Post-op - day four

Clare cooked waffles for breakfast in honour of Rhiannon's stay, one of her favourites. The two of them went to the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama at lunchtime, to attend a play reading which is part of a drama student practical project. Clare got to hear about it as a member of the 'Connect' friends of RWCMD organisation. 

Student groups design and present several short plays for a specific little theatre venue (reproduced physically in the College), working with the real life theatre director and producer whose venue it is. At the end of the project, the plays are done in the intended location, the Gate Theatre, Notting Hill. It's a brilliant educational idea, as they can pause, analyse and reflect at each stage of the process with the help of staff and an actual theatre director, without being under the usual commercial time pressure of a real-time situation. It's a RWCMD innovation, now emulated by other performing arts places around Britain. As Rhiannon is keen on performing arts and design, we thought this would be of interest, and so she was!

A District Nurse came at the end of the morning, and agreed I was in a fit enough state to attend the wound clinic tomorrow. Later in the day she rang through with an appointment time. They may need me to attend daily for a while. I don't mind, as it allows me to structure my day to include a walk. 

After lunch and a siesta, I walked around Pontcanna Fields and visited Blackweir Bridge for the first time since the op. It was mild and the sun shone in a cloudless sky, and I felt pretty good, elated in fact, about being alive and this well, just four days into recovery. I walked two and  a half miles, and didn't feel exhausted afterwards.

Martin phoned me while I was out and told me about the sudden death of a near contemporary, John Lewis, Dean of Llandaff who retired in 2012. He had suffered from heart trouble while in office but regained health sufficiently to live out his three score years and ten. His death reminds me that I too am on borrowed time, more so, after six months of surviving in such an infection prone state. There's no telling how long we have to live. It's a matter of being grateful for what we get. Especially extra time, which is extra quality time, like today.