21 April 2024 (catching up..)

‘But I have all, and abound: I am full’, Philippians 4:18.

Cloud 9 is an ‘upside down’ apartment, with the bedrooms on the lower floor and the open plan living area with balcony above. No matter how many times we experience it, ascending the stairs in the morning to be greeted by an expanse of sparkling sea is always a special moment and never fails to take our breath away. Yesterday (Saturday) was as stunning as it gets- the sun triumphant in a cloudless deep blue sky, the sea utterly calm with ruler-straight horizon. Looking across to Studland, every feature of the coastline was sharply drawn, even the tiny jagged details of Old Harry Rocks. We stood on the balcony in the warm sun and took deep breaths of the sea air whilst seagulls circled overhead, appreciating being able to be here more than ever.

It was a wonderful day; with chemo crash on its best behaviour, we made the most of every moment: riding scooters down to the beach for some shell-hunting and rock climbing (well I made it about a foot off the ground), lunch on the balcony, a visit to Mum’s lovely beach for the first Mr. Whippys of the year… And then a little evening birthday celebration with local family: bubbly, Mexican and cake. Perfect.

Payback arrived this morning, however, in the form of full-blown chemo crash with some unwelcome freebies: a terrible headache and a weird kind of whole-body tenderness painful to to the touch, particularly on my neck and scalp. Apparently this can be the warm-up act for the hair loss gig… we shall see. I’ve definitely had some thinning but so far my hair has surprised and impressed me with its loyalty- I definitely consider 3 birthday weekends with the company of my hair as a massive win.

But these days are the hardest. For me, unable to do or enjoy anything at all: feeling too awful to even be bored, which is really saying something. And for those around me, having to see me in that state.

After another beautifully sunny but far from easy day, we are now chugging back to Herts in the trusty little car, and I’ve been very slowly writing this the whole journey – a superhuman effort but I feel a desperate need to not waste any more time than is strictly necessary… for a start, we have unfinished business with 1993…

My crazy year in America rollercoastered to its close, filled with more adventures than I could ever write down. The Au Pair visa allowed me to stay in the country for 13 months, so I saved my 2-week holiday allowance until the end of the year and booked a trip with a company called ‘Trek America’ and opted for the 6- week ‘Grand Trek’, in which I would complete a round trip of the entire USA in a minibus with 12 others from around the world, camping mostly but staying in hotels in the bigger cities such as Chicago and San Francisco. The age limit for the trip was 39; almost everyone fell within the 19-25 bracket apart from one rather large, crass Australian lady with 39 years behind her. Guess who I was assigned as my tent partner?!!

Sheilas aside, it was an incredible six weeks, a true once-in-a-lifetime trip that crowned an amazing year. But now came the goodbyes and an inevitable turning towards the reality that awaited in the UK.

Becca and I stayed awake for the whole of the night flight back, feeling a huge mix of emotions: excitement to be going back to our homes and families after more than a year, but also a huge amount of apprehension: we had changed so much, would we fit back in?

I didn’t. Everything was wrong. The roads were too narrow. The weather was too cold. The shops were never open. Everything seemed grey, boring, insular. I met up with my old friends and found it difficult to connect with them. Mum wanted to cook for me and do all of my washing but after a year of total independence I wanted to do it myself…

There were only four weeks before I’d be heading off to Uni, so I tried to focus on that. Surely more adventures would await there, in the playground of life?

I had gone out to the US with my deferred place at the University of Nottingham safely in my pocket, but over the year my horizons widened and I began to feel braver and see things differently. Nottingham had been a safe bet- a pretty, leafy campus, a cosy, nurturing music department in which I could easily excel. I had been more excited by the music department and course at City University in London, feeling that it would be an excellent fit for me, but the thought of living in the capital had been rather scary and unappealing to a sheltered Surrey girl… Once I was riding the metros of D.C like a native, however, my outlook changed and I felt that I could handle anything- yes, even the Angel Islington. These were the days of pen and paper so I had to ask my parents to reapply for City University on my behalf and pop the form in the post. Allocation day duly arrived, along with a phone call from Mum.

