very very very good day at the doctor's

I mean...some people with good or bad news like to stretch out the storytelling, keeping the audience guessing long after they could have cut to the chase.

I mean, like you're watching Inside Edition, and a quick blurb comes on...President elected, more at 10. and, like it would have taken them less time to say, Bush elected, and actually given the information.

pisses me off.

so, like I could have said, so, I went to see Dr. Nemechek, and Erin, the receptionist, had called at 11:22am saying they were running behind and could I come at 1:30pm instead of 1pm, but I was playing the 24 bit Beatles files of A Hard Day's Night and we didn't get the message, but lisa was anxious to leave so we got there at 12:45, and Erin said Dr. Nemechek could see me right then, as it would only take five minutes...

I could have said that. but I don't do that. I'll tell you the important stuff right a...

oh.

very very very good day at the doctor's. while I was talking with Dr. Nemechek, Dr. Davis the radiologist walked in, and lisa and I got to talk with both of them at once.

pathology had come back from the operation...no tumor in the lymph nodes...no lymph cells in the tumor...no surprises.

Dr. Nemechek said the side effects from the general radiation plus the very small targeted boost area should be no worse than they would have been from just the general...that the decrease in the possibility of recurrence from what it would be without radiation still is right at 50%. Dr. Davis said I would probably get a sore throat at about week 5, and have it for a month or two.

bleah.

but he also said something that redefined, as words can, my next few weeks/ life.

he said, in cases like yours, most of the time, we can stop the growth.

it's a guy taking a guess.

but he seemed more confident than Dr. Nemechek, even.

we are all breathing easier. Marty Mc Fly's picture is fading back in, instead of further out. the shadows shown by the Ghost of Christmas Future can indeed be dispelled! mobsters in Vegas who were betting against me are getting measured for concrete overcoats as the odds change. the scary stuff that used to seem like it had a tails' chance of happening now seems more like a remote snake eyes.

I think everything is going to be alright.

I think I'm going to, maintaining all the debits I still have to get through now and in future, be sassy.

I'm not guaranteed anything. but I'm keeping Dr. Davis' words right in the spotlight. my strictly disciplined goofing off in these says seems like an investment not as much in a gamble, but in the most likely of likelihoods.

words

are thought of as ways to describe our experiences, our world. ways of showing other people what it is like to be us, in the midst of what we are going through.

words are thought of as shining light on our path.

and they do...but less in the manner of a sun, more in the manner of a spotlight, illuminating chosen subjects in chosen ways, and with shadows often cast in just as intentional a manner.

words organize thought, and thus genuinely influence perception.

"on this tour, Spinal Tap is playing clubs and smaller venues, instead of the arenas they were in last time. do you think the band's popularity is waning?"

"no. no, no. oh, no. not at all. I just think the band's appeal is becoming more selective."

a spin worthy of a Derek Taylor...we have to consciously say, hey, wait a second...

Derek Taylor was the one who, in 1964 as The Beatles' press agent, responded to comments that The Beatles' music was ephemeral and would be soon forgotten by saying that he would be very much surprised if, in thirty years, these very songs were not considered the core classics of popular music.

for someone to just say those words required so much reorganizing of the perception of most people at the time that it went a long way towards making the words true.

it was Derek who was brought in by The Beach Boys in 1966, when the stretch between the surf-and-cars formula that had brought success and the movement towards "rock" music of substance threatened to leave the Boys behind. Mike Love didn't "get" what would have to happen for The Beach Boys to stay in pop music; neither did the record company.

but Derek Taylor knew that Brian Wilson did. and Derek was asked to put a spin on the band that would make them "cool".

his response was to say, "Brian Wilson is a genius."

it was a statement no one could dispute, but that no one had ever quite seen in that way before. suddenly the strict conventions of fun in the sun songs were the early playground of a musical genius...not a trap for the band forever. and...what is that genius doing now?

those words were carefully chosen spotlights, with shadows that covered just what needed to be covered...shadows that would later play a part in engulfing and obscuring Brian himself.

I've had some recent shadows to deal with.

and I get the Law of Attraction. I do.

I hear that, to fear something, you have to create a space inside you for it to exist, which is the very thing you're trying not to do.

I realize there is 1. codependence, constructing yourself along the lines of something outside of yourself, 2. rebellion, constructing yourself according to the contrary of something outside of yourself, and 3. independence, constructing yourself solely along the lines of what is inside you.

and I see that rebellion is more codependent than codependence, creating inside you the very thing you were rebelling against.

"what you resist, persists" say the ESTers, though I am not sure whether or not they still persist.

I have had a good number of great people tell me, everything is going to be alright.

it is so the right sentiment.

but I've stopped short of constantly saying it, to myself and others.

my days have been so much the matter of each step, finding the best thing to do right now on the healing path.

this is what we do when we believe in the path.

I've let myself imagine next Christmas, saying, wow, that was sure a hard time, sure glad it all came out ok.

but mostly, these days are the days. this stuff here seems like the important stuff. I can't, no matter what I do today, relocate one invasive cell. but I can make a day's deposit in the energy bank, for the radiation leafblower to come, the high tech light that I need to discourage those cells' will to live before it discourages mine.

in that quest, The Rolling Stones' Exile On Main Street remaster, say, is a potent and necessary weapon.

but as well, yesterday, I found just the spotlights I want, the words with just the mood lighting for these times.

these are going to be very, very, very good days.

it's a prediction, as much as "everything is going to be alright"

but it resonates in me in just the right way. it seems correct.

for one thing, every day will bring its increased level of health. and, man, nothing is more welcome. today is a week since the second operation...and it's a very very very good day.

I'm seeing both Dr. Nemechek and the radiation doctor, getting staples out (yeah baby!), and anticipating no new model, only steps on the path we've set.

it would take a great deal of focus, in these days when I'm feeling better every day and adding in more and more aspects of my usual life, to remember that I still have tumor cells, and that the big fight is going to happen in the radiation, and that there isn't going to be an "all clear", only periodic "no problem yet" scans.

there will be a temptation to just get carried away by the return of so much that I love, all the things I live to do.

