding in a coupla weeks in Nelson of Hannah Baxter and Jon Thomson.  Thereafter, joining a couple of other families for the Spanish dancing horses show.  After that, it's birthday season for the girls.
Who will join me, and reflect on the summer months?

"Summertime,
And the livin' is easy
Fish are jumpin'
And the cotton is high

Oh, Your daddy's rich
And your mamma's good lookin'
So hush little baby
Don't you cry

One of these mornings
You're going to rise up singing
Then you'll spread your wings
And you'll take to the sky

But until that morning
There's a'nothing can harm you
With your daddy and mammy standing by"

George Gershwin

So....it's 3am and the cancer-stick is swirling dreams again.
I'm in an aquatic centre with far too many people, all in the yellow and red uniforms of the life guards.  They're everywhere, squirting surfaces with cleaner.  They block my path.
I can't find Claire.  I run into changing rooms, food areas, calling "Claire!  Claire Booker!" I am stared at.
Then I see her, waiting alone and very still in a corner.  I run up to her, and she says, "I thought I should stay in one place, Mum.  But I knew you'd find me, and I'd be safe."
And that's what makes all of this so very, very hard.


But to finish on quite another note, just what did sad insomniacs do before the Internet?  Before they could rise in the dead of night and have a discussion with some hairy truck driver in Birmingham posing as 'Cindy from Seattle'?

Our three day trekking expedition, with Dom, Yvi and Jamie Oberholzer, into The Lakes (Shepperd, Taylor and Sumner) started inauspiciously when the two long-drop toilets at the hut were found on their sides.  Blown over, probably.  The "foof" sound was my hope of a flush toilet fading into the picturesque sunset. 
John's uncle Ted, and his wife Sandie, had kindly allowed us to use their hut (The Shiver Inn) which sleeps 7. Little Jamie, almost 2, had a cot.  We were at the hut within two hours, after a leisurely stop at Loch Katrine. Very generously, Sandie's son Jim Greenslade and family had loaned us their horse float. 
Most cunningly, the hut had an outside bench with running water and a permanent campfire with grate and billies.  Yvi, no stranger to the Great Outdoors, soon had a stew bubbling. 
The Bookers didn't do so terribly well with packing.  I forgot the bread, while John did not step up to the role of Toilet Paper Officer.  The girls all failed to pick the sunscreen up off the table.  Thankfully Yvi had the bases covered. 
Fern, who joins me in Not Camping, also could not come to grips with instructions about digging holes in the forest when nature called. We let Nature know there was a time and place, namely Friday evening back at home.
On day two the trekkers headed over the hill to see Lake Mason, while I watched Dom pull up a lovely trout.  He smoked it for lunch and it will go down as a Memorable Meal in our lifetimes.
While I don't rough things very well, and I was plagued with headaches, getting into the magnificent high country is just one of those things we Kiwis can do any time, for just the cost of the petrol.  There were lots of people camping with family at Loch Katrine, kids splashing about in clear water, kayaking, fishing....
Here's an ode to anglers everywhere.
Birds singing on my shoulder
In harmony, it seems,
How they sing,
How they sing,
How they sing.
Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah,...
There's something in the water,
Something in the water..."

By Brooke Fraser

Well, here we all are then, staring at the ghost of Christmas past!! I still have mince pies in the freezer (made too early, buried too deep and forgotten), Christmas cake going strong, a ham in the freezer (because Aunty Sue, who hosted Christmas so wonderfully again with Uncle Charlie, already had one), three trees up and several appointments with boxes of chocolates still to keep.  I laugh as I open the pantry and recall the times I have told my girls "that chocolate has my name on it" because they have taken it literally and the chocolate they received this Christmas is emblazoned with their names in permanent maker!!
Not that THAT would stop me when the cooking chocolate had gone.
Mercifully I have stopped taking the steroids which forced me to eat everything in sight (and even some stuff that wasn't).
I'm feeling very pooped, probably a delayed reaction to the radiotherapy but possibly a response to all this heat!, and quite headachey.  See the oncologist in a week so will find out if there are more plans afoot for treatment, or if we just wait and see.  Meanwhile, my sister Marnie has been able to source me some lingzhi mushroom capsules - an ancient and highly respected Chinese medicine - which have a wicked, wicked aftertaste but I'm thrilled to be able to take.  They might possibly inhibit tumour growth or prevent tumours forming.  Watch this space, I guess.
John's been planning a horse trek with the girls to Lake Taylor/Loch Katrine area, but the horse transport is proving tricky.  Just a light trek, about one hour's ride in to a hut, an hour's ride the following day to the natural hot springs, and back out.  Honey, "my" horse on loan from Laurie O'Carroll will be ridden by Fern or Claire, and I will be in the truck with the supplies.
Looking forward, the following week, to a gift from Marnie and Genevieve of a girls' day out in town, featuring a pizza lunch, a trip around the Arts Centre and some jewellery-making at Beads Unlimited for the girls, a beauty treatment for me and an ice-cream for the girls at the mall, all topped off with a couple of games of 10-pin bowling!  Great fun!  At our current rate of outings, that's a year's worth of entertainment in a day!
My kitchen is my bolt-hole, and am enjoying a fabulous frypan, to which nothing will stick, from Mum and the Annabel Langbein cookbook from Mary. Angela Clifford and her sweet son Flynn today gave us some organic strawbs and a couple of fig trees, while Janine Youle from next door has given us a jar of beetroot relish she made with the bounty from their garden.  We live well!!!
My very best wishes to all for 2011.

And from James Blunt once again (it's one of the few CDs I have with me right now), plus it reminds me of the lovely house we rented at Amberley Beach, where I once woke to see the sunrise, plus Hector's dolphins frolicking in the waves. 

"Beautiful dawn,
lights up the shore for me
there is nothing else in the world
I'd rather wake up and see."

High, by James Blunt