A Poem

Morning comes in like a soft breeze, Sun is slow to rise
Life starts to awake little by little

After the sun makes its daily debut
The race of life is on its way, charging in hard.
With no particular direction to no particular point.

After dawn falls over the day
And the shadows have grown long,
What have we done?
What has been accomplished?

We settle into the night like proud soldiers
Arriving home from battle, But what have we done?
What have we accomplished?

As night turns to day and day back into night
We are all just busy little ants in this world
All out for ourselves.
Controlled by the system
And relient on its ways

What does one do once free from this?
Able to enjoy the moments of the day
No matter of time or its place.

Times arrow is pointed in a
direction for us all.
You get One shot
One chance
To do what you must
And enjoy what you can

Life's day is upon us
Take it by the hand.

Continued

Continued from the same writing.
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   Nature is the greatest healer that we all have.  I have used her beauty to soothe the mind and body numerous times and continue to see outdoor adventures as a time to let go and free the mind.  Having the opportunity to be in the whitewater rafting community as a photographer the past two seasons I have found a real love for a job that puts me outdoors on a daily basis.  From the sweltering hot summer days to the chilly fall mornings with fog and rain.  I Love It!
   This has given me new desires for what I want out of life and the things I will be able to do in the future post-transplant.  A life with new lungs gives me a much more inviting future knowing that I will be stronger and with the ability to breathe.  I look forward to the day I can take off running down a forest trail, watching the trees and ground cover pass me by in a blur.  Every step will be timed and planned out strategically, placing each foot on a rock, a root, or piece of dirt so that it may just for a moment as I pass thru.
   Meanwhile, all this activity of hiking in and out of river valleys has been great for my health.  But I must also say that not every day was an easy one.  Going to work is a great motivator when I dont feel like leaving the house.   On these days and more recently the river has left me with ample time to strengthen the mind.  Reading books about nature, adventure, philosophy and of course science has provided me with great insight into human life and the determination required to continue.
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   Those days on the river were the most therapeutic and in good timing.  As life always is in the right time.  I can not express now or then how I needed those days; alone, under and umbrella with pouring rain, camera gear, a book, and myself.  I will use the word meditation to describe how my brain worked while on the banks of the Gauley river.   It wasn't just the rain or the sun, it was mountains, birds, and water.  The way the fog would lift off the river in the mornings or after a rain.  It was the hiking into the woods early in the morning listening to birds announce my presents while passing thru.   It was those days that showed me life.  Not just my life but theres all of the trees, bugs, snakes, birds, the Earth.
   Now 13 months post transplant I have went running down forest trails seeing what I dreamed of when writing that.  Having gone to several places in this time and hiked what I could not before.  Even ran on trails I could have only walked up with oxygen on.  To read what I only dreamt of and for those things to become reality has become the greatest gift of life.  Life Itself!


   "But if each of us could have the tally of his future years set before him, as we can of our past years, how alarmed would be those who saw only a few years ahead, and how carefully would they use them.  And yet it is easy to organize an amount, however small, which is assured; we have to be more careful in preserving what will cease at an unknown point."  ~Seneca

  

Life from a not so distant past.

Sometime in early 2009, approximately 2 1/2 years before lung transplant.  Actually date unknown.
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     As I come to another bridge to cross, Cystic Fibrosis (CF) has taught me many fundamentals in life.  As with most thing in life, I have learned, doesn't come without blood shed, a battered ego, and a few scrapes on the nose.  That being said, I now come to a point that consideration about a double lung transplant needs to be taken seriously.

     CF has molded me to be a hard headed, independent person that is willing to do anything that I desire without allowing my lung condition hold me back.  I have worked as a carpet cleaner, fire + water restoration technician for almost a decade; partially against medical advise.  Traveling to high elevations where oxygen in the atmosphere is low and the risk for accidents or lung problems are greatly increased.  I have been; skiing, caving, camping, hiking, working outdoors and just about anything else, that as a child, was advised to avoid.

"One of the greatest pleasures in life is doing what people say you cannot do."  ~Walter Bagehot

My lifestyle has been molded into a life of travel, exploring the unknown and pushing myself to move forward despite what my lungs and body may be telling me.  I have had some once in a lifetime opportunities to see parts of the world with some great friends and family that provide me with loving support and understanding.

     As time moves on so does life. A life that has brought me to this, double lung transplant.  The words may sound scary, and the risks may be high, but I'm not a person to get "hung-up" on the what-if's.  What I see is potential, potential to; climb higher, do more, see more, live more!  That is what I see when relating to transplant.

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Looking back it is hard to believe that I would be sitting here now reading and writing these words again.  It has been a long and emotionally challenging 3 years of self reflection, mental anguish, and joy. I hope that by publishing how I felt and what I thought during this time will reach out to someone who can learn more about their life as I have mine.

"Only by much searching and mining are gold and diamonds obtained, and man can find every truth connected with his being if he will dig deep into the mine of his soul."  ~James Allen