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.