I find it still hard to believe that’s it’s been a full year since treatments in Boston … can you believe that? It was a year ago this week that I sat in the Proton Center awaiting my turn for the machine, and how they were re-scheduling everyone’s sessions so that no one missed a treatment over the Thanksgiving Holidays.

I remember last Thanksgiving like it was yesterday, and when I look back at the notes I kept during that period of time, I can still see, smell and taste the treatment rooms like I was there this morning. Here’s some of the notes I kept last year on the day before Thanksgiving.

Unpublished Notes: From my notebook, in the waiting room the day of the Proton Center, the day before Thanksgiving 2009:
“Finally, now I can start to recognize a few of the faces of other patients. I don’t know if I’ve mentally blocked that out, or if the treatments are effecting my memory … I’ve always been pretty good with that type of thing but for some reason I never seem to see the same faces while under-going treatment. I come and go basically the same time everyday and almost never see the same people here with me … I find that strange in the sense, the schedule for treatment is so tight, and at the same time it seems that no one is going through repeating treatments like I am …. how weird is that?

Oh man, …. here comes the kids to get their pre-Thanksgiving treatment, talk about depressing. These sweet little things don’t even know what the hell is going on around them … what an awful thing. Some of these kids have known no other life but treatment … the crazy thing is … they’re still laughing and smiling, and although it’s depressing at times to sit here … I can’t help but smile back at them.”

Happy Thanksgiving to all … and remember to be thankful for something in your life … beleive me, no matter how bad things are in your world … there are others (maybe even neighbors), that are not as fortunate as you are.

Also, several folks have found oncologists in my area … which is amazing because i did some searching before posting that and couldn’t find one. I thank all you that sent suggestions and will start investigating this coming weekend. My friend Rose from Sweden even found one! Now thats amazing

I’m trying out some hats for cancer patients that Sher ordered for me online. They are hand-made by a cancer patient in all kinds of styles and colours. I have tried three of them, and all of them are very comfortable. Now I don’t think, I’m quite using them for the intended purpose which is to cover your hair during chemotherapy … however, I do use them to keep my head warm while sleeping.

Since this cancerous adventure began, my head has been cold at night and these hats are definitely doing their job. They’re inexpensive, comfy, and if you’re in need of such, it’s certainly worth it. She fast, dependable and down right honest. Here’s a link to her web site: http://www.cjhats.com/

Topic Change:

Yesterday they told me not to get the area where I’m being treated with protons wet! Like in the shower or bath. Yikes, wish I would’ve known that four five weeks ago. For some reason water seems to aggravate it. Of course it’s almost impossible to avoid all contact with water … but I’ll give it a try. I also have to assume that it would require full healing before getting my tattoo placed there, of course … only common sense.

Topic Change:

I was supposed to eat at an Ethiopian Restaurant this eve but … I couldn’t find a place to park my car! … within a block or two. Unfortunately, I had to leave … but will try again next week.

Topic Change:

I met with Doc today and he seemed excited about how things were going. His plan for the future has been simplified and is now to finish treatments this coming week and then schedule the tests and scans for a return trip in about six weeks. That’s it … that simply.

He did express some concern over the skin on which the protons have been passing through. Unfortunately, this does cause damage to the skin and is going to get worse before it gets better. The thin layer skin that covers my spine is pretty much toasted and he said he expects it to breakdown within a week or so. In other words, it just can’t take any more treatment. This is what I’ve been trying to photograph.

They gave me some special bandages and suave to apply when it starts to blister, don’t rub it, don’t scrub it … simply let it breakdown and heal it self. Keep it clean by covering it. Should take about a week to ten days. Also suggested if it gets worse then he expects to email him some pictures and he’ll make suggestions via email or telephone.

All and all, this is generally good news, if that’s all the damage I walk away with, and we’ve really put this tumor on hold … then I claim success.

Today’s treatment was a little funky though. For the first time this week, they brought into the treatment room on time. I, and they, assumed the proton maker was working just fine. They set me on the board as usual and spent the typical fifteen minutes lining my body up. They ran the scanning process first as always, this gives the computers a comparison to go by. If something isn’t correct, or I’m not lined up properly, the proton machine won’t run … this way there can be no major misses or mistakes.

