10,450 Feet
There’s something Dad and I talked about on this trip that I’ve been chewing on ever since.
He never really got a retirement. His symptoms made that decision for him, and from the moment he stopped working, he went straight into a different full-time job — appointments, scans, surgeries, hospital stays, infusions, pill bottles, phone calls, and more appointments. No gap in between. No breather. Just one calendar handed off to another.
I’m so glad he got to go to the mountains.
Driggs, Idaho
We stayed on the Idaho side of the Tetons in a house with a patio pointed straight at the range.
Day one we did nothing. Unpacked. Sat down. That was the entire agenda and I stand by it.
And honestly? That patio won the trip. Dad kept ending up back out there — not doing anything, not on the phone with anybody’s scheduling department, just sitting and looking at mountains. That’s his place. Always has been. He needed it so much more than any of us realized going in.
The tram left without him
Sad in the moment, funny now. We took the Jackson Hole Aerial Tram up to 10,450 feet.
Dad decided he HAD to get a picture. Non-negotiable. Once-in-a-lifetime shot. And while he was out there directing his photo shoot, the tram — which has a schedule and zero interest in anyone’s artistic visions, loaded up and left with Zeke, Levi, and me on board.
So he rode down alone. Solo tram. Just a man and his photograph.
Worth it though, because the views up there genuinely do not photograph, which is a little rude considering how that all played out. We had waffles at the top with brown sugar butter and Nutella and I would like to state for the record that waffles hit different when you’re on top of the world.
Everything else, rapid fire
Yellowstone Bear World. Drive-through bears. Exactly as advertised. No notes.
Jenny Lake. We hiked, Dad found a spot and just sat and took the whole thing in, and we saw a moose. A real one.
Random pull-offs. Some of the best scenery of the week came from just stopping wherever looked good.
Victors Emporium. Milkshakes. Dad’s official verdict: “almost as good as the ones I make at home.” For those keeping score, that is the highest rating he has ever issues to a milkshake he did not personally construct.
Jackson. Spent a day in town, hit the Million Dollar Cowboy Bar, had breakfast at Provisions, and Dad bought himself a beautiful turquoise ring from an authentic Native American store. He earned that ring twice over.
The one complaint: wildfire smoke from Canada and Oregon parked itself over the range on and off, so some days the Tetons were less “majestic peaks” and more “rumor of peaks.” CLeared up enough though at times.
Also: somebody turned seven
We got to celebrate Zeke’s 7th birthday out there, which turned the whole trip into something else entirely.
There’s a version of this year where that birthday gets absorbed into everything else going on. Instead he got it in the mountains, with his Poppa there for all of it. I don’t think either of them is going to forget it, and I’m not either.
Seven years old, in the Tetons. Not a bad one to draw!
The trip home, an epic in three acts
Scheduled arrival: Thursday, 9PM.
Actual arrival: Saturday, 4AM.
We spent two days stranded in Colorado. I’m not going to relive it again because the story does not improve with retelling. Zeke and Dad were absolute troopers through the whole ordeal and both deserve medals. We are all still not caught up on sleep.
Okay, now onto the medical stuff
Dad got treatment today. Straight off of a week of travel and a 4 AM homecoming, his levels still looked good and they cleared him. No delay. He’s officially started cycle 5.
His bones are responding well. This has been the most encouraging piece of the whole thing and it’s holding steady.
The lymph nodes. We met with one of the oncologists today about the spots that turned up on the recent PET and CT. He said he isn’t concerned about them and that inflammation could explain what we’re seeing. He’s happy with how treatment is going and isn’t changing anything. Plan is another PET in about 3-4 more cycles to check in. We’ll know more than, and I’ll tell you when we do.
Thyroid. Extra bloodwork today because his thyroid’s been running a little low. Standard follow-up, nothing alarming, and “normal” with treatment.
Salt pills. These have been making him miserably nauseous, so the doctor is cutting the daily count down a bit. Small adjustment, but hopefully it’ll make a big difference in how Dad is feeling, which is the whole point.
Two new specialists. He’s got a referral and scheduled appointments with a nephrologist (kidneys) and an endocrinologist )hormones, thyroid) to hopefully finally figure out these sodium issues. So between oncology, palliative care, primary care, and now these two, Dad has assembled a full medical franchise. I feel like I should have a group chat with these people, even if it’s just me talking.
Palliative care. We keep meeting with them and they keep being one of the most useful parts of this entire process. Symptom management, practical tips, adjustments. They’ve been fantastic and I will keep saying it until people stop flinching at that word.
So that’s the update. He sat on the patio for a week and looked at mountains. He rode a tram by himself because of a photograph (worth it). He got a turquoise ring and a milkshake he had opinions about.
He needed (and deserved) every bit of it.
Thanks for checking in on him. It genuinely matters.
