Spring at last!

I'm feeling pleased with myself today. Firstly it's been a truly beautiful and warm spring day which has been long overdue and secondly because I'd expected to be exhausted today after my 4 very busy but enriching days in London. Instead I practically bounced out of bed before 9 (very rare indeed!)and went to be beautified or at least tidied up at the hairdressers followed by a relaxing half hour in my favourite local cafe. I then took Bass (my wonderful lab)out in the sunshine and while he ran and pranced around madly I was sitting on the grass mugging up on my Italian and feeling full of the joys of spring - literally! I also managed to fit in around 3 hours of practice,another dog walk,2 wash cycles and an hour and half of teaching which is a lot for me especially after a busy time. I'm also feeling a lot lighter and brighter in myself. Of course I could well wake up tomorrow and the tiredness really hit me as I often seem to get a delayed reaction but I'll just take what comes!

I also feel proud that I managed to not only survive but really enjoy the 3 day piano course even though I forget how exhausting London is!It took me an hour and quarter each way from my wonderful friends' house to the course each day and the course itself ran from 10-5 for 3 days which was a challenge for me. I managed to make sure I played in the mornings as after lunch I tended to aim to sit on the sofa at the back so I could drift off to sleep mainly unnoticed when I needed to!
There were 9 of us of varied but generally diploma level and above on the course. I knew 3 of the other students and the teacher already but the others were all lovely and it turned out that one lady was also from Grimsby originally like me and not only that but used to live literally round the corner from me whilst we were growing up and we went to the same primary school! It's a small world!
We would each take it in turns to play something and then get feedback and helpful hints on improving from the teacher and the other students. It was a very supportive class and we began each day with relaxation exercises in the garden of our teacher's lovely home. We had a lot of laughter and sharing and wonderful music during the 3 days and the course ended with us all playing in a concert attended by friends. I felt very honoured that I had 3 friends there and felt very supported and I enjoyed playing the Stephen Hough arrangement of My Favourite Things from The Sound of Music even if the purists perhaps might not have approved!
The best thing about all my stays in London are that I stay with the most wonderful family whom I've now known for almost 20 years since teaching their eldest daughter in my very first batch of pupils and going on to teach their younger daughter. I feel like family in their home and even their gorgeous dog helps me to miss mine a little less! I'm so blessed with my friends and it really does me so much good to be with people with whom I feel really able to be exactly myself.
I'm going to go to sleep contented now and hope tomorrow brings even more productivity but I'll take whatever comes my way!

Quick Update!

It is with horror that I realise tomorrow is the last day of April and I have 2 more (including this as one)blog posts to do before May arrives and I mustn't break any of my challenge pledges!
Therefore this will be a short post as I am exhausted but happy after 4 days in London on a piano course and my bed beckons plus cuddles with my lovely labrador who is ecstatic to be home from the kennels.

I am pleased to report that I've finished the first of the books I've pledged to read. It was Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie which tells the story of two sisters and their families in Nigeria during the Biafran/Nigerian civil war of 1967-70. It's a wonderfully written and moving and gripping read and I was sad to come to the end of it. You really end up caring for the characters so much and I had no idea about this war and what happened during that time in Nigeria.

I've now started reading Lume Lume, the Italian novel (in Italian)I pledged to read for my language challenge and am really enjoying it and although I haven't looked at my Italian for almost a year I'm finding I can understand it very well and don't need to look up as much as I had expected. It's a gentle whimsical story about a chap living in a very multicultural neighbourhood in Italy and trying to find the words to an old Romanian song called "Lume Lume" which means people and the world and he's searching for it's true meaning and encountering many different cultures on his doorstep and describing his neighbours' different ways of life of mixing their ethnic cultures with the Italian way of life.

Whilst in London I bought an intermediate level Italian book intended to push you to the next level and I'm enjoying revising and trying to improve my language skills. I really enjoy learning languages and trying to get more proficient and Italian is such a musical and lyrical language. It'll only be 24 days until I fly to Sardinia so I'd like to be able to express myself in a more naturally Italian way to try and blend in!!

I had a very enriching time in London on the Advanced piano course with old and new friends.
I will write about it in my next post tomorrow for the last one in April as now I really must get some sleep!

Getting stuck in amongst life's challenges!

I can't believe it's already 10 days since I last posted and pledged my seven challanges!
Life's had its ups and downs during that time. The small online support group for women with Stage 4 breast cancer to which I belong to has lost yet another member this week (8 since Christmas Day) and affairs of the heart have been affecting me.

I had a great long weekend of social frivolities last weekend with lovely friends and a great 70s night which was great fun. However, 4 consecutive days and nights of activity completely flawed me for most of this week and I've not been feeling very good emotionally. Tiredness plays a huge part in affecting my emotions and as the week as gone on my energy is showing signs of returning! I spent much of yesterday in bed with a migraine which has become my hallmark of my body showing it's rundown but am feeling a lot better today.

A friend mentioned after seeing my challenges that she thought they were rather ambitious and I must say seeing them in print I know what she means but her comment made me realise that actually anything other than the disease and treatment is easy really. The real challenge of coping every day with a terminal illness that can and will deteriorate any day is having the will power to make the most of every moment and to somehow try to handle the ever-present fear of dying. We all know we're going to die but most of us don't give it a second thought but being told you have Stage 4 cancer which will never be cured means it's like having a volcano inside you and never knowing when or what exactly will set it off. The drugs will help for a while and thankfully mine have worked amazingly well  for 4 and half years but no-one will be able to tell when and how they will stop working. No-one can take hope away and no-one can take away the determination I have to have an enriched purposeful life for as long as I have breath in my body!