After the scan, they pulled me back and put in the acrylic resistors and brass barrel heads and sent me forward for the firing of the protons … except nothing happened. It appeared that the pc that runs the software that controls all this got hung up. So they told me to sit tight for a minute and then rebooted it, and tried again … nothing.

Then the technician came over and said, another computer crashed and that I should get dressed and go wait in one of the nurses rooms while they attempt to fix it. No problem, I got up and left the room, but as I passed the corner I saw Ethan C. come running down the hall towards the proton room. If you remember, Ethan is the dude that gave one of the seminars on Proton Therapy I attended (I have one of his seminars on the audio page). As he approached I jokingly, (and with a smile) said “Hey man, what the hell kind of software are you writing that crashes in the middle of a treatment”.

He looked at me stunned at first, and then realized I was smiling and smiled back and said “come on, follow me”. We walked back into the treatment room and by this time the entire network had crashed or locked up. It’s a network that only runs the proton machines … but there’s sixteen computers networked together and they have to be rebooted in proper sequence in order to for everything to work properly. So after some fast, orderly rebooting and bingo! … things were back online and ready to go.

I got my treatment ten minutes later and I was on my way!

So, with all that excitement, I decided again, that I’d wait for the weekend to ask Sher to take the photos so that we (yes, me too) can see what proton does to skin after many high powered treatments.

Tomorrow I’m on my way back to Vermont, hopefully things will run smoothly and I’ll be able to leave town around noon time!

Hey … only one more week to go!

Well treatment the last few days has been ok … running later then normal, but fine. It appears that every time they (the proton center), shut down for a few days (like over Thanksgiving), that it takes a few more days to get things running smoothly again. Not sure why that is, but there’s definitely a pattern forming.

I’ve been trying to get a photo of my back taken but the nurses at MGH have been so busy since I’ve returned that I haven’t seen or felt an appropriate time to ask one of them to do it. And somehow, I just can’t get the camera lined up properly myself.

It’s an interesting mark that the treatments have left … which I assume will dissipate in time, but definitely worth archiving. The best I can tell is, that it looks really nasty … but it really doesn’t hurt … maybe like a light sunburn. Looks much worse then it feels. Otherwise, I’ll ask Sher to photo it for me and post it over the weekend.

Treatments just gets harder to deal with every week. It’s not that the treatments are worse, or that I feel any sicker. It’s not that my living quarters aren’t great … because they’re the best. It’s not anything like that at all … what it is, is that waking up everyday to face the same thing over and over is getting old. Imagine if you had a doctors appointment … everyday, and that it took hours to complete … wouldn’t that be a pain in the butt? Somehow it just seems to absorb my entire day, energy and life.

Of course, most folks coming through the proton center are only getting a few treatments. Many are also getting chemotherapy or some other radio therapy too. That’s one of the reason that I seem to never see the same people here too. I don’t think anyone here at this time is going for the full 43 treatments like I have … or if they are, I haven’t seen or met them.

Tomorrow I expect to see Doc D. and have a full queue of questions for him about the near future.

Tomorrow night I’m hopefully having dinner at a small place called Addis, Red Sea. It’s an Ethiopian Restaurant on Tremont St. in Boston. I’m excited about that! … sounds like a fun place to eat. Here’s a link to their menu. http://www.addisredsea.com/

Well, that’s all I have to post for the time being … isn’t that great! I’m feeling pretty well considering, and soon I’ll be back in Vermont … and after that, only one more week!

I was at the dealership for about twenty minutes, when they gave me the car back and said it was finished. Great … that left me a little extra time, and I could now take my time going to Boston.

As I got out on the highway going through New Hampshire the traffic started to build and slow down. I made it only about ten minutes before my appointment time … I thought I had at least a whole extra hour, plus … but it must’ve gotten lost in the traffic.

The proton center was running late when I got there. Trouble with the cyclotron caused me to wait an extra hour and a half. Mainly caused by being shut down for four days. Now, by the time I’m getting out of MGH and Boston, the rush hour traffic is built up and it’s pouring rain! … and I mean pouring.

