LymphoMartini by Tom Music

Tom Music is doing what I am doing - except his is a first hand account.

...and he is wittier, more charming, and more informative than I am. He was also genius/hilarious enough to make a graph of his hair loss! His entries start here and go on for the past year.

Comrade.

The Genesis Tub

Brendan is almost done with chemotherapy.
It's already October.
Three more weeks worth of sitting and accepting poison. Three more weeks until they scan him again while I silently plead to fates I don't believe can actually be influenced by begging and/or pleading that all those poisons they pumped in to my brother were not in vain. That he didn't endure 12 weeks of this to have lymphoma hold down the fort.
The other day, mid-conversation, I reminded myself that there is a not only a possibility that if the cancer leaves, it could come back, but that the treatment can also cause leukemia.
It worries me that Brendan still has eyebrows and eyelashes. Which sounds weird and awful. It's because Brendan once mentioned Dr. Rose comparing extreme loss of his hair to "knowing we really got [the cancer]."
I hope we can still stick it to that man with eyelashes and eyebrows intact.
Maybe Dr. Rose was just finding a way to comfort him through the hair loss.

I don't know, really, what to do if that giant pile of snow remains.

Brendan had to spend a couple of days in the hospital after encountering a fever of 102 and a strikingly low white blood cell count. I was in the middle of working at an understaffed restaurant when I read the text from Dad telling me Brendan went to the ER due to that dangerous increase in body temperature. I suppose the hospital is the safest place he could be - and you'd think that would serve to diminish any worry. You'd be wrong.
They strung him up to a bag of antibiotics and waited for to see if a primitive society would grow in a pietri dish. He took his own temperature often. He complained of a headache and boredom, but nothing else. I stopped by to hang out, bring him edible food, a toothbrush (soft - chemo is mean to your mouth) and chorus of laughter at the plastic bag of wet rags they brought him to clean himself with. I returned to pick him up 36 hours after admission at 8am - and he went right back to work that day.

I didn't expect the age of "everyone is getting married/having kids!" to coincide with "...why is everyone getting cancer?". Maybe it's because my ear is pressed to the train tracks, listening intently for the slightest vibration. Maybe this is how it has always been - a dominant existence within the intricate lattice of my social web. If that is the case, it makes me feel selfish to be so invested in the unified hatred of disease so late in the game. Although, it is an odd relief that sweeps over me when I find someone else who is enlisted in this army.
Comfort in comradery.

I won't ever get used to this. Maybe that is something I can get used to.

Now that treatment is halfway complete, Brendan and I have decided we need to get cracking on our gift for Dr. Rose. We've decided on getting him an additional magnificent tie or two to add to his collection - since those ties have been a highlight of his appearances throughout Brendan's treatment.
So.
If you know a place...

...and the fire rages