It's good to get out of the neighborhood

Me, Tami and Nancy at Candlewood Lake last month

Recently I have ventured a little farther from the neighborhood. Not counting my visits to Dana-Farber, I hardly ever go further than a 30-mile radius from my house. I still haven't gone far, but you really get the feeling that you're breaking out even when you're just taking a little trip.

A few weeks ago, I went to New Milford, Conn., for an overnight at the lake house where my friend Tami and her family have been going since I've known her, which dates back to high school. When planning and packing up, I had the great feeling of being a "normal" person packing a bag for somewhere other than the hospital. Emily, another member of our sisterhood, had to stay home in Pittsburgh and work. We talked to her on speaker-phone, so it was almost like she was there.

And by coincidence, Ben was covering a Rutgers football game in Pittsburgh, so he stayed with his "Auntie Em,"
who took him to the movies.

My worries, and my hand sanitizer, went with me. We took a long walk and as we were going up a steep hill, I asked Tami, "Do you feel winded?" (Translation: Am I OK?) Yes, she said.

She added that she feels winded every time she walks up that hill. It's not that I expect to have the same endurance as other people, but rather that I expect to have similar or better endurance to what I had the day or two before. If I feel that I'm more tired than usual, I begin to wonder if I am getting sick in a little or big way.

Of course, no matter how refreshing the change of scene, most everyone takes their regular concerns with them, so in that respect, I was just as normal as anyone else.

We don't see each other that often, but we pick up without missing a beat. I guess that's what happens when you've been friends for 40 years. One day it poured, so we sat inside and talked and ate and ate and talked. The next day it was beautiful, and we walked down the road for a long time. We said hi to two horses in a field who came over to the stone wall to see us.
The horses walked along next to us on their side of the wall. I wanted them to stop so I could take their picture, but they kept moving.
So I jogged ahead to take their photo from a better angle.
"Hey," I said to my friends. "Look at me. I'm jogging!"