It takes an hour and a half again, to get to Nahant (which is normally a twenty minute drive). Then, finally I get to the house, and my key won’t open the door … and it’s still pouring down rain. After trying to get the door open for like ten minutes and getting soaked and chilled to the bone, I decided to walk around the back and see if another door might be open. Yep, sure enough, I get in.

Actually, it was almost comical in a sense … a day totally gone awry. So, somehow it ended up taking me about ten hours, to get to Boston, get treated, and get to Nahant … whew, glad its not like that every week! Gotta keep that sense of humor going. I hate the cold rain.

All is calm and I’m warm and dry now J

Subject Change:

I want to thank Ms. McCruddy for her heart-felt email, and for following this blog. I wish her and hubby all the best. In the right-hand column I placed a link to her blog called, Off the Deep End: The Crud Chronicles. Another true, ongoing story (diagnosed in early November), about chondrosarcoma. Check her blog out.

You know, at least once a week, since I’ve started this blog, I get an email or phone call from someone that’s been touched by a life changing situation, like cancer or brain tumor or something. I find it amazing that so many people are using the internet to search out information and educate themselves, and sometimes their doctors, before making decisions. I think that’s great, because no doctor knows it all. I believe their intentions are well meaning … but there’s no way, they can know everything that can go wrong, in your body. It’s great to have a research tool

I’m proud of this blog for that very reason … it has helped many people find a realistic online experience and straight-forward information about proton therapy and chondrosarcoma. Because I’ll tell you, there isn’t much out there that actually useful.

Subject Change:

Sometime this week I hope to be finding out some information about what the near future holds for me. I have a few questions for Doc about when I’m actually going to be finished with not only treatments, but with the scans and tests afterwards … in other-words, when am I free?

I am in search of an oncologist in my area of Vermont, although I have doubts about finding one here. Our phone book doesn’t even list it as a category! Which leads me to believe that I’ll be searching through New Hampshire, New York, and Massachusetts for one too.

The idea behind the local oncologist, is to have someone close by that can communicate with Doc Delaney … simply saving me extra trips to Boston for scans later on.

For those that don’t know what an oncologist is: He/She is a physician with advanced training, experience and education that provides them with the skills necessary to examine, diagnose and manage or treat cancerous tumors.

Simple enough right? Yeah, sure. Not as simple as it sounds.

I forgot to ask Sher to take a few photo’s of my back so that you can see what 35 treatments with a proton beam looks like. If I can find someone at the hospital to do tomorrow, I’ll post them tomorrow.

Can’t wait to pop that Turkey in the oven and start to smell all those familiar scents of a classic Thanksgiving dinner. I’ve been accustomed to those smells for a full fifty-seven years. Sure, I always stuffed myself full of turkey on Thanksgiving Day, along with mashed potatoes, turnips, carrots, lot’s of stuffing and gravy, and let’s not forget all those pies and desserts! Yep, I was one of those that indulged to the maximum.

I make my turkey the same way my grandmother and mother did and have continued that tradition through my household too … Thanksgiving just isn’t the same without all of it.

But this year I’m thinking different, yes of course, I’m going to have my traditional Thanksgiving goodies … but honestly, it’s only because others have helped me, through a tough year … the toughest of my life and you damn well better know that I wouldn’t be enjoying this years festivities if weren’t for their help, your help … yep, you.

So what am I thankful for this year?

I’m thankful for those of you that have banded together and helped Sher, Alberic and I make it through the year. I’m thankful for all those supportive letters and emails that helped keep my spirits high. I’m thankful for the decision that both Sher and I made, to go with Proton Therapy instead of the traditional surgery.

I’m thankful for ARIS (and all whom work there) for helping keep us afloat during these last months, and to Teri and Herb M. for supplying me with a wonderfully comfortable place to live.

I’m thankful for all those personal friends that understood my sense of humor and continued to make me laugh, even though most of the time I felt like crying.

I’m thankful for all the doctors, nurses, technicians and healthcare workers that have relentlessly worked on me. Not just at Massachusetts General, but also Dartmouth Hitchcock, Springfield Hospital, Francis Burr and the Cox Center. Let me tell you, I went through some doctors this year.