I intend to make the most of that temptation.

so, everything is going to be alright. really.

but I like the spotlights of my chosen words, and also the shadows that fall over certain aspects of what I am seeing. these are going to be very, very, very good days.

p. s. it seems like Joni Mitchell's "Shadows and Light" would tie in nicely with this writing.

it actually doesn't.

but I was reminded of it, and I do still think it's one of the coolest things ever written.

so here's the first verse:

Every picture has its shadows
And it has some source of light
Blindness, blindness and sight
The perils of benefactors
The blessings of parasites
Blindness, blindness and sight
Threatened by all things
Devil of cruelty
Drawn to all things
Devil of delight
Mythical devil of the ever-broken laws
Governing blindness, blindness and sight

o. k., this is more like it...

this is what I felt like after the first operation. this is what it's going to take a couple of weeks of serious goofing off to get past.

yeah, I'm wiped.

and I have that feeling that my body is trying to flush out not only the hospital stuff I got that is completely foreign to it, but the stuff it's been creating to try to balance all that stuff out.

yeah, here's what I expected.

for a bit, I had visions of rehearsal right away...

if it's ok with y'all, let's not...

the competition for the most beautiful day of the year

is really getting fierce.

it's hard to beat the golden light in the fall. it's hard to beat the cirrus skyscapes of summer. it's hard to beat the Christmas postcard picture windows in mountains or city or plains in winter. nothing more pervasively pretty than snow day snow.

but I first moved to Boulder in 1966, from Poughkeepsie, New York, and the colors I saw that first spring were no brighter, no better defined, no clearer and righter than right now.

I suppose it should come as no wonder to anyone who knows me that the months of the year are among the things I feel bear an eerie likeness to the progression of Beatles albums.

Rubber Soul seems early spring green to me, the start of new growth, re-awakening of creative forces. maybe it's more marijuana green than prairie grass...but it feels so April.

Revolver continues and consolidates the creative path...what could be better, after winter, than April? well, try on May for size. "The Word" seems a little last month, after you've heard "Tomorrow Never Knows".

and the end of May! the Memorial Day checkered flag! lilacs full out, tall grasses, those brown dirt Rockies turning into Greenies. how can tomorrow possibly have anything more beautiful in store than what has gone before, what there is today?

well, we who can see into the past know the answer to that question about the future with the June 1st 1967 release date of Sgt. Pepper's. not just different days, mind you, but a new season, Summertime. and a Summer soundtrack that insured that musicians making records forever after would have a lot of damn work to do.

but, going back to the present (?), these greens, blues, whites beat any photo ever taken, any memory held.

I played guitar a long time last night. a little shaky at first, but kind of ended up with a little more confidence. I sang very little...voice box still feels kind of thick, laryngitis-y. but not damaged. it'll come back as it needs to.

and I still feel better than I know why I should.

I'm starting to sort out the new healing from the old. shoulder continuing to strengthen, range of motion better. but there's a virulent swelling in a new spot, which is getting a lot of ice attention.

this is no familiar territory. I want to watch every signal. but...some of them are saying, come on, come back, heal.

it's been over twenty years since I have had this little amount of tumor in my body.

but what is left is the scariest.

I'm optimistic, determined, ready to take each step, in touch with the gift of these days.

but I'd be a damn fool not to be scared.

gentle readers, we get to be scared now. we get to cry, to wonder, to feel laden, to stand in shadow in a beautiful day. we get to take turns supporting each other...myself giving support as well as receiving it.

we get to express the real feelings appropriately.

what we don't get to do is lose control of our focus, let what we think about be determined by anything but our choice.

and we don't get to lose sight of what the medical realities are.

Dr. Nemechek says, we have a great plan.

smart money...even in an area with this many reverses and unknowns...says that plan is going to work. and that come December, we'll be celebrating some problem free scans, and I'll be wondering what to get for Christmas for everyone who saw me through this crazy mess.

the sense of where we go if this plan were not to work has been left appropriately indistinct. except that it has been made clear, other steps await. he said they usually like to combine two modalities...surgery and radiation, radiation and chemo... it is unusual to go for a second round of radiation, but not unheard of, just as it was very unusual to have a second surgery as I did, but not unheard of.

we know that he didn't take away the near microscopic layer of grits because it would have taken some functionality from me. I don't know how much. I don't know what kind. I don't know if any step after this can have full functionality as an outcome...maybe.

but just because he left some behind doesn't make it "inoperable". it's way operable. there's just a way better idea.

you might also be interested...at one point, debra asked Dr. Nemechek, so everyone talks about the stages of cancer...what stage is this?

he said, this cancer is unstaged.

I said, so, maybe like off-Broadway.

unstaged cancer, saith the net, is cancer for which there is not enough information to indicate a stage.

O. K. so this is a gamble in a game where no one has the least idea what the damn rules are.

but this is, scans show and I believe, a way way localized event.

maybe there are microscopic remnants from the tumor in part of the neck (maybe not)...that's the business of the generalized radiation. we know there is the thin layer he left, coming close to a spinal nerve. that's going to be the business of the gamma knife/ cyber knife, which business it is eminently qualified for.

I think there ain't nothin' anywhere else.

and I think the plan is a great plan.

thanks for letting me write this all out.

I think it was in Larry Plover's ninth grade english class, which was kind of more about living than speaking, that I learned about the contrapositive.

you posit a quality about an object..."that fire engine is red"...that's the positive.

you wish to negate a construct..."that fire engine is not red"...that's the negative.

a contrapositive offers another construct instead of a negation..."that fire engine is yellow".

musical performance is an excellent illustration of the value of the contrapositive.

because many people take their musical performance and try to "eliminate the negative" from it...get rid of mistakes.

the problem with trying to negate something negative is that it just ads to the negativity. "ok, here comes that place I always mess up, better plan ahead to get tense..."

then you finally hold on tight enough to get through the trouble spot, and totally forget what comes next. and eventually you can end up with a take that says, I hope I don't mess up, I hope I don't mess up...

but...countercreating.

finding something good about the performance, and strengthening it.

reconnecting with the feeling you want, and focusing on getting that out.

bettering the consonants of a line you're having pitch problems on, and watching the pitch problems disappear.

we can't negate those lost, confused cells that still remain from the tumor.

but we can counter create.

music. health. strength. healing.

