How many cancer patients does it take to change a light bulb?
None. They're too weak to climb the ladder.

What's the real reason Biggie was bald?
Chemo money mo' problems!

What's the difference between a skinhead and a cancer patient?
The skinhead's not going to die from a horrible, incurable disease.


oh snap!

Life moves on, whether we act as cowards or heroes. Life has no other discipline to impose, if we would but realize it, than to accept life unquestioningly. Everything we shut our eyes to, everything we run away from, everything we deny, denigrate or despise, serves to defeat us in the end. What seems nasty, painful, evil, can become a source of beauty, joy, and strength, if faced with an open mind. Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such. -Henry Miller

artwork Nicoray via fecalface.

I wrote a letter to myself to be mailed five years from now, but it suprised me so much in its sincerity that I thought I'd post it here instead.

Dear FutureMe,

Are you alive?

If so, I am happy.

You are now a long-term cancer survivor. Reoccurance is unlikely. YOU DID IT. All of the pain and anguish of chemotherapy has been worth it. Can you still taste your foods? Can you still taste success? I hope you've had a little.

If you've had a reoccurance, stay strong. The good days alone are enough to keep fighting. The blue sky, the fresh air, a shared smile. I hope you have found love. Even if it has come and gone, you've had it in your grasp.

Always remember the hollow, nauseous days of chemo, and all that you've learned from cancer. Remember your humility. Remember to give back. Remember to smile, because people say you are more beautiful that way.


If you are dead, I love you, I'm sorry, and I hope someone else can read this.

I love to watch.

There is a site called FutureMe, on which you can send an email at a future date. Some of the emails are public and this one sucked me in. I like the format. Personal essay with a smattering of mediore poetry and a couple of spiritual debates for good measure. Seems like something I'd probably write, actually.

I like the idea of sending yourself something from the future. I think I'll send all of you my secrets, to be read 5 years from now. I'm not sure if I'll be around 5 years from now. If I am, I will be considered a "longtime survivor".

fancy that.

www.futureme.org

SIKE.

My counts were too low again for chemo. Everything will be pushed back a week, again.

sigh.

last night on Ruby st.

Tomorrow I get the red devil for the LAST time.


I can't sleep tonight. The anxiety involved with this drug is debilitating. Last November really was hell- I couldn't walk, talk, eat, sleep. Every movement involved pain. Of course I dread that happening again.

wiki says:

The history of doxorubicin can be traced back to the 1950s, when an Italian research company, Farmitalia Research Laboratories, began an organized effort to find anticancer compounds from soil-based microbes. A soil sample was isolated from the area surrounding the Castel del Monte, a 13th century castle. A new strain of Streptomyces peucetius which produced a bright red pigment was isolated, and an antibiotic was produced from this bacterium that was found to have good activity against murine tumors. Since a group of French researchers discovered the same compound at about the same time, the two teams named the compound daunorubicin, combining the name Dauni, a pre-Roman tribe that occupied the area of Italy where the compound was isolated, with the French word for ruby, rubis, describing the color.

My ruby tattoo has a whole new meaning. As in, if you're on doxorubicin, you're "on ruby street".

Not after Tuesday!

au contraire

love this collaborative art concept:

http://www.bornmagazine.org/

I'm going to submit some of my poetry, just to see what happens.

There was a moment last week. I was lying with my friend in bed, listening to a mix tape, our hands together. That's it. It was the perfect example of why I want to keep living life. Holding hands is underrated.

Tonight I am sick of being sick.

Emily Wells

I have such a crush on this girl.

I sent off a bunch of mixed tapes for you all and am sad I didn't include her.

miss misery

as soon as the ifosfomide begins to flow, so does the puke.

misery, misery, misery.

for some reason the drugs cause spasms in my lungs, making me hicup endlessly.

The mesna pump I've got to have hooked up to my port 24/7 does not help- I can barely sleep with the constant "katchha katchha" by my side, reminding me of my nausea and strange foreign poisions running through my veins.

One more month of hell.


here is my baldy head.

DO THIS.

SF Beat Sarcoma "fun run" 2009

I'm really going to try to be here and walk as much as I can.

If you are in SF, please come and show support?

I remember being in the ER the first time I ever heard the word sarcoma- those foreign, terrifying three syllables have more baggage than I'd like to ever carry. Hopefully after this month I will have "beat" cancer for good... one can only hope.

linkage: beatsarcoma.org

Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette

I love her.

"Like all those who never use their strength to the limit," Colette wrote, "I am hostile to those who let life burn them out."

I say sob story, you say get over it.

I was walking around the Tenderloin alone today, running errands, my muscles sore from all of this new activity, when I realized that OH MY GOD, I'm happy. Really really truly happy to have a taste of living once again. To be inspired by the strangers and the grey streets around me. The macaroni and cheese puke I passed by on Hyde didn't even deter my good mood in the slightest (although, why would it, after six months of chemo?).

I was worried that my former mess of a life would continue post-cancer, but that doesn't seem to be the case. I'm consciously trying to make the right decisions and allow positive, constructive people into my world.

I am breaking into sobs as I try and write this, now full blown tears dripping onto the hard-wood floor in a little puddle at my feet. I am finally realizing the scope of what I have just been through. The overwhelming fear and feeling of death, the daily gritting of my teeth as I prepare myself for chemo, needles and blood and puke and endless, indescribable pain. It's not even over yet.

All of this and still the chance to be happy. I can hardly believe it. This is why I'm crying.

You have no idea what you are able to overcome. You cannot fathom how strong you really are.

Trust me.

If anything, I want my story to show you that.