‘You’ve got York!’ She proudly announced.

I was more than confused. ‘But I didn’t apply for York!’

‘I did… ‘ revealed Mum… If I could have looked her in the eye, I would have seen a very big glint. Mum had known how much I wanted to go to York and had reasoned that there was nothing at all to lose by offering up my 4 A grades and seeing if the bait was taken. It was.

In the end, ironically, only one good thing came out of York (spoiler alert, it was Steve, but he comes into the story later…). My time there did not get off to a good start. It didn’t help that I was still pining for the US and craving more of the kind of adventures that I had tasted out there: I was met with either apathy or strange looks from the non-gap-year freshers when I dared to propose a night out off-campus.

It didn’t help that despite being offered a place on the music course fair and square I still felt inadequate, particularly in my playing ability. There were students there who were already making names for themselves as performers, yet I was struggling with the Bach Inventions that my Uni piano teacher desperately kept trying to throw at me- I simply didn’t have the right technical foundation to negotiate them. And it really didn’t help that I spent most of my first term dressed as a tree in a production of Britten’s opera Paul Bunyan. I had come here with the intention of serious academic study, not to play fancy dress.

In retrospect, I was having a knee-jerk reaction (compounded no doubt by the lingering USA reverse culture shock) and should have stuck things out- the music course would have become more rigorous and I could have focused on my strengths of analysis and composition, leaving the performance side of things to the freaky virtuosi. But I panicked and crawled grovelling back to my first love: steady, reliable English. I went to see the Head of English Literature at York to ask if I might transfer to the course. He didn’t even let me sit down, dismissing both my request and myself with a wave of his hand and a blunt assertion that ‘the course is full’. I had no choice but to make my way out of the room. In a movie-worthy moment, however, the door had almost shut behind me when a dismembered voice crept through the tiny crack to reach my ears:

‘What were your A-Level grades?’

I shared the information back through the crack, which was immediately widenened by the professor opening the door and gesturing towards a chair.

‘Let’s see what we can do,’ he said.

We often tell our children that grades don’t matter. Sometimes, however, they do…

It was thus arranged that I would transfer to English but use the option to take one module in the music department to study Composition. The best of both; the course was fine and I enjoyed the challenge of high-level literary analysis, but I still wasn’t happy overall. I hadn’t found any people that I could really connect with: as far as I saw it, most of the girls were ‘square’ and all of the boys were ratbags…

I did however continue to think about ‘big’ things, the meaning of life: logic told me that only one thing could possibly be true and I was determined to find out what it was. Nowadays we have a universe’s worth of information at our fingertips and we make use of it: checking out Tripadvisor and Google reviews before going to a restaurant, poring over school websites and Ofsted reports when considering schools for our children. But in the case of spiritual things most people are happy with whatever they create in their head and make that their reality: ‘I’m going to float around in heaven looking down on you’, ‘I don’t think there’s anything after death so I’m just going to be one with the earth, a part of the grass and trees’, ”I’ve followed all of my family beliefs and traditions so I’m bound to be ok’, ‘I quite like the ideas of this religion so I’ll go with that.’ But since when have any of us been able to make our imaginings reality? And can a thousand different things all be true?

19 year-old me resolved to not rest until I had found the one thing that was true; I had no idea at the time where this journey would take me or if it would even be fruitful, but by the grace of God my wildest expectations were exceeded. More to follow…

23 April 2024

Happily not too much to report… I managed to jettison the horrible extra symptoms from Sunday somewhere along the M3, giving me the ammo and determination that I needed to fight the weakness today. I think I won, managing to teach 3 piano lessons with the same mental energy and enthusiasm as ever- maybe even more.

And it was so very special and lovely to receive birthday cards from two little girls who I used to teach in my school choirs, containing the most heartfelt messages:

It was more than wonderful- and needful- to be reminded that I am still Mrs. Jellett, still a valued teacher, with so more to define me than cancer.

Thank you, Lily and Erin!

‘He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.’ Psalm 91:4