Thu the 11th of Jun - The Good, the Great and the Fun

On Wednesday, very good friends of Mara’s (and now of mine) are in town. Pierre and Emilie come all the way from Martinique. They first travel to France and from there over the Alps to Italy. Pierre’s father, Mr Robin, pilots his own little plane and so, very much in style, they land with “Air Robin” in Perugia’s airport. They’re here for 2 days.

Pierre and Mara’s friendship takes them back to Venezuela where, as teenagers, they went to school together. He’s a little younger than Mara who to this day still calls him “mon petit Pierre”. He’s very bright and an extremely gifted story teller. He crafts his stories so wittily, acts out the different characters, builds up the suspense, engages his audience and inevitably has us bent double with laughter at the end of all his hilarious adventures. This is exactly what the Doctor prescribes and conveniently, Pierre just happens to be one. His wife, Emilie, compliments him perfectly. She’s absolutely lovely, caring and just as fun to be around.

They both have medical backgrounds and have closely followed Mar’s health Pericles. She’s been looking forward to their visit for weeks but as excited as she is, she may not feel fit enough to see them, let alone spend time with them. Pierre and Emilie understand and are very willing to take the risk. They expect to see a tired, weak, emaciated Mara. Instead, to everyone’s surprise, a perky, upbeat, lively Mara welcomes them. For a minute, I worry she is over-exerting herself but then I realize 3 key events took place in the last 2 days.

Firstly, the results of the chemo treatment are positive. With fewer than 5% of leukemic blasts, Mara is in remission! RELIEF!
Secondly, she received over a liter in blood transfusion. Her body desperately needed this pick-me-upper and practically drank it in one gulp. Enough to give anyone an energy booster.
Finally, seeing very good friends always gives the extra and final adrenaline rush.

Pierre, like Mara, is a great fountain of useless information. When spotting a squirrel he asks: “Did you know they have very short memories? They always forget where they hide their nuts. It works out because they end up finding other squirrels’ hidden nuts.” Mara points out the communist principle behind this. We conclude that we are surrounded by forgetful communist squirrels.

On Friday, Mara will even be released from the hospital for two whole weeks. There is one worry casting a shadow over our celebration. Her liver shows very high levels of toxicity. The doctors decide to push out the transplant from the 20th of June to a week to 10 days later thus allowing these levels to naturally drop. I give a positive spin to this situation. I thank her liver for giving us more time to fatten her up and to strengthen her spirit before Round 5 of WrestleChemoMania starts: "Mighty Mara" vs "Nukem Leukem". Ding. Ding. Ding.

After Emilie, Pierre and his parents leave, I accompany Mara to the hospital for her last evening before her 2 week luxury “holiday”. Every evening, a nurse, either Paolo, Mauro or Michele hooks her back up to her drip. Every evening, Mar’s standard greeting is “Take all your time, I’m in no hurry to be hooked up”. Tonight is no exception.