Window Sill

I can’t remember my first window sill; I was way too little to even contemplate the concept of looking out the window.

I became acquainted with my window sill after hearing the intense change from crystal clear soundlessness with a few owls here and there, to a hideous explosion of sound charging through the quiet atmosphere like it was cream cheese with chives.

So I lived with my bedroom a stone’s throw from a major road, back when even major roads were quiet in the night.

From this window sill I could watch the darkness conquer the dim misty blue to cover the house in a sheet of deep black with a sparkle of light from across the road.

I could secretly listen to my parents out on the terrace on hot summers, while pretending to be out with the rest of the kids from the street. Even have a peep from above until I clumsily moved something, and heard a curious but cautious “what you doing?” (As if I was about to jump or something. lol)

I couldn’t watch the insanely cluttered and obsessive Christmas lights on the house across the road, as they did hurt my eyes after a while.

The first time I was living away from the security of my parents, it was to look after a terrace house, which still had its 60 to 70s style imprinted on every room with effort, the somehow creaky wood panelling was so awful you could get splinters just by looking at it for too long, and the patterns on the carpet which gave the inspiration to stereograms (magic pictures).

I only remember the living room window sill where once we enjoyed a day full of entertainment while a seagull dive bombed countless students as they walked by its hardly noticeable baby.

Our next place was a big window sill FAIL, we were so trapped in this flat, one side we had a very major road, traffic lights, and a horrific public house with jobless dusty women-beaters part of the midday to dusk scenery. On the other side was nothing, literally nothing but building seen through a window that didn’t even open.

On leaving that hideous box we went to a breezy safe haven for three months, where I liked to sit by the window watching the waves sometimes batter the coast, and sometimes lick the heels of happy people with kites.

That would take me to where I am now, happily sitting on a window sill.

Imagine a huge window sill with room for a long cushion to perch my little bum while reading, writing, or just thinking.

Some people have the bedroom, some have their kitchen, some will never leave there glorious couch, some will use their bathroom as a safe haven, and I sometimes do, but mostly I like to lose myself on the window sill, not really looking out, but mostly letting the air hit my face energising my thoughts.

My first about Cancer

It always seems difficult to know what to write in times of sadness.

We feel like we want to say something to vent our terribly haunting emotions.

Or if you’re like me, sometimes it’s easy to be happy in your misery and not say anything at all.

I’ve heard that cancer will affect one in every three of us is some way or another, but for me it’s has seemed to be a big part of life, and I didn’t even realise it until recently.

My Grandmother on my father’s side, had skin cancer, my father also had skin cancer, my grandmother on my mums side suffered cancer three times in her life, and now recently my mother has been diagnosed with stage four kidney cancer.

In 2008, 15,211 people died from cancer.

If you think about that, and compare it to a disaster…for example in 1592, 15,000 people were killed in a plague which has made its mark in history, but cancer is doing this every year. In the future will we look back at these days as the age of cancer? I doubt it.

Im still waiting for the figures for 2009 but im sure we will see an increase.

I’ve always been aware of cancer, and how much effort the charities have to put in to keep our attention, I suppose the only reason cancer charities get as much money as they do is because cancer effects so many people.

Im writing this post to digest a few things that have just occurred to me about cancer, for example there isn’t just one cancer.

Pathology .

a.

a malignant and invasive growth or tumor, esp. oneoriginating in epithelium, tending to recur after excisionand to metastasize to other sites.

b.

any disease characterized by such growths.

any evil condition or thing that spreads destructively; blight.

I was about to type up the varying types of cancer, then I saw this from the National Cancer Institute.

Cancer Research UK has a shorter list, but I want to talk about kidney cancer.

My Mum had been complaining to the GP for a good while about a annoying ache at on her lower back, she did actually go a number of times, and each time the diagnosis would be stress of a pulled muscle so they gave her some anti-inflammatory drugs to keep the pain down. At this point I would like to show you how damaging Ibuprofen can be.

Eventually my mum was in hospital with so much pain, the doctors assumed that she had gall stones, until the ultrasound showed a massive lump which used to be the kidney.

Kidney cancer is a very slow moving cancer so its hugely likely that she has had this lump for a very very long time, maybe even years.

She had been complaining about the pains for well over a year or two.

Kidney Cancer is the 11^th most common cancer in the UK, my mum was having breast screening very regularly because of her mother who had breast cancer.

Most people who are diagnosed are over 65, my mum is 50.

It affects many more men than women, this is because in the past more men smoked cigarettes.

I used to smoke, I started when I was 20 and I have been since 1^st Jan 2010 without any, my mum had quit smoking a few months before, she had smoked all her life from her teens.

Causes of Kidney cancer: There are some kidney cancer risk factors we know about. These are:

• Smoking – If you smoke your risk could be double that of a non smoker.
• Chemicals at work – People working in some industries have a higher risk.
• Faulty genes – Some people inherit a tendency to develop kidney cancer. This is called hereditary or familial kidney cancer. Certain inherited conditions also increase the risk.
• Being obese
• Having kidney disease that needs dialysis
• Other risk factors that have been investigated and may increase risk include high blood pressure and heavy use of mild painkillers, such as aspirin, paracetamol, and ‘non steroidal anti inflammatory drugs’ (NSAIDs), such as ibuprofen.

Makes me quite sick to think that she was coming away from the GP prescribed with something that was helping her actually get cancer.

Enough for now.