The view from the top of ‘Boob Mountain’
On Christmas Day, we were asked to go around the dinner table and say what our favourite gift was this year. I was the last one at the table so I had a lot of time to reflect on what my favourite gift really was, was it the Selphy printer, the Minnie Mouse charm? And then it came to me, my favourite gift was my health. Let me explain: The weekend before Christmas, some friends invited us to their country home in the eastern townships. We figured it would be an ideal time to go, right after I handed in my last assignment and when my sweety had the weekend off.
So Friday evening we dropped off the naughty-ham (our dog) and after our friends picked us up, we were on our way. When we got to our destination, it was suggested that it might be fun to hike up ‘Boob Mountain’ the next day, we all agreed that a hike sounded like a lot of fun.
Unfortunately, it didn’t occur to me that we’d be hiking on an incline… Our friend lent me a walking pole/stick which really helped a lot. There was a lot more snow on the mountain than we had in the city, in fact, we didn’t have any snow in the city at that point. The scenery of the trees and the snow was so picturesque, it was like being part of a perfect wintery scene. I had to stop a few times to catch my breath (everyone was super cool about the multiple stops), but I kept pressing forward higher and higher up the mountain until eventually, we reached the top. The view was breathtaking!!
Suddenly, I remembered the resident who had upset me so much in the fall by her words and her callousness. I thought of that day, and the juxtaposition of having just hiked up a mountain proving her wrong. I am currently at an intersection in terms of treatment, in January I will find out how well the TACE treatment worked. For now, I am grateful that I was able to hike up ‘mount boob,’ something that I would not have been able to physically do a couple of short months ago. I am someone who is normally very active, walks a lot, takes the stairs instead of elevators, so to not be able to do these things, even for short periods of time is very frustrating. To be able to make it to the top without being overwhelmed and asking to turn back halfway, was a big deal for me.
That was my favourite gift this Christmas.
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