I can be scared, I can cry, and I can reach as well for continuance, and betterment, of my ongoing life. I can keep impossible possibilities out of consideration, and not jump ahead over days I really want to hold onto. being present means seeing where I am today, and choosing the best creation to make of the day, choosing to express and acknowledge the shadow and still walk outside of it, into Summertime, and Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

why do I feel as good as I do?

I don't get it.

it was a longer, messier surgery according to Dr. Nemechek.

maybe I'm still flushing steroids out of my system.

but I feel like getting into some trouble. doing projects.

now, there's a new spot in my neck that isn't happy. I don't know what it's going to want, need, hate. and I am so not even turning my head.

but I walked for about a half hour yesterday...short of breath a little, but not uncomfortable at all.

parts of me feel like they are still healing, better every day, from the first surgery. much of me hasn't lost much health.

it is an axiom of mine that, just when you feel you can depend on life to fuck you over, it turns around and messes you all up.

I thought this would be ground I'd have walked six weeks or so ago. that I'd know the territory. I don't. I need to keep my eyes open every day. need to look around for what works, what doesn't.

I feel a little more laryngeal stuff in my throat, as if I were coming down with something. I think it's just breathing tube hangover...but I'm not leaping into singing...not really supposed to talk much.

but I feel, stitched up and breathing hard, low energy, good.

I don't get it. but I'll take it. if somehow I improved from here for a fortnight, I might well be able to attend some gigs, do some stuff.

that would be happymaking.

it's just this dissonant combination of being a real nightmare...and kind of ok.

ready to not be in hospital, as the Brits say, anymore

I went to sleep about 1am. when the nurse came in at quarter after 5, I coudn't believe how exhausted I was. I thought I'd conk right out again...she changed the IV, and I know I'm getting some steroids throughout...anyway, I'm kind of awake, and feeling like I can stay pretty comfortable in a bed as long as head turning is not required.
back muscles seem to still be healing from the first surgery, not reaggravated...SCM was really trouble right at the end of surgery, but now is quite content as long as I don't turn. something new in my neck is unhappy, but this recovery is going to be different from the last, and I still don't know how. I'll leave my eyes open to the possibilites of some things being easier, better. but it was a long tricky surgery, and I'm still in hospital where I was out after one day last time.

the mind and body are amazing. there's healing, which is like running the game tape of the injury backwards, until it unhappens.
but there's also adapting to trauma with going into shock, which changes the pain threshold. both mentally and physically.
when I thought this surgery was going to be quick and clean, I felt impatient. as the nurse had trouble setting up the IV, inside I was feeling unlucky...and really nauseated for the first time in this hospital experience. . they had confusion about the time...7am or 7:30am...and I felt impatient.

now, with the heaviness of the outcome of the surgery, all that stuff has slid to the background, and I'm pretty freaking patient. go ahead, step on my blue suede shoes if you need to, just help me get good.
and today isn't the 20th anymore. somehow this resilient mind...aided by a body that is pretty comfortable today...is coming to terms with where this all is, what needs to be faced.

these next weeks are going to be close to what I thought. job 1- healing. and being told by my body what that is, what works and doesn't, how long.
radiation two and a half weeks from now. I'll meet with them this thursday or friday, and have a better picture of what's involved. I was tired last week. I'm exhausted now. with radiation...who knows?
then some kind of wait to see how it all worked.

I remember the weekend after I heard John Lennon had been killed.
Pete Mc Cabe, with whom I was living in Hollywood, said he woke up the morning after to John's voice yelling, "Help!" on the radio. it was hard for him
I didn't know if I could play Beatles songs again. yeah, yeah, yeah...no. that's how it felt.
it was three days or so later I came to the place of, now it's more imortant than ever to sing those songs.

I bought a lucky poster to guide me through this last surgery. when I heard the news, I said, that's it, no more lucky posters.

this morning, I'm feeling lucky again.

debra asked Dr. Nemechek a question about what stage to call this cancer. he responded that it was unstaged. I volunteered, off-Broadway.
I went from an asymptomatic disease to a pain free recovery from the first surgery. limitations, discomfort, but no pain. people in this building would kill to be able to have that. some of them staff.
I anticipate another pain free recovery this time.
lucky, lucky, lucky.

I had a huge malignant tumor in my head. that's fucking serious. to get away with that and still have physical ability to do music...I'm going to be awful lucky.
and I think that's as likely an outcome as any; we might just get away with it.

but in the weeks to come, doing music is going to be very important to me. it's Job 2. I am going to do everything I can to heal...but that includes doing what I love. Nemechek said so in so many words, and I knew it anyway.
I may have to sit down. I may need cartage. I don't know if I can do a gig in two weeks, or three.
I know the time will come, and I will be doing them.
according to this plan, the next rubicon is a ways off. now, two days ago, I had consigned recovery planning to a place I reserve for meteorologists. twenty years of schooling and you're right about half the time. I could toss a coin and get that percentage. plan, ptui...you're not fooling me with that jazz anymore.
not today.
no new model today. hopefully go home. heal. stay open to what that takes. do the radiation. see how enervating that is. stay with the music work as much as possible. find out what I can when I can after that.
visualize the grits getting lazier and lazier. we had an agenda, but it's just become too hard, maybe we'll let Scott be in charge of growth for awhile.
it's best, guys. really. you think you can kill me and go on without me...it doesn't work that way, honest. there is no I in team, but there is an M and an E, and me says, you're off the team.
life in the food chain is hard. but I'm at the top of it. I know you guys want to live and grow, as I do. I realize you could be less malignant than you are misinformed.
but there will be more and higher life on this planet if you cells go away somewhere, or go to sleep.

maybe I could get them that message if I got a cell phone.

the blessing and curse of days, I told someone recently is that they go.

today isn't yesterday, which now was arguably the worst day of my life.

