wednesday, let's play ball, mariners baseball

and they won. of course it was 0/0 until the 7th inning when the mariners finally scored. we love baseball, and we specially love going to the games together.

last thursday mr. roll came home from work and told me he had a surprise for me. mariners tickets. section 134, row 32--right behind home plate. good.

when we were dating and commuting between berkeley and seattle to see each other every other week, one thing we did a lof of during spring and summer, was go to baseball games. when mr. roll came to berkeley we headed the oakland a's. when i would go up to seattle, we headed for the seattle mariners. and for the record, i introduced mr. roll to garlic fries in oakland, long before they finally arrived at safeco field.

baseball has been not much more than a fond memory since 1991, for us due to mr. roll's cancer. these past few years have been a struggle for him health wise between 8+ surgeries where he is in the hospital for an entire week, and the chemo. the chemo. the ironic thing about the chemo is that it is given to hopefully preserve his life, and yet it makes him feel as if his life is over. it robs him of his health. robs him of a life. robbed him of an immune system so going into crowds was not something he could do. and watching sports on television just isn't the same as being there.

even harder to give up than the mariners, was his not being able to go to his beloved hockey. oh my gosh does mr. roll love hockey. i think it's because he's from minneapolis. all that snow. all those frozen lakes. the frozen tundra it is, and he loved playing hockey. he loves watching hockey. seattle does not have a nhl team, but seattle does have a junior league team, the seattle thunderbirds. we go. we love. we have missed.

i had never been to a hockey game until i met and began dating mr. roll. tonight i am going to buy him (us) short season tickets. october will be here before we know it and hockey season will be upon us.

mr. roll stopped chemo back in december when i developed septic shock. he decided he couldn't be with me all the time and do chemo too. he discussed it all, of course, with his oncologist (who came into icu, while i was in a coma, to see me and to visit with mr. roll, and ended up sitting and talking to him 2 hours. not only is he a brilliant dr., but his bedside manner is the best.) the dr. would have liked mr. roll to start back on his chemo regimen months ago, but mr. roll said "no". he has been on chemo since september 2002, only missing about 15 weeks in these years that he was on a "break". the chemo is hard. he's sick. he lost so much weight. no energy. life pretty much came to a standstill. since he's been off the chemo now he is feeling so good. he feels like he has a life again. so, in agreement with me and his oncologist he has a ct scan every two months and the current tumor is looked at closely for changes. so far no changes. so far it's all good.

we talked on the way home, from the baseball game, and we're ready to step back into enjoying being out in large crowds. or at least baseball and hockey crowds.