Whatever I was determined to write about last night when I decided to write at all has passed through my mind faster than the V of geese on their way north. (Perhaps to escape an unusually cold Atlanta?) What remains is evidence of getting older, not the least of which is these bouts of forgetting. In answer to someone who asked if I used to dance I started talking about salsa -- which I love and haven't danced since my first years here -- and it's cousin, mambo, and for the life of me I couldn't remember what to call it except that it started with an m. This was mambo I was struggling to recall. The passion for which caused me to get up at the crack 'o dawn each and every Saturday for years and take the 2 or 3 to Harlem, exiting at the 135th Street station and then around the corner to the legendary Y, exchange street shoes for dance shoes and dancing my ass off. In studios, on gym floors. In clubs. And every once in a while on the street. I needed mambo like peanut butter needs jelly. And yet I couldn't recall the word.
Moving on. It will be that way, for the immediate future and perhaps even for the future future. (Other than in grammar there is no such thing as the future perfect.) I have never been a fantasist (or at least don't consider myself one) but since I'm not going to remember things, might as well make them up, eh? Or, at least try to remember the broad strokes of a life lived so long that I can point to a 40 year old crown in my mouth that now makes contact with a 24 hour crown, both of which better last me forever.
A year of elegies, I call this. My friend, Fred, is dying. He, who I had designated as the executor of my will 20 years ago, will not live long enough to do me the honor. He's leaving before me, a result of Stage 3B colon cancer diagnosed 7 long years ago. He, and any honest medical provider would tell you the same, should not be alive in 2014. But he is and it has been grueling, magnificent, humbling, lonely, relentless, stupid, exhausting, infuriating, and tiring all at once. Throughout most of the odyssey he kept a journal, the Cancer Diaries, which was published as a book by Skyhorse Publishing. Not everyone, with or without cancer, can read it. Much of it is too raw, too painful, too indicative of a fate from a disease that seems to say tag! you're it! And we are superstitious creatures wondering if I read this will I get cancer, too? But if you want to know some of what it's like to fight to live through searing pain and depression and hopelessness -- well, this may be the ticket. Anyone who knows Fred knows he is one tough motherfucker and if you've been his friend or colleague for more than a minute, chances are you've been on the receiving end of his toughness. But, he is also one of the most honorable and loving people I know.
As anyone who's gone through this with a friend or family member, there is dying and there is dying. Fred's in the former stage, not the latter. Which means that the, if not quite zest, but will to live is very strong. Very strong. He and many others will swim up from, literally, the depths of despair towards any and every kind of ameliorative treatment so that one more day -- even if it's flat on your back poised for the visitation of the roiling pain that tumors poaching your life force is -- of precious life. So, we go on. A drug here. An definitive answer there. A nap.
There are two processes, excepting c-sections and suicide, that take their own damn time: birth and death. Make plans if you want to, but don't expect them to be followed according to your wishes. The body will do what it wants to do. We must make the most of time.
Moving on. It will be that way, for the immediate future and perhaps even for the future future. (Other than in grammar there is no such thing as the future perfect.) I have never been a fantasist (or at least don't consider myself one) but since I'm not going to remember things, might as well make them up, eh? Or, at least try to remember the broad strokes of a life lived so long that I can point to a 40 year old crown in my mouth that now makes contact with a 24 hour crown, both of which better last me forever.
A year of elegies, I call this. My friend, Fred, is dying. He, who I had designated as the executor of my will 20 years ago, will not live long enough to do me the honor. He's leaving before me, a result of Stage 3B colon cancer diagnosed 7 long years ago. He, and any honest medical provider would tell you the same, should not be alive in 2014. But he is and it has been grueling, magnificent, humbling, lonely, relentless, stupid, exhausting, infuriating, and tiring all at once. Throughout most of the odyssey he kept a journal, the Cancer Diaries, which was published as a book by Skyhorse Publishing. Not everyone, with or without cancer, can read it. Much of it is too raw, too painful, too indicative of a fate from a disease that seems to say tag! you're it! And we are superstitious creatures wondering if I read this will I get cancer, too? But if you want to know some of what it's like to fight to live through searing pain and depression and hopelessness -- well, this may be the ticket. Anyone who knows Fred knows he is one tough motherfucker and if you've been his friend or colleague for more than a minute, chances are you've been on the receiving end of his toughness. But, he is also one of the most honorable and loving people I know.
As anyone who's gone through this with a friend or family member, there is dying and there is dying. Fred's in the former stage, not the latter. Which means that the, if not quite zest, but will to live is very strong. Very strong. He and many others will swim up from, literally, the depths of despair towards any and every kind of ameliorative treatment so that one more day -- even if it's flat on your back poised for the visitation of the roiling pain that tumors poaching your life force is -- of precious life. So, we go on. A drug here. An definitive answer there. A nap.
There are two processes, excepting c-sections and suicide, that take their own damn time: birth and death. Make plans if you want to, but don't expect them to be followed according to your wishes. The body will do what it wants to do. We must make the most of time.
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