Patricia Steer

We passed too often in the night of this disease, Pat Steer and I.

We made plans that sometimes turned out too hard to keep.

One of our plans was to get together at the Creekside, to talk books and dogs, but she got sicker, and I was suddenly very sick. We planned for phone calls that fell through and for my driving over for sit-down talks at her condo that I never had enough time for.

I wanted to have her tell me how to to cope with a disease that neither of us wanted.

She lived with stage IV rectal cancer for 8 years. After five years of early stage colon cancer, my cancer has returned in an unexpected way, and I desperately want some of those eight years. What a special gift that would be. Read the rest of this entry »

[Our dear friend and advocate Pat Steer passed away on July 17, 2012. This was the last blog post she wrote for us.]

My friend Janet asked me last week if there were still things I wished I could do, any unfinished things on my bucket list. I thought for a minute before I said, “No.”

I’m sure Janet expected something like a wish to visit the Grand Canyon or take that cross-country sleeper train trip I’d always promised myself. What I really wanted to say, the first thing that came to mind: “I want to be strong enough to go upstairs and do a load of laundry.” Inconsequential as it seems, climbing the stairs to do laundry is where my head went when asked about my bucket list.

I never had a formal bucket list; instead, I created long-term goals. Despite all the goal-maker’s advice, mine were never written down, and were flexible, but I did get to most of them. I didn’t make yearly resolutions; I made training goals for my dogs. I set goals to pay off credit cards and become debt-free (and did it). I set a goal to pay off my condo in 10 years (and did it). Read the rest of this entry »