I probably won't leave the hospital today. but I slept well, eating good, walking to the bathroom by myself, where yesterday it was a three person project. no pain, as long as I don't do anything at all with my neck.
practically comfortable. give or take the steroids, restful.

with ocasional moods of, I don't like this. I don't like this.

the next weeks haven't changed much for me. somewhat harder surgery recovery, I'm guessing. radiation as soon as possible...two weeks from monday, he's saying. and he's talking about the area he left in of the tumor, the grit, getting some gamma knife/ cyber knife "boost" during the radiation...an added hardship, an added blessing.
it was going to be a matter of getting through the gigs the next weeks, after recovering...and it still is a matter of that.
but with even a stronger sense over those weeks of an important gamble.
if radiation does the trick, I'll be fully functional and, save for a handful of reminders that may never go away, pretty much back in my life.
if it doesn't, it's off to the next stop on the medical mystery tour, spinal nerve cancer edition. he says we usually treat two ways at one...surgery and radiation, radiation and chemo. I think if they do another operation on me, open me up again, it would take away the stuff we've been fighting to save.
one good thing Andy said is that the operation stuns healthy organs and cells...but it also stuns malignant cells. I was fearing that these multicentimeter tumors can grow in weeks, and what if there are a couple of centimeters more by radiation time?
his answer was...would it change our approach?
no. we would still send radiation up to bat. but it works best on microscopic and grit sized troubles.
so I would feel the chances go down of its success.

what I'm trying to find an analogy for is the constant constructing of a model of the disease, living it with it for an hour or a few days, then the most recent information totally smashed. and revealing a more serious threat.

I mean, as Arlo would say, I meeeeeeeeeeeean here I am on the group W bench...

twenty years I have a slow growing tumor in my neck. dime. quarter. by the time it reached quarter, ten years ago, I was having it scanned, the doctors saying it can't be anything.
new model...Dr. Lipkin says, it needs to be addressed, we'll leave the nerve and clean the outside.new model...Dr. Nemechek says, it doesn't look like anything, but needs to come out.
new model...it starts hurting before the surgery. Doc says it's probably on the 11th nerve, and we can't move the surgery sooner, we'll fix it then.
new model...at the surgery, not on the 11th, but some unnamed nerve. go recover.
new model...pathology show it's malignant. radiation is prescribed. need a PET scan to show if it's metastisized anywhere else in the body.
new model PET scan shows it nowhere else in my body. we can't tell, says Andy, if it's in the old surgery area, because healing tissue can't be told apart from malignant tissue. MRI won't tell that either, but it will serve as a baseline for future scans.
new model. we go into the radiologists office to get a date on the start of radiation. MRI shows another lump described by Dr. Casey as a button or nubbin. a second operation is indicated.
new model. Nemechek calls. it's more like a thumb. danger to voice box, possible removal of SCM and 11th nerve, possible impact on both playing and singing.
new model. a couple of days before second surgery, Nemechek's call is reassuring to me. new MRI shows nothin in operating area, and a 2.1 centimeter growth. get that, shut the door with radiation, wait and hope for no recurrence.
new model. all the things I prayed for stay intact. Nemechek takes out a 3.8 to 4 cm growth leading right up to the spinal nerves. he dare not cut any more, and leaves some tumor grit behind, with some staples showing right where radiology can use a gamma or cyber knife to take away it's will to grow.
had it been on the 11th to begin with, this problem would not have happened. not as lucky as we thought.

I have a German heritage, and Scotch, and I depend too much on structure.
but all the best modelmaking minds involved on this have not been able to predict the course of it worth poop.
and it keeps getting more serious with each model.
I'm one of those cancer roulette wheel guys now. pay your money and faite vos jeux.
it's like one of those murder mysteries where at every turn, the former friends seem like foes, stuff you thought you knew for fact is discounted, facts come to light that necissitate a complete mental reconstuction of the murder...
and every chapter pulls you further in, raises the stakes, becomes more serious.

I don't like it.

it's a relef to get mad at the not knowing, the mental labor of remodeling. but it isn't the surprise that is hard...the hard stuff is the stuff, the seriousness of the cancer, every clearer insight is of a more serious problem.
Andy says...if it were a melanoma, I 'd point to thousands of cases and I could tell you how freaked out to be. now I can't.
he is very proud of the surgery. it took a long time. it was a mess in there. he came away with everything, and/ or a plan.

but I don't like any of it one bit.

I'm a little worried I won't be in any shape for the gigs in the beginning of june...but it's as always way too early to tell. couldn't do it today...

the structure thing should come in handy in the next few weeks...every day, I'll settle into what we know, and what to do about it, and I'll be able to treat my fears about the outcome like the fear of falling when I look out over a cliff...yes, falling would suck, and the best way to stay balancd is to focus on the walking, not the falling.

lastly, I said to the girls.

it's hell to feel so helpless, like there's nothing you can do. but even that isn't the truest truth.
yes, there's nothing we can do that would be in and of itself sufficient to cause the healing we want
to happen.
but we can exert a pull on the outcome, in the area of mental and physical healing and health. not a sufficient one, but a very very necessary one.
the stronger I am...the more grateful for everything I have, the more supported I feel, the more positive energy is shown me...the better I can make everything that I need to do to heal.
I remember when the doctor's office told me the insurance wasn't authorizing the PET scan. it was on the day formerly known as the worst in my life. and I caved. all of the medical stuff, and now to have a shadow of financial stuff to worry about as well!!
well, it's still thought that insurance will come around. but the point is, if I don't have to worry about bands freaking out over me not being there, about friends kind of suddenly being absent, of girls not taking care of themselves as if that would do any good...then I can dedicate 99% of my CPU strength to getting better, to dealing with only those shadows. maybe even get a model of some good ways to stay positive.
and that is exactly what I'm being given.

so, we are not helpless. and what you are doing for me, giving me, really matters, really pulls in the right direction. really. thanks.

