Before I type one more word, I want to thank you. Really thank you. And I mean thank you. Sincerely. Not politely type thank you. Actually say thank you as I type thank you.

You see, it feels weirdly special to feel warm thoughts of people touching you. And not just any people too. People of all different corners of the world, people whom you never have actually met, people brave enough to open their struggles for the world to see.

Thank you Lee. Thank you Yvonne. Thank you Jenniy. Thank you Dazed. Thank you Lynda. Thank you Lucy. Thank you Linda. Thank you Morphy.Thank you jlyn. Thank you Ann. Thank you Tracy. You all touched my heart again.

I think I have written before that my husband and I try to take 3 weeks off the summer and run and hide in some island.

The first days are always so relaxed. He can ask me in the third day for instance "Honey, wanna go to X beach today?" And I will usually reply "Can't we go tomorrow? Where we were yesterday was so peaceful!" This will happen the other way around too. "Let's go visit this little village and have dinner there!" I will say all enthusiastically "But but but...I want to try the dish I didn't have yesterday in that little restaurant we were last night" he will say with a drooling voice.

And of course, none of us will insist. Because at the time, we still have weeks of island holidays in front of us, or days and days, or a week. And the most important thing is that we are in an island swimming and relaxing and enjoying each other's company.

And then, the last 3 or four days will come. And there always are beaches we did not visit, and taverns we did not dine at, and villages we never saw. And I always, always get sad and sort of spoil my last days with sadness because we leave soon. I know part of it is only natural. Who wants to leave kilometers of golden sand and crystal clear waters to return to a 10 hour working day? But part of it is regret. Regret for not doing things while we could.

On our third day before leaving the island, I thought about all the places we did not see. I was sad because the days of bliss were coming to an end. And then it stroke me. Of course we cannot see and visit everything. Of course we cannot do all the things we plan. And of course, I do not want to go on leaving my life the way I live my holidays!

What I mean is, of all the things we are able of doing, seeing, visiting, acquiring, eating, discussing, buying, neglecting, smelling, tasting, trying, denying, of aaaaaalllllllllllll these things, some rank higher.

Let's make priorities. Let's not take things and life for granted. Let''s not think...oh...we still have so much time in front of us. Mainly, let's not reach the last couple of days regretting for the things we didn't do, the things we didn't see.

Let's make the most of what we have right now. This Friday. If you just hanged up the phone to a friend inviting you for dinner tonight turning their offer out thinking that it could be a good idea but you are a bit tired and have nothing to wear and have not budgeted enough points for dinnert and think that you will stay home and go out tomorrow, call this friend now and say you reconsidered and make plans!

Our ferry left the island at 01.00 p.m. I adore ferries at night. And long trips too. They are my way of smoothly reentering reality. 11 hours was this one. As the ferry smoothly sailed, I was alone in the deck smoking a cigarette, watching the moon, thinking of coming back. I thought my friend being operated early in the morning, I thought about my family, I thought about work, I thought about the Olympics, I thought about you too. I have all your postcards written and I was thinking that I will have to post them as soon as I get in Athens. I was also trying to think about the first post in this blog after the holidays. There I got so confused, lol

I did not know what to talk about. Overload of images and sensations. Oveload of tiny moments of enlightenment. Overload of Olympic and patriotic feelings.

And then my mom had to check in the hospital.

My mom is home now. The operation went very smooth as a procedure. But they did not remove a cyst. They removed a tumor. And they have send it for biopsy. Its texture seems cancerous. We will know Monday .. Tuesday the latest.

The doctor explained all possibilities. If it is cancer, she is lucky because it was in the lower bladder, which makes it treatable. She will go for a day for six weeks to do some effusions. And then she will have to check everything else of course.

If it is not, she and I will do something crazy together and she gets to decide what.

I am petrified and panicked. But I am also proud because last night she told Angelos (my husband) when he went over to give her back some things, that she never expected me to be so strong and calm when the doctor talked to us. And that she feels that she can rely on me. I have always been so overly protected of bad news, bad health situations from her just cause I always seemed (and was) so fragile into taking them, so unable of dealing with them.

I never knew I could be so composed on the outside although crying and yelling in the inside. I never knew I could act so well. I never knew I could stay in a hospital room straight for 33 hours with my mom full of tubes and catheters and needles and stuff and be fun to be with and helpful too! I will be honest. I NEVER want to do this again. NEVER NEVER NEVER. I want my mom to be fine. I want the doctors to proved incompetent in their guess and so wrong about the texture of this little tumor and stick my tongue in their face and call them names for scaring us all to death. But I will be honest again. I will do it again and again and again. Because it made my mom feel better and calmer.

Tomorrow morning, I will wake up, make my coffee with lotsa ice cubes, turn on my puter, update on the remaining blogs I have left unread, and tell you all about our holidays. Or Olympics. Or both :) Because I feel that we should not leave things we want to do undone. In case we regret not doing them...