I’m back from brain irradiation.
It was close to a replay of the rad treatments I had to my
chest/lung tumor. Two of the original Radionettes were there (See Day Three), and two had moved on to other
afterglow pursuits. I was again offered a choice of music to be played during
the session, but this time I opted out.
I thought of requesting “If I Only Had A Brain,” but I
didn’t want to add sublime to the sublime.
No, for some reason, this time I wanted the pure deal:
unfettered, no distractions, no place to file my fear, no easy-out refocuses. Nothing
but me and the slow-revolving click-humming appendages of the linear accelerator.
Strapped, wrapped, mapped, tapped and zapped.
Now, here I am. Next day. At breakfast with Diane:
Diane: I have rhyming names for your brain tumor: either
Cerebellar Fella, or Cerebellar Stella, if it's a girl.
Me: Uh ... but, how will I know if it's male or female?
Diane: Same way you know if I'm male or female.
Me: Bacon with your eggs this morning?
Diane: Exactly.
In two months, we’ll have another MRI look and see if Fella
or Stella died for my country. Meanwhile, we’ll be starting another round of
immuno- AND chemotherapy, with concurrent infusions every three weeks times
four of Keytruda, Carboplatin and Pemetrexed.
It must be obvious to you that I’ve been blessed with a
brilliant metaphor for a cancer baseball season with my personal shortstop Tinker
Keytruda flipping it to second base Evers Carboplatin throwing a strike over to
first base Chance Pemetrexed on defense.
Looks like I’ll have to play offense a while longer.
More as we go, El
