Defining Normalcy Again

My brother Steve (left) and I at Daytona 11 days before my surgery

I went back to work at my teaching job three weeks and one day after my lung cancer surgery, and it feels great! The surgery itself was seven weeks and two days ago and if you read my blog regularly then you know I am a full time teacher in an adult high school called The Excel Center in Noblesville, Indiana. Now that my surgery is behind me, I have to define a new normal for myself as I have never missed so much work in all my life and I am still testing out what kind of limits I will have physically since I had the upper lobe of my right lung removed. And just so you know, I don't claim to be a cancer fighter since I haven't really done anything - the doctors did it all - but I am relieved that all the pathology shows I am cancer free. Thank God for early detection so if you've been a smoker like I was for 40 years, get yourself checked out. My journey started with a $49 heart scan last October and now five months later, I have cleared a significant hurdle in my life journey thanks to the medical professionals at IU Health.

The oddest thing in all of this is that there are times when it feels so surreal - as though it all happened to someone else. Throughout the process, I have found support in areas I would never have anticipated, especially through my social media contacts, many of whom I've never met in person but who have given me a boost nonetheless through their comments, feedback and encouragement. I have really appreciated that and during my recovery have spent a lot of time trying to thank people for their support. I apologize if I've missed anyone but please know that it has meant so much to me. This whole experience has helped me to start looking at life differently so I am extremely grateful for that. Who ever says they are grateful for having had cancer? I don't know but I am, and it feels like I have a second chance at life so I don't want to waste a minute.

My jump shot in 1976 

Growing up all I wanted to do was play pro basketball but I didn't quite make it there. I was fortunate to play high school football and basketball and then play Division III college basketball at the University of Chicago. I have been lucky to be an athlete all my life and I remain very active even now closing in on 62 years young.  I even played 30 minutes in my UC alumni basketball game in January a few weeks before my surgery so when the doctors were asking me the last few months if I could walk up two flights of stairs, I would just laugh. Now I'm not saying I'm ready to get back on the court and play ball again, but the racing season is upon us and I will be getting thousands of steps at racetracks this year starting this weekend with the ARCA Menards Series race at Salem Speedway. 

Before my diagnosis I had planned on going to Sebring last month for the combined WEC and IMSA sports car races. Instead I got to watch a lot of it on television after returning to work at my teaching job on Thursday of Sebring week. I was pretty worn out from the renewed level of increased activity so having the Sebring races on television was some consolation for not being able to attend. I knew  several photographers who were there and it was great to follow their work on social media both Friday and Saturday. My next race with the ARCA Menards Series is at Salem Speedway and while I realize that bumpy little high banked half mile in southern Indiana bears no resemblance to the flat Sebring airport road course in central Florida, it will be great to get back to my racing photo work nonetheless.

Jasper's Fairview Cemetery overlook to St. Joseph's church and beyond

In the meantime, I have my Indiana Arts Commission photo book project on older Indiana cemeteries to complete. I have a couple more road trips to complete to gather photos but I have a lot of material to use already and the concept is becoming more clear in my mind as my completion deadline approaches this June. If you have not seen my Facebook page for "Hoosier Cemeteries: A Photo Study", then please check it out and give me feedback. I also have a page on my Alleygroup website at this link with other photos from my various trips. So far I have been able to hit all corners of the state except for the southwest so that is where I need to go next to find some older cemeteries that have been overlooked or perhaps are now surrounded by newer development. It's been especially interesting visiting some "pioneer" cemeteries and a few that have genealogical significance for my own family. surname "Alley". You start to see some patterns and similarities with headstones and grave markers according to time periods across the state when you visit ones that date back to the early- to mid-1800's as I have.

Today I am sitting in a hospital waiting room as my fiance undergoes breast cancer surgery so finding a new "normal" is being thrust upon our family in ways we could not have envisioned even when we went to Nashville, Tennessee at the end of December. To top it off, her brother also has cancer so this dreaded affliction has hit us hard emotionally so if it is true that bad things come in threes, then we should be done with all of that and our luck surely must be changing soon. I sure hope so. In any case, we are going to carry on and live our lives as best we can, trust the process and do the things we are meant to do. Thanks to everyone for the love and support. See you at a racetrack somewhere soon. And if you want to know more about my Hoosier Cemetery photo project, then please drop me a line!

Vevay, Indiana cemetery along the Ohio River in southern Indiana contrast with the mills in Kentucky across the river

Alley-Jones-Gloshen pioneer cemetery near Brookville

St. Ferdinand cemetery with the Immaculate Heart nunnery in the background

Creed Rules ARCA at Iowa Speedway

Sheldon Creed celebrates another win

This past weekend I was happy to get back on the road with the ARCA Racing Series after being away since Talladega in early May. It was great to see everyone again and the teasing started right away at the hotel Friday night when people started asking "who's the new guy?" But I played along and that became the running joke through the weekend. I love going to Iowa Speedway and apparently so does Sheldon Creed as he swept the pole and the race for  MDM Motorsports Saturday in the Fans With Benefits 150. Creed drives for the team with the most impressive record this season. That trend continued at Iowa with Creed getting his third win this season and MDM drivers taking three of the top four finishes as Chase Purdy took third and Zane Smith placed fourth. Youngster Chandler Smith continued his great short track runs with a second place finish for Venturini Motorsports. It's no surprise that Creed, Zane Smith and Purdy occupy the top three spots in the season standings with 12 races in the books. I've enjoyed watching MDM come into ARCA the last few years and "dabble" in the series by entering a few races here and there and doing quite well. Their results this year have been all the more impressive because of the enlarged scope of their participation and increased commitment to a multi-car entry at every race. That bodes well for the team in terms of season awards with eight races to go in 2018.