For all of Scifillian’s clients that have patiently waited for updates and business applications while I been being treated. I’m thankful for all those that have ordered new work to be done and helping to keep our business going.

Just look at the list in the right hand column and you’ll see a lot of them … and I have a ton more to add. This … this is the spirit of people helping people, that makes it a Thanksgiving to me.

I’m thankful for my doctors … no really. I know they’re getting paid for their work … but Doc D. didn’t ‘have’ to take a weird case like mine on. But he did, and I thank him.

Today, as I turned the corner of Cambridge on to Grove, I saw Larry out in the street with both walking canes and his sign hung around his neck, standing in the cold wind. I pass Larry every day, his hand-written sign reads “My name is Larry, I have MS, can’t work, help”. Usually I pass these guys up … but Larry really does have MS, he shakes like a leaf as he waits for donations from drivers and walkers that pass by.

I’ve spoken with Larry many times while I’ve waited for the light to change, he’s a kind and gentle man, he simply can’t work, and has no other option in life but to beg for a living. He’s lost everything … except hope and thankfulness that he’s alive.

As I often do, I reached in my pocket and handed him a few bucks out of the window of my warm car, and as he always does, he replied, “thank you” … but this time I replied back again said “no Larry, thank you my friend”. He looked at the Disabled stickers on my car, and the walking cane I keep between the front seats, and reached in his pocket and took out more money then I had handed him … and offered it to me! My eyes swelled with tears, and the light changed, and cars started to honk … I had to leave.

Yes, I’m thankful for Larry too. Larry’s offer to hand me more then I handed him tells me that no matter how tough you think you have it … there is always someone worse off and in need of help … now that’s Thanksgiving spirit.

But of all this stuff, do you know what I’m most thankful for this year?
Simply being here to enjoy it …. Thank you all.

Everything I accustomed to was closed. Even the valet parking, the coffee and food commissary, as a matter of fact, the entire Yawkey building was basically closed down. I actually searched out a policeman and asked if I could park in the lot and get through the building. Even the rotating doors were locked! He took me through.

The main hospital across the way looked open … but most of the outer buildings all looked closed down. I personally thought Sunday would be a busy day for visitors and things like that … but I guess not … how odd.

I did manage to get into the Proton Center and get a treatment which now leaves only another ten to go.

I also met with Doc today and he explained that the next step was to really hammer the tumor for the last ten sessions … I mean really hammer it. This means increased dosage with Each treatment and probably a little more sleepiness and nausea then I’ve been experiencing with Proton … but you know, that’s a small price to pay.

Working accurately around the nerve bundles has always been an issue, but it’s starting to have an effect on my walking any distance. I can feel the muscle and nerves in my legs painfully complaining each time I get treated. It’s necessary to hit the actual nerves in order to totally destroy the tumor. They’re entangled in a way that you can not attack one without attacking the other. This is the reason why the conventional surgery was so invasive and guaranteed to do permanent damage. Their plan was to simple cut out all the nerves and muscles along with the tumor.

The theory behind proton treatment is that the normal nerve and muscle cells will recover from the proton beam (hopefully in time), but the cancerous tumor cells won’t. Of course, it’ll take months if not years to determine if that actually happened. We just have to wait and see how things pan out.

Other then the pain, in the back of my right leg, I feel pretty good. There is still a constant tiredness and I expect that to increase a bit over the last ten treatments … but then I’m free for awhile.

One of the next things I have to deal with is finding a doctor in Vermont that is able to watch this cancer, read the scans and tests, and make suggestions on and if I need to return. Some of this Doc has said he’ll do … but we’d both like to find a place closer to home that can at least watch on a six month basis as things progress.

To me, this sounds like even more of a reason for Horward C.’s suggestion of a huge, online, data collecting study about cancer.

I’ve made an adjustment to the amount of treatments to go in the right-hand column n the site. According to the docs records (which I’m sure are more accurate then mine), I have received 31 or the 43 needed treatments, leaving only 12 to go. The column now reflects that.

That’s off 7 treatments from my calculations … I must’ve missed quite a few days of marking them down. Guess I’m not real surprised at that.