Although a little daunted my all my challenges I also am enjoying embracing them as it helps so much to have goals and challenges. I have a lot of piano pieces to prepare for the Advanced piano course I'm going to in London next weekend and for the Cheltenham Festival but am thoroughly enjoying getting my teeth stuck in. I rather rashly decided only about 3 weeks ago to learn a new (to me - although I did learn it over 20 years ago!)Beethoven Sonata op.110 movement and 3 Poulenc Novelettes which are new to me in addition to preparing a complete Bach Partita (no1),Bach Prelude and Fugue XV bk2(for the musos!),Reflets dans l'Eau by Debussy (so beautiful but very tricky),Widmung by Schumann/Liszt,The Lark by Glinka/Balakirev,Night-piece by Britten and the fantastic arrangement of My Favourite Things from the Sound of Music by the amazing Stephen Hough. Preparation is going pretty well and I'm looking forward to getting further insight into the pieces at the piano course which will hopefully be fun as well as educational.

I've pretty much got the 2 poems and modern sonnet memorised but need to keep saying them aloud as I still have memory slips when concentration goes.I used to recite poetry a lot when I was younger but haven't memorised and recited poems for over 25 years! It was my dad who instilled in me a love of words and poetry particularly. I used to think every father read poems to their children. I used to love it and knew many poems by heart from about the age of 6 or 7. I used to love humourous poems best. My favourite was Jim by Hilaire Belloc - a cautionary tale about a boy who lets go of the hand of his nanny at a zoo and gets eaten by a lion!

I'm getting stuck into the reading challenge and am halfway through the book Half of a Yellow Sun about the civil war in Nigeria in the 1960s which is gripping and I'm really enjoying it. Hopefully I will cover more ground with it during my train journey to London and back at the weekend.

It's certainly keeping me busy and hopefully I will feel more buoyant this week!

I am thrilled to have already raised £220 on my Justgiving page for Tenovus.and really hoping to reach my target of £1000 by the Miss Heart of Wales final on 23rd November.

http://www.justgiving.com/Anne-Shingler2/eurl.axd/a5a61497dff68d4dbf58304d6498a4b7

My Seven Challenges to raise funds for the wonderful Welsh Cancer charity Tenovus!

I've somehow managed to gain automatic entry to the finals of the prestigious Miss Heart of Wales 2013 Beauty Pageant to be held in City Hall Cardiff on 23rd November 2013 at the grand old age of 43!It's not the usual Beauty Pageant but is more interested in finding inner as well as outer beauty and the Charity that all the finalists will be raising money for is the Welsh Cancer support charity which is very close to my heart and have helped me so much along my journey with cancer. I amazed myself by coming 2nd in the Miss Natural Beauty of Tenovus Pageant last year to find an ambassador for the charity and I loved every minute of it and made some wonderful friends!

However, November seems an awful long time away in relative terms of my life! I will have had another scan   by then and my life may have changed again.

In order to keep myself looking forward and keeping motivated I have decided to set myself 7 personal challenges using my own skills and interests for my fundraising for Tenovus leading up to the Pageant in November. I find that keeping myself busy and getting stuck into projects I enjoy doing really helps me cope with the uncertainty and challenges of living with terminal illness.

My challenges are the following: 1.Writing challenge - I promise to do at least 4 posts a month on my blog and will keep updating it with news of my challenges.

2.Musical challenge - to prepare 9 substantial piano pieces to compete in the Cheltenham Performing Arts Festival in May and to prepare for 6 classes in the Birmingham Music Festival in October.

3.Self-confidence challenge - to memorize 3 poems and 2 prepared readings to compete in Cheltenham in May

4.Language challenge - to dust up my Italian for my holiday in Sardinia at the end of May and to read an Italian novel I bought 2 years ago and never started!Also to learn some basic Greek both written and spoken for my course there in July.

5.Reading challenge - to read 6 substantial books some of which I've had unread for years! They are:The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon,A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth,The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway,So Much for all That by Lionel Shriver,Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Bring up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel.

6.Creative challenge - to do 2 mosaic projects I got given as a gift 3 years ago and haven't got round to doing.

7. Baking Challenge - to make and sell cupcakes during the summer holidays.

If anyone would like to sponsor me I have set up a JustGiving page at http://www.justgiving.com/Anne-Shingler2 or you can donate to me offline. Life is going to be busier than ever over the next few months! It's been a very tricky start to the year for me as I have lost 9 amazing women known to me from breast cancer since Christmas Day and I know several women extremely poorly and suffering with the disease at the moment. In February it was 5 years since I was given the news I had Stage 4 terminal breast cancer and that my life expectancy would be severely shortened.I remember that day like it was yesterday and yet at the same time it really seems a lifetime away as my life has been transformed and largely for the better. I feel truly at peace with myself and have the most amazing and ever-increasing circle of incredible friends and am experiencing life from a very different viewpoint and feel so grateful and happy to be having the experiences I am! As they said in Fiddler on the Roof "To life,to life,l'Chaim"!