Riley Herbst got spun after a mid race restart but came back to finish with a damaged car

The 7/8ths mile Iowa bullring bills itself as the "Fastest Short Track On The Planet" and the racing here is typically quick and frantic. The 150 laps went by in a hurry with only a few on track incidents so the race really came down to track position and managing tires. Riley Herbst is third in season points so far but did not have a good race at Iowa. Another thing I love about Iowa is the variable banking which allows drivers to use multiple different lines and creates opportunities for lots of two wide and three wide racing.

James Hinchcliffe won the Indycar race as I grabbed a few pix on Saturday

The Iowa race weekend is the only time all season that ARCA and Indycar share the same venue which I dearly love. I wish I could have stayed for the Indycar race on Sunday but I had to get back to Indianapolis since I had professional development for teachers at our school set to begin on Monday. Now if I had a paying client for the Indycar race, I probably would have stayed but for once I chose not to banzai a late drive home and start off exhausted for the work week on my regular job. It was a good decision and I still got home in time to watch the Indycar race on television. As it was, I only got about five hours of sleep after finishing editing my ARCA photos at the track Saturday night and was glad to get home.

Perfect weather greeted us in Iowa

Everyone knows I'm a numbers guy - after all, I am a math teacher - so here goes! This was my fourth ARCA race at Iowa and this weekend had the best weather by far of any of them. Usually the Iowa race feels like working in a furnace but temperatures were only in the 80's so it really felt quite comfortable. We started race day with a 7:00 a.m. officials meeting before the teams started loading in at 8:00 and I didn't get back to our hotel until about 11:30 local time, so Saturday was nearly a 17 hour day. I did three full laps around the perimeter of the track while walking to photo locations during practice and the race and logged 18,042 steps for the day. While that was not a personal record for step count, I was definitely feeling it on the drive home Sunday once the adrenaline and Excedrin from race day had worn off. I ended up driving 953 miles from Friday to Sunday but my Civic Si was more than up to the task and I averaged over 34 miles per gallon.

We were blessed with a nice sunset Saturday night under clear skies

In addition to the weather being Chamber of Commerce perfect all weekend, the lighting all day Saturday was just beautiful. My habit during practice for an ARCA event is to go outside the track and shoot the cars going through the corners or coming straight at me. That view is one the teams like since the shots will show the attitude of the cars entering and rolling through the turns. For night races, I am always hopeful of getting a nice sunset shot during the race to show off a more artistic side of the event, and the sun sure cooperated this race. We got some fantastic golden light in the middle third of the race and I was joyfully going from spot to spot on the outside of Turn 3 to shoot down the backstretch while the low angle sunlight lit up the interior of every race car that came toward me. From the other end of the track I got a few sunset shots and then headed inside for the last third of the race to shoot the front stretch and pit stops. I tend to follow a "10 laps and move" strategy to get a variety of angles during a race and sometimes every move I make works out just right. Last Saturday was one of those nights and at the end of the Victory Lane celebrations I knew I was where I belonged as I had had a fantastic day shooting.

I don't really believe in coincidence anymore and I had an experience on the road Friday which was clearly just meant to be. After being on the road for less than an hour Friday morning, I hit a spot in a construction zone on I-74 where traffic came to a complete stop. As drivers in front of me started getting out of their cars to see what was going on I shut my car completely off and just sat there for about 30 minutes. Eventually I saw people snaking their way between big rigs to turn around and go over to the eastbound lanes of I-74 so I joined that caravan and was able to create my own detour. Apparently a wide load rig had gotten itself stuck on the bridge they were working on where both directions of traffic share the road but thankfully I was close enough to the front of the traffic jam that I could use the construction lanes to get out of there. As I backtracked over to US 136, I was happy to be rolling again and as I went through Waynetown, Indiana, I saw an old cemetery by the road as I entered town. Since I am working on a photo project called "Hoosier Cemeteries" (hashtag #HoosierCemeteries or on Facebook), I had to stop and take some pictures and I am so glad I did as the graves there went back to the 1820's. I made a note to return here again as there were Civil War veterans, veterans of the War of 1812, and a man who was in the Lewis and Clark expedition! I didn't know anything about that cemetery before the trip so this was a bonus find and well worth the inconvenience of a driving detour.

On the way home Sunday morning, I kept the windows open and enjoyed the flat, farmland scenery rolling by in Iowa and Illinois and since there was very little traffic it was an enjoyable drive. On long drives like this one, there's always lots of time to watch the world go by and I started noticing some airplanes in Illinois doing acrobatic loops and turns over farm fields along the way. As I got closer, I realized that those little planes were crop dusters, something I don't remember seeing very often in fields in Indiana. It looked like those pilots were having a lot of fun but I had no illusions about wanting to do anything like that myself:  drive a race car, yes, but not fly little airplanes like those daredevils. Compared to most of my ARCA friends, I had an easy weekend as the series was grinding through Week 8 of 11 straight weeks with a race. I will miss the next ARCA race at Elko, Minnesota this weekend but I'll rejoin the series at Berlin Raceway in Marne, Michigan the following weekend and then work six of the final seven races of the season.

The "golden light" from the setting sun lit up the cars beautifully during the middle part of the race

Our days at ARCA races start early with an officials' meeting which covers that day's event rules, schedule and expectations

Winner Sheldon Creed had a tidy little burnout in just the spot I like for photos!

The "Fans With Benefits 150" got some lucky Iowa fans into Victory Circle with winner Sheldon Creed