Surgery day addendum

Scott's doctor did spend time with him this afternoon explaining the surgery, answering questions, and setting course for what happens next. Top priority is healing from the surgery, then on to radiation which will likely include special targeted treatment of the area where some bits of tumor (grit was the term the doctor used this afternoon to describe it) remain. There are apparently several options as to the type of boosted radiation for this area, and Scott will make those decisions with the radiologist. For now, he's recovering from surgery day well, ate a full dinner, has been out of bed a few times already, and is very concerned that everyone who's following his journey know everything he knows as soon as he knows it. Hence this update!

Thank you all for your continuing prayers and other positive energy. Please keep it coming. Prayer is on the short list of things that can help most right now.

Kathy

Scott is feeling good right now but things are not as we thought

We haven’t talked to Dr. Nemechek yet (does any of this seem familiar?), but preliminary indications are that there was much more going on inside than we thought.

He took out 3.8 - 4 cm of tumor which was connected to the original tumor further up on the unnamed nerve (Arthur) but Dr. Nemechek told the girls that he thinks the origin of the tumor came from the spine and traveled down the nerve.

He left a sliver of tumor on the spine because he didn’t want to cut into the spine itself.

So all of our original goals were accomplished. No damage to the voice box, scm, or spinal accessory nerve. After healing, functionality will remain full.

But my understanding is that radiation will play a larger part than we thought. Again things always look different after the latest input from Andy. But he wanted to deal with the sliver of tumor on the spine with radiation and feels that is the best way to knock it out while keeping me rockin’.

2:45 has traditionally been a fortuitous sign for Andy sightings. And I’ll tell you what I know when I know it.

But it seems like he’s trying for everything. It seems like he’s taking his best shot not only at keeping me alive but at keeping me me. And I’m completely with him all the way.

The goal for me, for the girls, and for everyone is to put everything we have into life right now, into continuance, because that’s what we’re looking at. To face the shadows and still really really be here. I’m grateful Dr. Nemechek wants to go for everything and if he thinks we can do it, it would be a sorry person who thought about betting against him.

remember when the news we read here was usually really good? it is like that again...

had the MRI at 6:30 this morning (got up 4:45...almost as early as tomorrow...)

got back at like 8:30am and went to bed. Dr. Nemechek called while I was sleeping, 10am.

he left info on the answering machine...I told him I welcomed that, whatever HIPAA might say.

he said there was no other growth showing, in the old surgical area, the other side of the neck, anywhere but the one we've been looking at. and that it had grown a tiny bit, befitting either a tumor or some traumatized lymph node.

so, the operation tomorrow seems more straightforward than might have been feared. I mean, I think again that there's a tiny chance I could be cancer free now, and that the weeks that follow are just a bad insurance policy.

but mostly, there's less chance he'll get in there and have to start wholesaling. everything must go! 40 % cuts! I must be craaazy!

less chance of that. more of a single target to focus on, and radiation to shut the door later.

more chance, in my mind anyway, that this operation might be easier all around than the last.

it won't be long until we know, relatively for sure.

I know this has been happening not only to me, but to everyone I know. and everyone has been positive and as supportive and loving as can be. but I'll tell you, each and every person I've encountered in these weeks has been a little down, a little scared, a little shadowy.

it's very moving. I hear Clarence telling me, you know, George, you've had a wonderful life.

but I look forward to sharing my sense of relief and release with all of the angels in my firmament after a stunningly good outcome tomorrow. and hanging out with some happier people! I mean, really!

breathing easier

that was a phone call with Dr. Nemechek that could hardly have gone better...

except for a slight admonition not to send him books in email, which is what my letter of questions was.

I explained that Jeanette had told me to do it, as she could not make an appointment or promise he'd call. he said, she probably just doesn't want to make a promise that can't be kept.

it was thirteen days since I got those questions.

and they would have been a lot lighter thirteen days had I answers.

Andy says the growth is 2.1mm. maybe a thumbnail size.

he says the risk is greater to the voice box than the last surgery....the growth is closer to it. but he said, it's not an undue risk, or he wouldn't go in. he said he doesn't feel the danger is finding growth in the voice box...just the hazard of operating close to it.

it felt a little more like the warning label on a Prozac prescription.

(which by the way should read, don't take this)

he said it was away from the SCM and the 11th accessory nerve. but he said a half a dozen times, don't worry if we have to take those, it's really no big deal.

fine. can we take yours, then?

I think he'd have to find stuff to have to take them. and if he found stuff...I wouldn't want him to do anything else.

most important...I was arguing for an MRI done close to surgery time. that seemed to shed the light on the bad boys in the room. I saw his nurse, Jane, yesterday, and she promised she would pass that on...today when I called she said he told her they were going to be using ultrasound during the operation, which would show the same stuff.

so I was relieved...but when I talked to him, he said, it would be nice to compare apples to apples, not worry about technical differences.

I have an MRI scheduled for 6am tomorrow.

and I'm glad to do it. all I can say, though, is, don't get any big ideas about rehearsals at that hour in future.

My sense is that he expects there is one thing and one thing only to take out.

he said, if there's nine things growing in there, then you and I will be doing it together.

meaning...all bets are off, time to really rethink. and, though nothing's impossible, he's not really expecting it.

I'm one of those people who tend to defy expectation.

but...as far as using intuition and suspicion to chip away at the unknowable...I feel a lot lighter today after that call.

I said, well, Andy, it's been two weeks since we last spoke.

he said, isn't that weird?

sigh.

it reminds me of the first month I was playing with Runaway Express in the Sands casino in Atlantic City, backing up John McEuen.

John and I were walking to the elevator, and I said, John, it seems like the only reason you've had to talk to me for awhile is to yell at me for something.

he said, well, then, I guess my ex wife was right about me.

I was watching The Grateful Dead at Red Rocks in 1976...day 2 of three days of seeing them...and the guy in front of me didn't have a seat, was a threat to everyone around, and was kind of superceding the performance.

at one point I looked, and he was drinking my water.

hey, I said. that's my water.

yeah, I know, he said. I was sharing.

