The Best Possible Words

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I guess the good news is that I've completely adjusted to my new normal and life goes on.
The BIG NEWS is that my radiation oncologist said some very special words to me. She said that she believes I am disease free! Massive weight lifted, big sigh of relief...
Just to remind me that getting old is not for sissies, I had a scare recently. I woke up and felt my right eye drooping and I couldn't keep water in my mouth. I thought I was having a stroke. Bonnie took me to the emergency room and luckily the doctor said I wasn't having a stroke. I had Bell's Palsy, which she was very sure of since she had had it herself. For some reason, probably a viral infection, the facial nerve on one side gets inflamed and shuts down. She told me that it would get worse for 48 hours and then it would probably get better. The getting better could take 2 weeks to start or 2 years and she was guessing earlier rather than later since my symptoms seemed mild. This was good news since the probability of near complete or complete recovery was higher if the recoverys started sooner.
So off I went on a 2 week business trip to France with my eye goop (a mix of mineral oil and petroleum jelly) to keep my eye from drying out at night since I couldn't completely close my eye, my black pirate eye patch and some drugs to assist in my recovery. They say everything is relative and in this case it's true; after my cancer journey this just didn't seem like a big deal. Talking funny and having trouble eating and drinking just wasn't that bad and it was probably temporary to boot.
So far I've recovered about 95%. I still have problems getting soap in my eye in the shower and my smile is still a bit asmymmetric but the important thing is my cancer seems to be gone and for that I'm very very thankful.