That being the case, I expect that the last treatment could be as soon as Dec 8th, and then two days of scanning and testing before being entirely released. At least that’s the way I understand it at the moment. That’s great, earlier then I originally expected and really it can’t come soon enough. Just all the traveling has been a drain on my energy levels I’m sure. The return for check ups schedule has not been entirely set yet … but will involve multiple scans every 6 weeks for a while.

Wednesday was (intentionally) the busiest day I’ve spent in Boston since the beginning of treatments. I’d been wanting to try a day that was full of activity (like a normal day, before cancer), to see how long my energy would last, and how much I could “push” in a twenty-four hour period. Now to be honest, it’s also the only day that I tried to do anything other then show up for treatment,  try to work on the pc a little, eat a little, and sleep. I’ve taken almost no other activity while being here … At least nothing I can think of. Oh yes, let’s not forget the “driving” thing … lot’s of that.

So here’s what I did on Wednesday:
Therapy 11:40 am – 1:30pm
Break 1:30pm – 2:00pm.
Seminar 2:00pm – 3:30pm
Break 3:30pm  – 4:00pm
Seminar(2) 4:00pm – 6:00pm
Dinner at Evoo 6:30pm – 8:00pm.

Add an hours driving, and you have the basic idea. In between all this I was of course walking and traveling around the MGH campus, which is pretty darn big … at least for me it is. Getting around isn’t like it used to be when I was thirty or something.

Now, normally, I handle a day like this with ease, but in this case, I was totally exhausted at the end of my day which was about 8:30pm by the time I got back to Nahant. I barely had the energy to talk with Sher before going to sleep. As a matter of fact, I’m still tired from it today. Was I disappointed? Well, in some sense, yes … but I say that because I’ve always considered myself a high-energy person and it’s frustrating not to be able to do, as much as I could before.

In another sense, I’m not disappointed. I feel like I’m doing pretty damn good considering. I have cancer, I’m traveling back and forth weekly between two homes, I have five huge doses of radiation a week, trying to hang on to financials, household, business, job, and  two months ago I was literally dying … yes, I’m pretty proud that I’m able to do what I’m doing. It’s more amazing actually, when I really sit back and think about it.

I’m kind of stunned that I have only twelve more treatments to go … man that really hits the nail on the head for me. I know I’ll be able to finish that up without any issues … no kidding, I got this part of living with cancer licked. That’s the first step to re-grouping  right?

I never really looked at this in a co-joined way before but, … first I was diagnosed with Chondrosarcoma, now I’m just about to finish up the best treatment program available/possible … what’s next!?

OK … let’s not get carried away here … now we have to learn to live with this, for  as long as we can. But hey … I’ve gained a chance, a fighting chance.

I’ll be adding the recordings made at the seminars for those who think they’d like to learn more about the use of protons as a medical cure for lot’s of things.

Welcome back Dave J. ! Love those pics! I wish Sher and I could’ve joined you … btw … get ready ‘cause air time is coming at us soon!

Monday and Tuesday were both, plain and simple, exhausting days. Technical problems appear to have plagued the proton center so waiting in the sitting room has gone from the usual fifteen minutes to two and three hours. That makes for some serious discomfort for most patients. It’s hard to sit two or three hours when your feeling good … it’s close to impossible when your sick.

We all (patients, nurses, doctors, techs, everyone), made the best of a bad situation as we could be. They tried, really tried … but you know some of the patients just couldn’t handle the waiting. Sitting for hours isn’t any fun when a life saving device is tangled in snafus … but in the end, I think most people got a treatment … I did.

After treatment today I went up to the eight floor and visited what they called the Peace Garden. Basically, it’s a rooftop garden filled with benches, plants and lovely places to sit and maybe think. It was a very peaceful place to be.

It’s difficult to explain, but as I re-entered the main building again I noticed a long hallway leading down and around a corner. Being the typical nosey person (by nature) I am, I wandered down the hallway. As I was trying to get my bearings as to where I was, where I had parked my car, etc etc. I noticed along the top of the wall were hundreds, if not thousands, of hand written messages by past cancer patients of the center.

