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Remission Sucks December 29th, 2002. Before I get to the meat of this update, indicated by the title, just a short update on the Christmas holidays. It was a great Christmas for me for a number of reasons. First, I lived to see it! (that's always a plus!) Second, Casey and I got to meet my son. It's a long story and I'm not going to get into it here, but he'll be 10 years old on January 8th, and it was great to finally get to meet him and start getting to know him. I'm looking forward to getting to know a lot more. Casey and I went to cousin Pari's for the holiday feast, and the usual gang were there. It was great to see everyone again, especially granny. Pics of those few days over the holiday are HERE. They include pics from a party at Casey's house, meeting my son Marc here, and the feast at Pari's. As you'll see from the pics, if you take a look, we all had a lot of fun. Ok. Now on to something that I've been wrestling with more and more since I started feeling better physically. You'd think that being in remission would be great, wouldn't you? I feel pretty good. I seem to be pretty healthy. The doc says I can go back to work. Everything should be great, right? Lemme tell ya what sucks about being in remission from Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma cancer... Knowing it's coming back, but not when. Tomorrow? Next week? Next month? Next year? Not only that, but will I be able to survive it the second time around, or is this remission period I'm in right now the very last sick-free time of my life? Should I hit the road and go back to work and hope for the best, or should I stay as close to my family as possible and spend every minute I can with them? Being on the edge of my seat like this for the past few months is enough to make me kinda nuts. Then there's all the insurance goofiness, the money problems, the medical bills. I feel like it's all gonna just crush me as they pile up into a bigger and deeper pile of bureaucratic garbage. When I was laying on my deathbed, I was calm and fine. I knew what to expect: death. Soon. I wasn't looking forward to it, mind you, but I was ok with it. I could rationalize it. I could understand it. The pragmatic side of me kicked in nice and strong. The only bad feelings I had at all were for those that love me that would have to deal with my death, especially my daughter. This is different though. I'm super-glued to the tracks and there IS a train coming. I just don't have the schedule. Tom Petty sings "The waiting is the hardest part". You got that right. I just can't sit here any longer though. It's driving me mad. I gotta stop balancing nervously on the flagpole waiting for 'the big one', and start rocking it a little on my own. I need get back to work, back to life, back to the road adventure my life as always been. There're still lots of places and things I haven't seen and experienced yet in my life, and I need to get to them while I still can. I'm thinking I should go take some pictures of the Golden Gate Bridge, swim in the Pacific Ocean, do some more scuba diving in warm, tropical places. Yeah. Lots to do still. That's it. I've made my decision. I've got a doctor's appointment in January. If he doesn't find any problems, I'm picking my ass up and hitting the road again. No matter how it all turns out, at least I won't be sitting here waiting, wondering, worrying and stagnating. Anything's better than that. Remission sucks. Next:
Remission Rocks!
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