Hatred Grows

Prostate cancer and its attendant worries, and radiation treatment have intensified my hatred for my job.

Strange existence these days. 

I go to work and wallow in its insignificance, then I leave, drive to the hospital and get zapped.

The zapping has become a routine. I have been issued a membership card. Walk in, greet the receptionist, scan the card under the card reading machine, it beeps - announcing to the world that Joe has arrived.

I wait ten minutes. Someone comes out to get me. They vary, but I think I know them all by now, even after only 4 sessions. Good people.

Hand my membership card to my chaperone, walk down the same corridor, another person scans the card, I walk into The Room.

Someone stands in front of me holding a sheet, I drop my pants, I drop my underwear, and climb onto the table covered by the sheet. Very dignified.

They line me up using the tattoos they previously marked me with; they leave the room. The machine begins to rotate around me.

A weird experience. Thankfully, all told, it takes 15 minutes.

But I digress.

Bossman at work is the type of guy who thinks volume equals authority. He talks loudly about work related things and he will gladly cut you off to maintain his superiority.

He also talks differently to different people.

This is a trait I despise in people.

He talks to the chief building inspector with respect, he talks to me like a servant.

Of course I don't respond well to his lack of respect. I let him know when I am angry, and I address him with a lot of sarcasm (in that underhanded way that intelligent people use).

Two compliments I have received in life that always stuck with me.

1) A close friend of mine once told me that I taught him how to hug. He was not a huggy guy until he met me. Now he is and he enjoys it. I love that.

2) I worked for a book distributor years ago. I interacted with warehouse people and administrative people. On my last day, a guy from the warehouse told me he respected me because I talked to warehouse people and vice presidents in the same way.

I was touched by that.

Bossman at work doesn't do that. I think he is incapable of it because he is obviously petty.

I hope he crashes and burns in a sex scandal involving twisted photos of tangled body parts covered in mud, alongside Marquis de Sade-like implements of destruction.

Fuck him.

Gotta Fight

 "I rebel against death, yet I know that it is how I respond to death's inevitability that is going to make me less or more fully alive."

Madeleine L'Engle

Alone

I have spent many tortured hours alone since 2017.

Friday of Labor Day weekend 2017 - Carol's mastectomy. They told me it would take 3 hours. It took 5 and 1/2.

November 2, 2017 - Carol's brain surgery. 7 and 1/2 hours.

February 2020 - Carol's facial surgery. 20 hours over two days. 

Now I am facing radiation therapy alone.

For the record - it would be ridiculous for Carol to accompany me to the zappings. I don't expect her to, I don't want her to. The actual procedure takes 15 minutes.

For the record - Keith and Craig and Amanda drove to Boston to visit Carol and me during the facial surgery. I was grateful for that. We were grateful for that.

Truthfully, I didn't mind being alone for those hard hours. 33 all told. In fact I prefer it. And I don't mind making 44 trips alone to the hospital to get zapped.

My point is that it is hard. All of it.

Hard on the mind. And the heart. And the soul.

I read, ate and slept during Carol's surgeries. Thinking was the hard part. Thinking and worrying.

I had plenty of time to think.

I will be alone with my thoughts, coming and going, for 44 days. I imagine there will be some dark moments.

I will stick to the plan I outlined months ago - U2 on the radio - LOUD - for the drives. Hopefully I will be inspired enough to sing. I usually am. If so, my soul will have a fighting chance.

My mind is stronger and more positive than it was during Carol's tortures, and I handled her moments pretty well. Or well enough.

Plenty of tears, though.

If my thoughts get dark enough, I imagine there will be some tears during these rides.

That's OK.

Tears are honest.

And On The Fourth Day......................

I was motoring home last Friday night thinking typical Friday night thoughts.

It is a luxury to have a 4 day weekend every week, and I especially enjoy it now because I am putting each weekend to good use. 

I was thinking about the four days to come with an inner smile when suddenly it hit me - on the fourth day - Tuesday (tomorrow) - I begin 44 consecutive week days of radiation cancer treatment.

It hit me like a Biblical quote - "And on the fourth day he began radiation therapy."

Pretty much wiped the smile out of my innards.

Ironically, as I was writing this I got a call from the hospital reminding me of the appointment.

No avoiding it, baby. Reality intrudes.

I am trying to take a tough guy approach (defined as no worry) but it is a bit weird to think about my body being zapped. Burn baby, burn. Cancer, for Christ sake. The mind naturally wanders down twisted paths. 

As usual the side effects thing looms large. Last week they gave me a list - a long list - of potential side effects, ranging from the most common, least worrisome, to some shit that sounds apocalyptic.

The hormone therapy thing has not gone badly, and I am coming at this hard - eating healthy, eating less, losing weight, exercising my ass off - so I am hoping the side effects are minimal.

Of course I am worried about being able to keep up that pace. The number one side effect that everyone agrees on is fatigue. That word covers a wide range. Will I be tired or will I be narcoleptic?

Sleepy Joe.

I am at another one of those tipping points - the Day Before Day One.

I am nervous. Nervous about radiation, and freaked out a bit about how weird my life is gonna be for a while.

I start on April 6 and end on June 7. That sounds like a long stretch. It is a long stretch. Starting in phony New England spring, ending in real New England spring.

The only bonus is that I get out of work 1/2 an hour early every day between now and then.

The best approach is to be fatalistic. The Tony Soprano "what are you gonna do" approach. I can't ignore the cancer - they have made it very clear that it is High Risk. Ignoring it sounds like a death sentence.

So I gotta do this. So just do it.

Whatever else this is, it sure as hell is a character builder.

Please.............no

The following quote is from a book called Matterhorn, a fictional book about the Vietnam war.

The book was written by Karl Marlantes, a guy who served in Vietnam and was much decorated. I just finished the book - it is intense and powerful. Read it, if it's your kind of thing.

Anyway all that is a set up for the quote, which references war but is absolutely applicable to life in general.

It gave me chills.

"War was breaking life apart and splintering it, so there were no second chances and all the first chances were wasted."

A Firm Declaration

Today is Easter.

This is the last fucking holiday that Carol and I spend without our family.

Period.

Bring On The Funk, Baby

I was driving to work - innocently -  litsening to Adam Clayton's Funk playlist.

James Brown, Sly & The Family Stone, Rick James, Wild Cherry, Average White Band, Prince, Isaac Hayes, Curtis Mayfield and on and on and on.

Are you kidding me?

That shit makes you move, baby. Makes you feel so good.

I was so filled up with funk that even my shitty little job could not destroy me. Had so much funk in me that even after 8 hours of stupidity chipping away at me, my nose was still above water.

Barely, but still.

The important thing is that just below water level..............I was smiling.