They were hung in the same way that Buddhist flags are hung and I thought how interesting … of course, there was no way on the planet I was going to walk by and not read them. I had to, it was like a needle in my arm, an addiction, I was totally driven to read the messages as I slowly made my way down the hall. They were made of little squares of brightly colored cloth, maybe twelve inches by twelve inches, and all huge variety of colours.

Each one had a hand written message on them, and a signature, initials, and some were anonymous … many had spiritual messages, messages of hope, peace, acceptance of death … but one, an anonymous one, really caught my eye. It wasn’t the colour or anything like that, it was purely what it said.

Someone had written “Don’t Die With Your Music Still Inside You” on one of the clothes. Let me tell you … it sent a chill down my spine, literally, when I read it. I gave a shiver, and tucked the words away in my mind.

An hour or so later, as I was driving back to Nahant, those words started to ring in my ear, over and over … maybe they were trying to tell me something. They seemed to reflect something so deep inside, so personal and yet something that I wanted to, or was able to, share with others. I thought about this blog and “Don’t Die With Your Story Still Inside You” … what a powerful thing to write. It seemed to confirm the reasons why I continue this blog and the recording of this entire cancer thing … just amazing. What beautiful words.

It’s funny sometimes how a few words can effect you or what your doing. Those few words have given me more incentive to continue the blog and this ongoing story.

What does it mean? “Don’t Die With Your Music Still Inside You” … what does mean to you? For me it simply screams out why I started this blog in the first place. Why I called it possibly, my last piece of art … For those of you that have, or have had, any sort of streak of creativity in their lives it may be easier to understand. I’ve always considered myself a creative person and in several fields, art, music, poetry and yes, although most programmers won’t agree with this … but computer programming is, or can be, extremely creative. Math is art … no doubt about it.

Creativity comes in waves that can last anywhere from a few seconds, to years and years. Sometimes, you can turn it on, like turning a water faucet, turn it on, on demand. Other times it’s a struggle to get it started, to get those creative juices flowing and the thought process moving along.

It’s sort of like this rush or hurry to get all these things out of my head every single day while I still can. I don’t feel like my creativity is coming to an end because my health is faltering … if anything is happening, it’s exploding into a new genre. More powerful then ever … I feel like I could write poems, songs and stories all day long for the rest of life and never, ever run out of creative juices.

You know, I see the world differently now, and so there’s a whole new “world” to draw creativity and inspiration from. Some things that used to matter to me, I really don’t give a damn about any longer and visa versa. Example: I just stepped outside for a moment to grab a breath of the sea air here in Nahant and I can honestly say that it smells different then I’ve ever smelled it before. In some sense, I can say that I’m a whole new me … and I don’t think we all ever get that opportunity to experience that feeling. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying having cancer like this is great, but I am saying that creativity is at an all time high, and that is great!

Weird? … no, not really, that’s something sort of positive the cancer has given me … this incredible urge or drive, to finish up my art, as though I should empty it all out of me before this life finishes going sour … and it’s giving me the time to do it.

Anyway, for me it said, continue to write this story, and so … so be it. Someday, somewhere, it’ll touch or help someone through a nasty time in their life. And that’s exactly what this is all about … I don’t want to die, with this story still inside me.

Here’s a pic taken from the 8th floor of the Proton Center where the flags were hung. What a contrast from Vermont. This is where I spend my days.

Thanks for spending your time, reading this.

I was visited by three nurses, a different doctor, and then my regular nurse, and Doc Delaney. Now for those of you who don’t know, Massachusetts General is also a teaching hospital, and what a great place to have one. Directly in their neighborhood is Harvard, M.I.T., Tufts, Cambridge, Northeastern and a slew of other great schools that allow the hospital to have a giant pool of bright young people to draw from. It couldn’t have been planned better. I mean, this is one of the primary reasons they are so successful.

It was interesting, because they basically all asked very similar questions in their developing professional way, but also in an individualistic, human way. I could clearly see which ones had more human emotion attached to their voices and mannerism’s, and those that didn’t. Hmmm … now what the hell does that mean?

