Anniversary

Buddy and I met again (after 40 plus years) in August of last year.  To celebrate our anniversary, we booked a room at a  Bed and Breakfast on the other side of Dillsboro.   I had been there before so I knew what it was like.  Time passes, and things change. They built another building on the top of the mountain with rooms with spectacular views.

Buddy and I heading out to our B&B.

The front of the B&B.  This is the original where I stayed before.

The drive up to the chalet.

This is the sign (a miniature house) at foot of their drive way.  It was so cute!There was a pond with fish on the grounds.

Water lilies in the pond.

Buddy with our hostess.

Our hostess made the best homemade breakfast ever!  This was some sort of casserole.  She made home made muffins.This is the new building at the top of the mountain.  Our room was the on the bottom right.

We had a fireplace over the tub.  So romantic!

The beautiful sterling bracelet Buddy gave me for our anniversary.  It is really beautiful.We drove on the Parkway coming home.  I don’t think either one of us had been on this part of the Parkway.  I thought after all these years, I had covered the complete Parkway in North Carolina.At the higher elevations you can see the trees dying.Closer picture of the trees dying.  North Carolina has a real problem with some beetle that is killing our trees.

At the end of August, we got to see my very favorite singer, Kate Campbell.  She was the singer Nicole and I went on tour with in Ireland. 

Kate is my hero.  She can sing like the angels.  Her music always moves me to tears.  With my impending visit to the hospital, Kate was able to give me moments of peace.  I had no idea what was awaiting me in Cleveland. When I arrived in Cleveland and met with Dr. Lindsey I had to have a Cat Scan.  The scan showed a possible blood clot.  He told me that he could not do the procedure with the clot present.  He sent me to Dr. Gillinov.  Dr. Gillinov told me that I would have to have open heart surgery.  Well, talk about throwing someone a curve ball!  I was totally overwhelmed.  I finally got my head around the news and went ahead with the operation.  I will not bore you with all the details and the amount of pain, but they did replace my mitral valve, repaired my tricuspid valve, fixed a hole in my heart and did the maze procedure to help in the stopping of the A-fib.  What was suppose to be an over night stay in the hospital, turned out to be three weeks. Afterwards, I had to drive for two days in the back of the car(can’t sit in the front in case the air bags deploy).  Nicole now knows that I am made of the hard stuff.  I think I can tell you every hole and bump from here to Cleveland.  All that aside, I am truly one lucky lady.  I really believe that they saved my life.  Dr. Gillinov, by the way, was the surgeon that operated on Robin Williams.

My progress is slow, but steady.  I have had a few set backs, but on the whole, I am doing better. I went to my first Book Arts Group meeting this past Saturday.  I haven’t been to a meeting since the early Spring.  I walked around the circle for the first time in 2 years.  Baby steps, but they’re still steps.  My very precious daughter took 5 weeks to help care for me.  We are both blessed to have wonderful Chuck in our lives to put up with all this illness.  Thank you, dearest Chuck, for sharing Nicole all those weeks.  Buddy is another one I will never be able to thank.  He stayed with me the entire time I was in Cleveland, and he took a week to take care of me after Nicole left.  Then I went to his house so he could care for me.  My very dear Amelia was very generous with her time to come up here and take a turn in taking care of me.  I am truly blessed.

Blessings!