London Calling

Back to the grind stone, sob.

Floyd and I were in Kerry, SW Ireland for a holiday with our friends who own a spectacular house there. This is the 4th time we have been in the past year and we love it so much. They are great friends too so we had a fantastic time. The house is about 3 miles up it’s own private road. It is perched on the side of a mountain and overlooks a loch – all part of their property. The mountains constantly change colour depending on the time of day and whether it’s sunny or cloudy. It is just spectacular and so calming. We also took a boat trip (in their boat) across to Dingle. We had the resident dolphin Funghie (who lives around Dingle Bay) leaping about in the surf of the boat and whizzing along next to us. So amazing. Sigh!

We left for Ireland on Saturday, 26th May and I hated going then because my friend Davo was becoming so ill. By this time, Davo couldn’t MSN with me but we had already made plans about how we would communicate when that happened. We would continue sending our home made short movies for him. His best friend was sat with him and would do the typing. I would have my Blackberry and could send emails back. So this is what we were doing for a few days. On Sunday, while we were in Kerry, things were getting much worse. Davo hated people knowing too much detail about his illness so I won't give it here. Davo died just after midnight. I cannot really describe the devastating, crushing feeling – made so much worse because he did not want to go. He was scared and wanted to be saved. He would say that all he needed was a new body, his mind was just fine. I have a million emotions and I am sure I will talk about them again here but maybe later!

We talked a lot about what would happen after he passed. We talked about whether he would be able to send a sign or not. Well after I received the news of his passing, the storm we had in Ireland just stopped. I stood at the window looking over the moonlight loch crying for a bit. Only the moon was out in the sky. Floyd was still asleep. I tip-toed back to bed and lay there crying and praying for peace for Davo. After 5 minutes, for no reason I sat bolt upright and looked over to the window. Above the loch was a huge bright star, like the North Star but a bit brighter. I just knew that was Davo and his sign. I whispered a couple of things and it brightened. I said “oh now you’re just showing off” and then it just vanished. No other stars, just the moon. I went back to sleep smiling. Davo’s best friend in Germany was with Davo when he passed. He said they too had a storm which stopped as soon as Davo died.

I miss Davo so, so, so much. He was one of my best friends and where we were in constant contact for the best part of a year, it's left a huge gaping hole. I know that he had made me a special package with a homemade video that he asked would be sent to me after he had gone. This is so typical of his kindness and thoughtfulness. Though I am sure my heart will break all over again.

I am ok. I like to turn terrible situations over to create something positive from them. I am not scared of leukaemia but I respect it's power. If sat here weeping and mourning forever, then I go against everything I promised Davo I would do. I will carry on the fight against leukaemia by continuing to be an ambassador for Leukaemia Research, working on new projects I have coming up with them and helping fundraise.

I will see this nasty disease wither and die in my lifetime and I promised Davo it would all be for him and Floyd. You can count on it.

Soph

Weekend

We had an exhausting but wonderful weekend.

It was my aunt Jean’s 80^th birthday and there was a huge family get together in Hereford where she lives with my uncle.

I am so blessed to have a very large, fun-loving, warm friendly family! Floyd and I were sucked in to the sea of cousins, aunts and uncles and distant relatives we haven’t seen for years. There simply wasn’t enough time to chat to everyone. Everybody loved Floyd and he seemed to have a wonderful time. There was a big lunch in a church hall and then back to Uncle John & Aunt Jean’s to continue! We had tea and sat around in their beautiful garden (all 61 of us!). Floyd was playing croquet with some of my cousins. All I could hear was “we gotta knock Floyd out” or “right, let’s get him this time”!!!

On Saturday night we stayed in a gorgeous converted barn B&B near the Welsh border with some of my cousins. Even though we’d been up since 5.30am that morning, we were still totally up for meeting up with everyone else that evening. We went to another farm cottage where the rest were staying and sat up eating and drinking until late. Lovely. Just what I needed!

What I haven’t mentioned yet is Floyd and I should have driven to the B&B to join everyone on Friday night, as was the plan, but we wanted to spend time with Davo, my dear friend who is terminally ill with leukaemia. Davo keeps being given weeks and then days to live. This past week has seen him get weaker and weaker and his blood counts, heart rate and blood pressure are all faltering. I spend all day, every day on MSN Messenger with Davo and have done since October. Even though he has been in so much pain recently and struggling with his breathing, it hasn’t stopped our daily marathon chats.

I promised him on Friday that I would just go home and carry on messaging him from home. We would not go to Hereford until Saturday. That’s exactly what happened. We recorded some hilarious home movies on Friday and emailed them to Davo as each one was recorded. We were all laughing our arses off!! Floyd gave a ‘guide to the Scottish language’ which was great!

I had helped Davo arrange a special mother’s day present for him to give to his mum on Sunday. It was a top secret, military style operation which required sleuth like detective work from both my end and in Davo’s house. Even from Hereford, we were emailing on Saturday with ‘has the FedEx man been yet?’ ….. ‘the doorbell just rang! I think it’s him!’ etc. But it all worked out for the best possible result on Sunday!!

We rushed home yesterday and got in late afternoon. We had given a lift to my wonderful, amazing ancient relative Jock who is 92 years old. He usually drives himself everywhere but a his hip is playing up at the moment, he needed a lift home. But we still had time to hang out with Davo.

I was crushed to get news of Davo’s condition from his mum this morning. It’s not good and his breathing is much worse and he was unable to communicate this morning.

I cannot describe the anguish I feel at the thought of losing one of my best friends. But I refuse to give leukaemia any kind of victory. It tried to take Floyd from me and now it’s tugging away at Davo. It will never win because as Davo told me, it will die with him when he goes. So true. It will.

The plans we made just mock and make me sad. But the happiness, laughter, fun and love that we created always wins and that is something leukaemia will never get it’s hands on.

I love my friend dearly and send you arms of flowers and hugs Davo.

Meh.

xx