Prior to this cancer story, I’d never spent much time around healthcare professionals in a professional setting that is. Yes, of course I occasionally went to see a doctor, and all the standard stuff, but I never spent a lot of time with them, never seeing them everyday, day after day, never getting to know, or see the human or personal side of them, like I am being allowed to now.

It’s a strange thing to say, but I’ve never before felt or experienced the human and/or compassionate side of a doctor or nurse, or technician. Maybe you can say, “well why would you have”, which is true in a sense. I mean you may get a degree of compassionism from your family doctor that you’ve known for a long time, but this is somehow different.

Maybe it’s the hospital atmosphere, or maybe that it’s a cancer ward and many are in deeper trouble then I am, and maybe I’m not capturing the right words as to what it is. And it may simply be that I have never experienced it because I’d never been in a situation that required enough time to be spent with them before. Maybe it’s the reason they became healthcare individuals … to help people.

But I do believe, that it is, that human side of the individual healthcare professional, that makes one better, then another. If, you can call it that.

OK, so where’s this going? Today, within a three hour period, I saw and spoke with a total of six doctors and nurses (not counting the five on the technical equipment team for treatment). That’s a lot! … when’s the last time you’ve had that happen? Ever? For some reason, I was sort of “in tune” with watching the way, they were seeing me as a patient for the first time. I’ve never had the opportunity to do this before to rapidly experience that many at once..

I sort of stepped outside of my body, as they spoke with me, so that I could see them, speaking with me from another point of view. Maybe I was interviewing them at the same time.

Now I don’t know if these total newbies on the job, or semi-experienced, or what state of their career they were in. However, and why ever, I watching this side of them, as they spoke to me, I can’t really say or understand … I just was.

I observed at the same time, several different things. For one, I recognized that two of the nurses seemed more genuine in their care towards me, then the other. Define genuine? Caring, wanting to know, asking questions, prodding answers … mining for information from the patient, all during the time that they are weighing, taking blood pressure, etc etc.

The other, did the same things, but without the heavy questioning, without the enthusiasm? But, she did get all the same data … sort of. I wonder. Was this one more professional in a sense? … maybe that could be argued.

The most intense at this, was the new doctor! Now she asked a lot of questions and a quick exam, as though I was one of her regular patients. In five minutes, she knew quite a bit about me. Impressive, and with that same human touch. She was good, ready for primetime without a doubt.

Now, I don’t really know, and maybe it’s a matter of opinion, but somehow, the doctors and nurses that had the stronger human-compassionate side, I perceived as to having done a better job. But I’m not really confident, that’s true … my perceptions are true … but did they really do a better job?

Maybe you just had to be there to feel it. As a patient, it was an interesting experience and one I hope I get to repeat again before I leave MGH.

What an odd day, what an odd thing to do … watch them, watching me.

I lost another five – six pounds, due to the cold and living on ginger-ale and water, but I’m confident that I’ll be putting that back on within a week or so. The doc recognized this fact today, and seemed ok, with that as an answer, as to why the rapid loss of poundage.

This past week, we also had a catastrophic failure of one of our servers on Scifillian (which is the reason this blog was down for a day or two), but all seems to be functioning now. I won’t go into deep detail about it …. But I will say, that you really have to watch the scripts that you allow others to run in their sites. For you programmers out there, you understand what I’m talking about. It doesn’t have to be done intentionally, to create a disaster that brought down dozens of business sites for days. If you’ve sent me an email in the last few days and it bounced, this is the reason why, and I ask that you please resend it. Simply said, you can thank Josh F. for the very fact that you’re even reading this blog tonight. If it weren’t for him lending a quick hand in setting a new server up, I probably would’ve lost a lot of clients, and had a bunch of really pissed off customers. If there’s a computer god award out there, I give it him for this one.

You know, I been thinking about this from time to time, but I’ve never asked any of the doctors at MGH or any place I’ve been for that matter. Nor have I read an acceptable answer anywhere. It keeps crossing my mind as though for some reason, I should have, or need an answer, … or that there is an answer, out there somewhere, and I just haven’t met the right doctor or scientist that can give me a direct, accurate reply. My question is simply, but the answer could be so incredibly complex that it makes proton therapy look like child’s play.