Dr. Nemechek said, isn't that weird?

sometimes people have a way of letting you know, the conversation is going no further. I tend to respond by not responding further.

it's easier, like today, when the mood is one of relief.

Choices...

Every minute of everyday i have to choose
where i will spend the time in my head...

Freaking out, in fear, anger, & hopelessness... or...

in peace, and believing that everything can and will be alright...

being in a place of peace and loving feels so much better,
i know that is the best place for me to be.
fortunately, that's where i am most of the time these days.

with love and peace, debra

"crossword puzzles in the doctor's office"

is an expression I've long used.

the meaning is a shade different from "rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic", though both involve an activity that, at a time of moment, will affect the outcome not at all.

we know, though, that the Titanic is sinking.

in the doctor's office, we don't know whether the news will be bad news, or worse news, or no news, or news that there's nothing wrong.

parenthetically - I'm a stickler about the word "good" in medical situations. people have been telling me that my scar looks amazing! great! unbelievably good!

it really is amazing how minimal it looks. I'm very grateful. but, sorry, it never jumps into "good". a shirt, maybe, can look good. losing weight. some sun, a haircut.

but anyone my scar looks "good" to, I just don't share their taste.

so, end parentheses, there can be "good" news at the doctor's office. you wanted to become pregnant and he tells you you are.

but there is no gain when you didn't want to become pregnant and he tells you you are not. only continuance...and continuance can be a wonderful thing. but I feel "good news" implies some gain...not just a possible loss that, it turns out, will not be suffered.

waiting for that news in the doctor's office, you're totally helpless. you can't make, do, change anything.

which, to me, makes filling in the blanks in a crossword puzzle when you can't fill in the blank you are aching to fill quite a bit more rewarding. solving puzzling problems while waiting for medical resolution is like a dream that you can make things ok. a good dream.

these days, the Onion article that appeared in the 9/11 issue (which I believe to have been humor's finest moment) keeps coming up, wherein a housewife, hearing about the collapse of the towers, bakes a cake decorated like an American flag. "it was all I could think to do," she says.

that's crossword puzzles in the doctor's office.

I subscribe to the Sunday New York Times. part of it is the New York/ Broadway/ Sondheim thing. part of it is, the writing is just too damn good. I'll pul out the business section and read the first sentence on some financial thing I could care less about, and it will capture me and force me to read the whole damn exquisitely conceived and written thing.

most weeks, I throw the whole paper in my closet. who has the time?

these days, I do. and kathy will rummage around in the closet and pull out September 8, 2009, and we'll do the crossword puzzle.

Dr. Nemechek has not been in touch with me since last Wednesday, when he told me what I was facing with the second surgery. I've been in the doctor's office, waiting to have my questions answered, since then.

that he hasn't called isn't unusual. only unusual for him, what's unusual is the way he was always sure to call. he's reputed to be in some conference this weekend.

I'll fill in the blank by thinking he's doing more important stuff than tending to my questions, which were designed to trim back the edges of the Unknowable, and are probably not going to succeed. it helps me maintain a distinction between myself and all of the "really sick" people he must deal with.

I called his office last Monday, the 10th, and asked jeannette the receptionist if there was an appointment I could have with the doc before my surgery.

no.

what would be a good time for me to speak with him by phone?

a pause on the other end.

would it work best if I wrote the questions out and sent them to the office in email?

yes, that would probably work best.

I didn't do it in New York. Thursday day I had two gigs. but I did write the questions and send them Thursday night. anyone who wants to can see them...but even loquacious I stopped short of printing them here.

I called Friday. jeannette said he would look at them Monday, and then he'd decide on what response was possible for him.

as anyone who has worked with me knows, I tend to focus on what I am doing. on a day when I can either make the music or take the calls, I'll let the calls pile up. sometimes for awhile. it's always and only because I need to be doing what I'm doing.

karma's a bitch.

so the Sunday crossword puzzle sits on my front lawn.

people who don't understand the attraction of crossword puzzles don't get what an absolute peak of human experience the "aha!" moment is. Thomas Edison who for the thousand and first try uses tungsten in the light bulb. the songwriter who goes to the seven in the last verse; Sondheim when he realizes that the very first thing a guy would say to his buddy after a promising meeting - "I just met a girl named Maria" - scans in the music perfectly.

"Eureka! I have it!"

galaxies and planets and landforms and flowers and seeds and molecules and atoms are just so much white noise on a tv screen without sentient beings to organize them perceptually and ascribe meaning to the constellations they create.

"aha!" is the moment it happens.

and it will happen without fail three dozen times in every crossword puzzle.

"the road home", eight letters.

basepath.

"aha!"

not only that, but, "thought you'd fool me, did you!"

not only that, but, I dreamed I heard from the doctor, had the surgery, went through the radiation, figured out the trick, filled in the blanks, and at the end of it was able to sing, and play, and jump around onstage at least as well as I used to.

what a good dream.

and I do them in pen.

pens ready. if there's news tomorrow, you'll know.

going to be off the air for a few days

it isn't the make a wish foundation, but janice, who is taking this broke musician to see Sondheim.

the play, that is. Sondheim on Sondheim, with Barbara Cook and Vanessa Williams. on Broadway.

I won't even take a computer, won't see one til Wednesday night when we return.

it's an exceptional part of a completely exceptional time. and it helps.

I don't have any med info you don't have, and won't for a bit.

I'm just in two weeks of very enjoyable music, and some time off. after that, it's the professional healing circuit.

I'm starting to get tempted to print here the support I've been getting...verges on the dark side of ego to do so...great touching letters from Bill Roser and Christy Wessler, powerful reassuring blog comments from Keith Hughes...

Brian Daniell read the "worst day ever" blog entry, wrote a song about it that morning, and sang it for me that afternoon.

wanna see the lyrics?

