14 November 2011

Progress

For a few days now, I've been merging a number of documents I've written over the last two years. Notes, quotes, odd paragraphs here and there that eventually (hopefully) will all come together and form a coherent argument, and eventually, the  body of my thesis. I hope to have a draft done by this week, so I can show it to my supervisor and get some feedback before submitting the final version. I do feel like I'm finally progressing somewhere...

Speaking to mum earlier today, she said she spoke to my uncle, and it was getting hard to make out what he was saying. His tumour is growing on the lymph gland on the neck, so if the cancer is progressing, it will affect his speech. My cousin asked my mum to talk to my uncle, to try and persuade him to return to the treatment. But mum confided in me how difficult it is for her to do that. For one thing, she herself is undergoing treatment, and she knows fully what chemotherapy can do to the spirit and body of a person... "If he has chosen to stop the treatment, then we must respect that..."

I do wonder how my uncle is feeling right now... Is he afraid? Is he filled with dread and perhaps even regret, fear or perhaps even anger? I wrote to him sometime ago, tried to encourage him, and hoped he can "see beyond" life, "see beyond" death. It is all very easy to write about, but when it comes down to facing death who will have no fear...?



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