So ahhh, where do these weird, almost unheard of, cancers come from? What are they? … There are a lot of reasons why, someone, me included, would want to know. For instance, I wondered if it came down the line in my family, my mother’s side?, father’s side? I never heard of it, but it wasn’t long ago that they didn’t know 90% of the time what you died from anyway. Maybe it comes from two or even three generations back, maybe it developing right now and starting with me, and it’s in my genetic code, and I’m the idiot passing it on further down the line. Maybe it starts and stops right here with me, you just don’t know.

Here’s a big thought … maybe it’s our life-style … you know, the way we live, the stress of raising families in today’s world. It certainly could be, look at what we have to do to survive these days … you sell your soul to work, so that you can simply feed your kids … it wasn’t always like that.

Here’s another big thought … maybe it’s in our environment! Look at all the crap we live with and use, just go count the plastic containers in your house … and all those cleaning agents, and all the air pollution, water pollution and so on, and so on. Where does it come from?

What made the cells in my body go haywire and start duplicating themselves in a different way … that’s what cancer is. Cells begin to reproduce themselves dramatically different then they were meant too. All of a sudden, something sets them off  kilter, and they begin developing their own blood vessel network that looks like a crazy woman’s quilt and they begin expanding as though they are going to take over your entire body … and they will if you let them.

So what is it? … is it the radiation dissipation  from the test nukes they dropped in the 1950′s when I was just born?,  maybe it was the insecticides they sprayed the streets with when we were kids to keep the mosquitoes at bay, or the stuff they spray on lawns to keep your grass green and fed.

There is so much stuff that is allowed to be used on people, and there hasn’t been nearly enough time or testing that’s gone on to really say “this is safe”, because what they’re really telling us, is that “this is for sale”, not necessarily safe. Granted, I probably buy the crap and use it like everyone else … but have we been sold a “bill of goods” that totally one sided for the safety of business rather then people? Stick that in your pipe and smoke it.

It was only fifty years ago that the government itself was passing out free cigarettes to it’s soldiers in the military … that’s right, encouraging smoking! My father was one of them, he came back from World War 2 with a smoking habit, thanks to Uncle Sam, and therefore all his children smoked … it was OK back then to let your kids smoke. We wouldn’t dream of doing that today. We’re only talking one generation back … it’s incredibly close in time. Of course the tobacco itself wasn’t additive enough, so they also allowed the companies to fill them up with more chemistry then Harry Potter’s workshop and here we are today … everybody’s dying, health care expenses are skyrocketing, and our politicians are sitting back and wondering why? Come on, gimme a break, we’re not that stupid, at least I hope we’re not. They are working on dumbing down America though.

I remember as a kid in the streets of New York, there used to be pretty girls passing out free smokes (cigarettes) in the streets and in the bigger, fancier stores! Just right there, giving them to anyone who wanted them. Didn’t really matter if you were a kid or not. That’s how it was done in my lifetime … and that was probably only 40 years ago.

You can say they aren’t doing any longer, but you know what? … they still are, they’re just doing it in other countries! I shouldn’t go on and on about this stuff because it just gets you pissed off that it could be the reason people are still suffering so much today, and that’s not what this is all about … or is it?

Whatever it is, what I’d really like to know is, have I passed this on to my children, or is it something that’s a one time deal for me only? Do we need to watch our future generations for genetic mutations that may leave our family lines susceptible to such cancers. Are all family lines in such trouble? Everyday I see a lot of people (men, woman, and children) from around the globe (and I mean that, the Proton Center in Boston is servicing people from around the world), with all kinds of cancer and it makes me wonder if it’s always been like this and we simply weren’t aware, or if there is a huge increase in the rarer cancers like this.

I could understand if this cancer came from smoking, or a work/living environment like asbestos … but I don’t think that’s the case here, it’s simply an oddity at this time as far as I know … but I want ask Doc Delaney his opinion on that. He deals and works with this stuff everyday, and sees people with all these odd cancers, both young and old … what’s the story doc?

That’s it for tonight, I promised my dear old friend Lydia R. that I would write a restaurant review, the Boston section, of the world famous Zagat Guide, about one of her friends restaurants that I recently dined at.  Besides, I have a lot of work to catch up on.