Another Rainbow (for Scott)

Standin’ by the window

Watchin’ the wind blow

Rain from the mountain

To wash us clean

There’s another rainbow

Just gonna let her go

Teach my poor heart

What life means

Nothin’ comes easy

For the folks not tryin’

Nothin’ is given

If we don’t care

Nothin’ is easy

If we mind cryin’

All just comes to

What we can bear

What do we have but the love that's meant to be?

Keeps us safe from the night

What do I have but a paper full of rhymes?

Try to make them say

You’re gonna be all right

It’s gonna be all right

Standin’ by the window

Watch another rainbow

Driftin’ slowly

Out on the plains

Thunderclouds soarin’

Thoughts come a'pourin’

You never see rainbows

Till it rains

You never see rainbows

Till it rains

I am becoming aware that, regardless of whether or not it represents an accurate prediction, an informed decision, a practical basis for solace, it feels awful damn good to hear someone say, it's gonna be alright.

rest, gentle readers. chances are I'm not the only one needing it. take a break, and I'll catch you up after Wednesday.

"if the wheel is fixed,

I would still take a chance.

if we're treading on thin ice, then we may as well dance."

- "Do It", Jesse Winchester

ok. I slept. collected my daily ration of improved well being. feel less like a whipped puppy.

fairly confident that today will not bring another radical downward reevaluation.

the rehearsal with Christy was so great. the rehearsal last night with the Modniks was so great. singing with Jim and Vickie was so great.

if I end up needing some fight after the operation on the 20th, I want to remember good what I'd be fighting for.

it'll be great to see Vicki and Brian today.

I have to, now, start bowing out of gigs.

and I need to do it in a really present way.

it may or may not have been obvious, but all my life I've had a dark voice that said, if you ever get to the point where you can't be the one giving everything in a relationship, the relationship will end.

I don't think I'l be able to gig for a couple weeks after the 20th. with an option of, never.

but I think that option is like the small print at the bottom of the screen in a Lunesta ad. Dr. Nemechek isn't even considering, at this stage, doing anything he says can't be at least partly rehabilitated. and it would take nothing short of a stroke for me not to run the home studio, or share my prejudices about what would make someone's music even cooler.

and my dark childhood voice has to feel how out of place it is in the world of people in which I currently reside. I know no one who would be done with me if I can't help them.

in fact, that may be kind of an overarching lesson to come out of this time. I feel like my contribution to people's music is really valued, but that I am valued even more highly. I visualize caring, thoughts, and prayers permeating my doctors, surrounding and penetrating the misguided cells, giving me deeper breaths and sweeter rest, determining the outcome on the attitude battlefield.

I have to share one more story with anyone who might cock an eyebrow at all that:

I remember reading a piece about the question of whether light is wave or particle, energy or matter.

his study showed that most all of the research done on that question ended up proving the theory of the experimenter. if he was looking for particle, he found particle...looking for energy, it showed as energy.

most people jump to one conclusion, hearing that. but there is another intriguing possibility.

most people would say, well, a study as fragile as that, the bias of the experimenter is terribly hard to keep from corrupting the findings and interpretation.

but...

the other fascinating construct would be that the will of the experimenter influenced the result itself! that light, the strongest and subtlest of entities, is suggestible, accommodating. you want matter...let me do that for you. oh, you want energy...well, ok.

Einstein quantified a relationship, hitherto I suspect unimaginable, between matter and energy. (E=mc squared) he spent the rest of his life in an incomplete attempt to relate all energy forms

in a Unified Field Theory.

but...a direct active effect of will on phenomena...wouldn't that change the view we have of the universe! there's an equation I'd love to see.

and I'm here to say, we don't know it doesn't happen.

we do know that a fantastic amount of things we think happen to us are instead the direct result of our painting every stroke on our life's canvas, and signing it at the bottom. stuff that seems like life impacting us is actually our own creation, even if will itself has no subatomic gravity-like pull.

support, thoughts, care, prayers are like the folk songs that can change hearts, minds, and history though they exist only in air.

and when Dr. Nemechek calls this morning, my attitude will be...

let's do this thing.

worst day of my life.

I woke up this morning ready to go to my 10am meeting with the radiation doctor, to hear when we would start and how I would prepare.

he said the tumor board (!) met yesterday and looked at the MRI. it was clear to Drs. Casey and Nemechek, and the other members, that there was a growth showing up...Casey said it was the size of a button. he felt it was further along the same nerve.

he said that the consensus was that another operation would be needed to remove it, the sooner the better.

he said he couldn't comment on the surgery itself...which is where all my questions were. it was a brief meeting, and it stunned both lisa and I.

we went upstairs, to Dr. Nemechek's office.

jeannette, one of his receptionists, has his best interest at heart, and does her best to keep everyone from calling him every minute, somewhat like George Bailey during the run on the bank. as I sometimes say about myself, some days I can either make and take the calls, or do the day.

jeannette said he was in surgery all day and probably would not check in after.

so, putting together the pieces I knew, I began to adjust. a much smaller growth, an easier operation, maybe a shorter one, better for anaesthesia, and for recovery. then three to five weeks til radiation starts.

if I were a batter, I said, these would be balls. keeping me from going ahead...but not setting me further back. I liked the idea of Dr. Nemechek being in there knowing , this time, that there was malignancy, giving the radiation less to have to work on.

all well out of the way of loss of ability to play, to sing, way away from the really bad cancers, way away from chemotherapy...I could invest such without despair.

even waiting...again...for the doctor's call...today or tomorrow, I'l find out.

he did call, a little after five.

it's about like the front part of a thumb, he said. he spoke a lot of going in at a more conventional angle to get it. he said, it could be benign, it could be a lymphoma, it could be a lymphoma with malignant cells, or it could be de novo (a term I learned from the geneticist) meaning newly come into existence of its own.

I said, but it didn't image in January's MRI.

he said, I know, that's got me a little freaked. and an excellent reason to take it out.

then he said...the location is somewhat closer, as the crow flies, to my voice box.

so...there is a risk, he said, of sacrificing my voice to cancer.

he said there are excellent rehabilitation options, and the voice can be brought back...but not, he said, to your standard of perfection.

yeah, I hate it when a sub perfect voice attempts "Wooly Bully".

he also mentioned again, I don't know if you want me to take out the SCM and 11th cranial nerve while I'm in there, just to be safe. he has said that rehabilitation is possible in those cases...no comment made about any standard of perfection in my guitar playing. like I say, smart guy.

he'd use the same incision. start radiation maybe three weeks after.

