25 Years

Today is our 25th anniversary, so Happy Anniversary Carol. Marrying you is the best thing I've ever done. We're in Mammoth Lakes this week celebrating our anniversary, Carol's dad's birthday, Carol's parents 60th Anniversary and just being together with family. By coincidence more than design, Carol and I spent our honeymoon in Mammoth 25 years ago:

July 1985

At the Mono Lake Overlook July 2010

As for my recovery from surgery, things are going as well as could be expected. I've been continuing to feel good most of the time and there has been no sign of the symptoms I had been having before. The head is still a little sore as it heals, but nothing too bad. I've had a few times when I get kind of shaky and feel sort of nervous. I think this is a side effect of the meds, but we're keeping an eye on it. I exchanged emails with my neurologist last week and he said while people generally stay on anti-seizure meds for about a year after surgery like mine, since my case is unusual he thinks we can try tapering off the meds after about three months. So, that puts the test sometime in early October. We won't really know until then how successful the surgery was. I remain optimistic. I have a surgery follow-up appointment with Dr X next Monday. I presume he will determine how well I'm doing and decide if I can resume driving and weather I'll be ready to go back to work the following week. I'm looking forward to this appointment because I have a few more questions I would like to ask about the surgery.

Last week Carol shaved my head because I had to see how I looked completely bald. Here it is:

Most people seem to like it except Gayle. Her comment was simply "don't do that again". And I probably won't . It's a lot of work! Especially with hair as thick and fast-growing as mine. I think I will stick with the short buzz until the weather starts to cool off in the fall.

On Friday the staples came out at my local doctor's office. And despite how painful the staples look, I could hardly feel them coming out.

I decided to commemorate this event in my life with a tattoo. I had this done last week in Sacramento at the same place that did my first one:

Looking back now on having my head opened, it all seems a bit surreal. But life is slowly getting back to normal. I've been visiting with friends and family and I've been getting some new photographs done. Here is a self-portrait that Carol helped me with last friday:

And here are a couple of recent portraits of Gayle and Sarah:

One more day at a time. And today is a day to celebrate 25 years with Carol. I can't imagine what life would have been like with anyone else by my side.