Good morning! Surprise!

The phone rang early this morning as I was getting ready for work. It was the manager of the radiation oncology department at the Gray Cancer Center.

I just missed the call, but the message on our answering machine was, "Hi! This is Sue calling from the Radiation Oncology Department. We're ready to start your treatment. We can start today. Can you come in?"

No! No! I need time to prepare! Psychologically, I mean! Besides, John has a toothache and has to go to the dentist!! I can't do this all by myself!! I want my mommy!!!

So, I went to Connecticut Valley Hospital for the holiday meeting of the Keep the Promise Coalition, where I got a small award for entering a card in their 'cards for legislators' contest (that was nice), went home to do some work on the computer, then drove to Hartford and had my first radiation treatment. I'm scheduled for 20, rather than the 25 that Dr. Bertsch, the radiation oncologist, had first proposed. I saw her briefly today, and she said something about how this was the only way she could figure out how to do it without damaging my heart and lungs. Of course, I wasn't prepared to respond, but I'll have to ask: are you trying to say, you wish you could treat it more aggressively, but can't? I suppose, actually, that that's always the conundrum...how to kill the cancer cells without killing the patient.

I have my regular treatment tomorrow, and the radiation department will "squeeze me in" after my appointment with Dr. Schauer, while I'm waiting for the Herceptin to come down from the hospital pharmacy. I'll ask Dr. Schauer my questions. Pat, who is sort of my guru, is meeting me at the hospital, and will stay for the treatment. She wants to meet my oncologist, and see what the whole scene is like. She has committed to seeing me through this whole process--the process of dying, I mean.

A little poem for you, from the wonderful, wonderful Wendell Berry.

...For the Future

...

Planting trees early in spring,
we make a place for birds to sing

in time to come. How do we know?

They are singing here now.

There is no other guarantee

that singing will ever be.

...

Wishing you great blessings 'on the eve of the holy night'. Tomorrow, at 7:22 p.m. EST, the light is reborn!

...

May

Tattoos and other fine things

I got a new tattoo today.

I had a CT scan to plan for the attack on the tumor in my sternum this afternoon. The radiation techs told me that they were going to try to use the five little tattoos I got for radiation to the breast--they're used to precisely aim the x-ray beam--but after they did the scan they decided they needed one more. So now I have six little indigo dots on my chest. And one beautiful vine twining around my right wrist.

I should have asked them to do my eyebrows. They never grew in quite right after chemo.

I expect to hear from Dr. Bertsch toward the end of next week. I have a Herceptin treatment with Dr. Schauer, my medical oncologist, on the 21st (the Solstice, birth of the light!), and he'll probably have talked with her about the plan for radiotherapy. Treatment will probably start right after Christmas, or perhaps they'll have to wait until after New Year's. I imagine the schedule gets tight with people taking time off around the holidays. Anyway, I'll keep posting.

Real life

So, I was on my way to have my body buffed, my nails airbrushed, my feet dipped, my lip waxed, my eyelashes tinted, my brows threaded, my skin exfoliated, my ears candled, and my hair extended when real life intervened.

Darn, darn real life.

It was fun writing that first sentence. It's quite true, though, that I never cease to be amazed at the creative ways in which human beings can waste money, and, more important by far, time.

I was a pretty teenager, after having been a homely child in all my younger years. I enjoyed the attention that being attractive got me, but I never made the mistake of thinking that either the physical attractiveness or the consequent attention meant anything.

This Sunday I will lead the Brooklyn Unitarian Universalist Society's Solstice service for the fifth year. The theme will be paradox.

I don't talk about this much, because it tends to be perceived as a sort of "holier than thou" stance, but about eighteen years ago I had what I came to regard as a mystical experience. It's difficult to explain, but I suddenly--and for a period of months after--"knew" the unity of opposites. Not as "joy in pain", or even just "death as necessary to life", or that kind of thing. In a moment of gnosis, I saw opposites as the same thing.

I wish I could have that knowing back. Intellectually, of course, I can experience yin and yang, but I want to know the circle again. We all need to know, truly know, that we are the seed of our own death. Life gains so much more meaning if we come to that understanding. And so I am left, again, with "ripeness": the moment of perfection is the moment of death.

That's me in the corner...

Wow! I guess it's been a really long time since I posted.

A huge number of things have happened since then. The biggest is that I had my PET/CT scan, just four months after the last one this time, and it seems the tumor in my sternum is growing.