I said, but it probably won't be the big hammer, like the last operation, will it?

he said, be ready for the big hammer.

I still have lots of questions. is this risk, this urging to be ready for the worst...is it the small print on the bottom of an aspirin bottle, quoting rare but real cases of spontaneous combustion after taking? is it, well, flip a coin? what percent is it warning of the consequences of a technical slip, what percent is it "when I go in there, I may find some stuff that needs doing"?

I've had things happen in my life. broken heart days. polyp operation. stolen guitars.

ok...I guess I've never really had anything happen in my life. it's been the daydream of a favored son.

today was the worst of it.

not specifically over the line I drew, between the unpleasant and the unbearable. but having every possibility to go there.

I have, as some know and some could not, an inclination to let things I love disappear too easily. the shadow voices say, you'll never sing or play again.

it's almost like we'd rather pretend we could know the bleakest outcome, than not knowing.

("well, I was never any good anyway", I'd say)

we spoke of surgery being on the 20th.

so, some gigs are going to roll.

letting down the bands. not bringing in badly needed money. these are the things human nature would have me transfer my genuine crises to.

money has always worked out and it always will. in fact, I'm no doubt way over my deductible for the year...so I think most everything will be free. far be it from me to resist a 2 for 1 sale, even from a doctor.

it's time to mistell Dave Bell's Zen story on the meaning of life.

a man is chased for his life on a high plain. his enemy is gaining, his body's throbbing. there is an end to the plain ahead, a cliff.

sure enough he goes over the cliff, and holds onto a small root, hanging. his enemy finds him and begins to apply foot pressure to his hands. the root starts to come out.

suddenly, to the side, the man notices and instantly loves, one beautiful wild white flower, growing out of the mountain.

these are such beautiful days. all of my music stuff has been so great, people great to see again.

body better every day, the miracle of healing.

on the worst day of my life.

All you need is...

and i feel it pouring in and around us all.

Thank you with all my love, Debra

negotiating an easement

this is a week of easing back into something like my actual life.

went over a lot of music Monday, played a lot yesterday, going to be playing a lot today

I was beat last night. went to bed at 10:30. slept a lot.

but I'm ready for the day. SCM muscle in my neck is talking to me some...I feel like I've gone past the point where, if I feel something in one of my recovering muscles, I'm doing something wrong. I think it's time to reacquaint my muscles with the job they are going to be doing. which means I can train as long as I don't strain. moving equipment (amp in the opposite hand), rehearsing.

so I'll keep an eye on anything, like that neck muscle, that talks to me...but I'll ask it to contribute in something like the old way sometimes.

planned obsolescence

that's the purpose and destiny of this blog.

I slept for about seven hours, woke up and read some Sondheim for awhile. kind of like the weeks where I would wake up after a few hours, and read til it was time to sleep again.

it kind of reminded me. I shaved the beard. I got a haircut. I'm rehearsing.

but I'm still recovering.

I'm not sure any state of health is enough that we should tell our bodies what to do more than they tell us what to do. but I'm still in the work zone, orange cones all around, fines doubled for speeding.

I meet with the radiology doc, Dr. Casey, tomorrow to go over the plan of attack. there will certainly be a report on that meeting herein.

the call from Dr. Nemechek on Monday was kind of a good news cleanup. he looked at the stuff that was "lighting up" (that's so the best way to say that) on the PET scan, and determined that it was all in the area he had operated on, as is expected...read my lips, no new growth. he said little bits like the pea sized reading in my lungs show up on PET scans "all the time". he said it wil be 90 days after the end of radiation before we scan again...read, the fall...and we will watch all things.

but, devoted reader, it gives me only slightly mixed feelings to say...at some point, maybe soon, entries in this space will fizzle and stop.

it is one of America's proudest traditions, that in the annals of Medical Justice, a defendant is Healthy until proven Malignant.

and so shall I consider myself in the coming months and years.

good news

PET scan was "as expected". radiation tentatively scheduled for the 17th.

there was a 4 mm something on one of my lungs that Dr. Nemechek said may have always been there. nothing to do but keep an eye on it. the lab guys reported stuff "lighting up" on the scan near the operation...the doc wants to make sure it is exactly where he was, which is going to light up in any case. he'll do that tomorrow.

but it's plan A.

I cried. the biggest yes/no of my life, and it's a big yes. it'll be awhile before any alarm can sound.

until that, or never, it's the rainbow of normal concerns that has always played across the picture I've painted of my life.

and getting through radiation.

it isn't just the patient who feels helpless...everyone who chooses to feel his pain as theirs, to flow along in the river of his life...and even if the forks later diverge, the waters are never again totally separate...can feel even more helpless.

but, gentle reader, this time, your care and prayers were enough.

no news

a little unusual for us not to have heard from Dr. Nemechek yesterday concerning the PET scan results, which will tell whether I have any other misunderstood cells in other places in my body.

or, rather, Dr. Nemechek's incredible persistence about keeping in touch with me has been very very unusual...this seems unlike him.

I called his office to make sure he had the right phone number (he said he had some trouble calling here one weekend). the service said they would tell him, and if he didn't call back in 15 minutes, get back in touch with them. I waited 45 and called...they said they had personally spoken with him (and given him the number). they said he was "in the middle of something".

one can imagine. like, one of the "really sick" people. or, like, his life.

or he saw the results and wanted to run it by a few folks before saying definitively. albert einstein is a notoriously slow ouija board participant.

I'm fond of saying that the hardest work some people do some days is finding a comfortable position. I feel like adding, also waiting. I'm doing pretty well with it...in fact, it could be another month or so if the news is bad. then I'd be saying, what was the damn hurry?

but it was a tense adrenalin-y day for my loved ones. and today, no relief yet.