Having admitted to being a heavy smoker I seem to be in a minority on this board. I think I do have the advantage of not questioning " why me" I quit smoking but not living. I was never one to try and live a safe life. I was a big wave surfer when I lived in California and almost died in a few big storms. I have spent the past 16 years working in tropical forests in some of the remotest areas in the world. I have had multiple bouts of malaria, typhoid, typhus and diseases even my doctors couldn't diagnose. I am very familiar with the intensive care unit at numerous hospitals. I own an ultralight airplane that I fly every day I can when the weather here is warm (I had my engine die on me during treatment and crash landed in a preachers back yard). I have had so many close calls with death that I wake up every day in wonder that god has granted me another 24 hours.

I read about bucket lists and I think; I don't have one. When I was diagnosed, my only thought was to stay at home with my wife and son.

I'm better now and have to start planning another exploration program in the Amazon next month. I'm going to a place so remote, the maps are blank and the rivers have never been named. Funny thing is I always loved that sort of thing. Now that I have survived this far against the cancer, I really just want to stay home, not because it�s safe, but because it�s where my family is.

I�ve seen old men who never really lived a day in their lives and buried young men who lived more in their short lives then most other people do in long ones. The one thing I never was good at or spent much time thinking about was why good or bad things happened to me. Life is just a collection of good and bad things and a bunch of stuff in between those extremes. Eventually we all have the ultimate bad day, our last. Until then I�m living forward and not looking back

Kelly