Of course, I knew this would happen, but I was hoping there'd be more stable time. The good news, however, is that since I started treatment at Hartford Hospital in April of '05, they have acquired a new technology called "intensity modulated" radiotherapy. The reason I couldn't have radiation before is that the older technology would have caused major heart damage, since my heart is right behind the tumor area. With the new technology, the radiation oncologist says she should be able to limit or altogether avoid exposing the heart to radiation.

I have a CT scan scheduled for December 13 to measure the parameters of the tumor. After that, there will be a few appointments to plan the "attack", and I'll probably begin radiation toward the end of this month.

Treatment will be daily for five weeks, which is problematic, especially since the hospital is 35 minutes in the opposite direction from where I work. But I've told the agency board my situation, and they've been very supportive. My concern is that they don't really understand what's at stake if I can't do all my hours. But I'll just have to do the best I can.

So I had a little pity party today. It's the first time I've cried since the doctor told me the news on November 28. So I probably needed to do that.

On another note, above are a couple of pieces I've done recently. The dark one is a sort of 'holiday' piece which will go up on eBay tomorrow night, as well as being part of a collaborative poster created by my Art Squared eBay group. The part that's supposed to look like a group of city buildings is actually a fractal graphic; I've been having fun with a free program called Xaos. The red one is called "I Am Woman", and features, among others, Annie Oakley with a better pair of legs, Angela Davis on a Wanted poster, and me, down in the lower left corner, losing my religion, I guess.

But I always get it back.

Brand new Tarot cards

...

These are cards I haven't tried to sell, ones I've been working on specifically for the Hygienic Art Gallery Holiday Show. (FYI, they don't have to be holiday-themed--just small format and under $150 in price.) I would welcome constructive criticism of these. I'm not sure they're actually finished...

So whaddaya think?

...

Three Digital Tarot Cards

These three images were sold on eBay in the ACEO size. I'm very pleased with the way these came out, along with the Magician, which was posted in my October 2 blog. I'll show you the ones I've been working on for the holiday show in the next post.

....

Harm none

My sitemeter tells me that some of you haven't given up on me.

I know it's been a very long time since I've posted. I'm busy. Very, very, busy.

I'm now working as interim executive director for DNEC (what's a DNEC? it's the Disabilities Network of Eastern Connecticut), where I worked for about eight years before changing jobs in March 2005. I'm a little afraid of publishing anything online about the circumstances surrounding my sudden change in employment status, so I'll let this suffice: they needed me. I mean needed me. And I am thrilled to be able to help.

I'm only working 25 hours a week; I limited my hours because I do have to have my regular cancer treatments and other things that would make it difficult to work full time. Fortunately, one of my co-workers has been promoted to managerial and supervisory duties, so I think I'll make it through until February, when I have to leave in order to keep my Social Security Disability. I will be sorry in many ways to go, but I'll clearly need a good rest by then.

The Wiccan faith has a sort of golden rule that says: "Harm none, do as ye will", sometimes quoted as "An [if] it [or ye] harm none, do as ye will". This is interpreted to mean that you shouldn't do anything to harm someone, and if you're not harming anyone, you can do anything you want. I call myself a pagan rather than a Wiccan, but I think this rule has its merits. I interpret it somewhat differently, though. I interpret it to mean that you can do what you want if it's not harmful, but if it might cause harm, then you need to consult other things besides your own will before you make the decision whether to do it or not. I don't believe it is instruction to never cause harm.

Why? Because harm is necessary. In the circumstances surrounding my new job, harm was done in order that the greater good, in this case the viability of the organization itself, might be preserved. I have compassion for those who were harmed. But DNEC has to survive in order to help individuals with disabilities receive the supports and civil rights to which they're entitled. And as I said, I am extremely happy--and grateful--to be part of this process.

'Nuff said about that! I have also been doing a reasonable amount of art work, despite my tendency to collapse when I arrive home. Last week I picked up the self-portrait I did for the Hygienic Art Gallery's breast cancer show, and the gallery manager, Maurene, told me it had gotten a lot of comments from people on how "powerful" it is. That emboldened me to ask how one gets in other shows there, and the upshot is that I have to produce 12 pieces for their holiday show by November 12! I've decided to enter 12 5" x 7" prints of my digital tarot cards. You've seen my Magician (October 2, the post entitled "Two more small digital collages"), but I'll post a few more for you to see in a separate post. Comments are very welcome! Some aren't finalized, and I could use some help in figuring out how to improve them. Thanks!