January 09th, 2022

9th January 2022
NEIL SMITH
As has been arranged for some time Neil Smith rang last Wednesday. What a nice chap he is! (Neil is the surgeon who operated on me a couple of years ago when I was first diagnosed with cancer (of the bowel.) We talked for half an hour or so and although most of the chat was about my feelings, the lung cancer, and its effect on me – which so far is more mental than physical – he somehow makes me feel better. He said if I decided to have another scan to see what’s happening, he would arrange it for me. I’m not sure if I want to do that. If it’s getting worse, spreading qu icker, that won’t help me at all. Quite the reverse.  Ignorance is bliss, is it not? I have sent him a copy of “We Thought It was All Over.” Another short book I have written on my experiences with the NHS.
I also spoke to Ian last week, whom I have known for... how long? We were at school together, so it must be fifty years or so.  At his request I have sent him a copy of my auto-bi. “Blame It on the War.” These chats with Humph tend to be a little depressing; the poor guy is in a bad way. The same age as me he is unable to look after himself, he had a stroke a couple of years ago and now can’t walk, even needs help to get out of the chair he sits in for most of the time.  He has two nurses attend him every day, and he has moved into his daughter’s house in Bishops Stortford. Talking to him is a reminder that there is always someone worse off than me. He asked if I missed Stephanie and I told him I missed Heather more than Steph and as I said it realised, he had forgotten Heather had died. But I do miss Steph, I think of her often. Not as much as Bumble, of course, she is still in my head 95% of my waking hours and I still have this awful guilt. I’m probably not helping myself by working on these videos. There she is, in front of me on the screen, smiling, talking, being Heather: flying in Jim’s Cessna, going up in a balloon, shopping in Hong Kong, Port St Lucie, Rio, Brighton, New York. How she loved shopping! I know, I know, I should stop watching them, it’s probably not doing my mental health any good apart from anything else, but as I think I have said before, it’s comforting seeing her, hearing her.