OTHER THAN THAT, MRS. LINCOLN...

Hi, folks. Bill here.

Yeah, now that Beth's blog seems to be in a death spiral (gee, I hope that sort of thing isn't catching), the voice of the patient is at last heard in the land.

And true it is that my beloved bride and I do see what went down in Durham yesterday somewhat differently. And it's true that I may be guilty of a "rosiness" born of self-willed ignorance.

But you need to know my starting point. I've been feeling so miserable since the operation that I foresaw my conversation with His Bladderwocky, M.D., going something like this:

His Bladderwocky [HB]: "Mr. Drennan, if you have contemplated purchasing some green bananas, I would heartily seek to dissuade you from an act so rash. As Elin told Tiger, it is time to put your affairs in order."

Me: "You mean, Doc . . . ."

HB: "I mean, realistically, that you enjoy the life expectancy of an off-brand Bulgarian water heater. Eschew, therefore, any investment in long-term junk bonds."

But that's not what happened. Quite. Here's my spin:

Post-operation, I currently harbor no macroscopic (i.e., visible-to-the-eye) cancers, and I take that fact as a plus. True, there's little doubt that now, even now, countless legions of microscopic (i.e., invisible) cancer bugs are coursing their way through my system, the original mass having penetrated the bladder wall and sprouted, inter alia, on a couple of lymph nodes. (Imagine a small child blowing on the dessicated bloom of a long-dead dandelion and the resultant shower of dead-white dandelion dander drifting along the summer zephyrs; metaphorically speaking, I think that's probably what's going on inside me just now. But at least the dandelions themselves are gone. For now.)

Moreover, I'm feeling better and stronger day by day now, something that hadn't been true heretofore. It turns out that all the post-op misery was not caused by either anemia or by my illness itself, but rather by the (predictable) rigors of surviving, at my age, a twelve-hour, open-body procedure.

On the downside, that four months of chemo seems not to have been efficacious in terms of containing my cancer. Rats. His Bladderwocky promises to try a new chemical mix if and when (when, probably) the disease crops up again in a meaningful way.

Finally, there's this: Is it possible, after eight or nine months of periodic suffering (not to go into self-serving detail), that the mere act of breathing in and out is a less precious enterprise to me than it once was? Yeah, that's possible. I read just the other day that there's a new treatment for prostate cancer; it costs millions of dollars, features a boatload of horrendous side effects, and increases life expectancy, on average, four-point-three *months*. Medicare is all set to approve this procedure, as are most insurance companies. Me, I wanted to laugh out loud. I can't tell you how much more I'd rather be holding the hand of Jesus for those four-point-three months than lingering around this shooting match we call life, sweet as it often is . . . .

Last word: Beth's blog has harbored many virtues, many of them reflective of the woman herself. But selfishly speaking, its greatest value to me has been to reveal the depth and breadth of how much (and how many) people out there--I mean you, dear reader--have chosen, unaccountably, to care about our recent trials. O God, my God, I have learned much in my illness (Flannery O'Connor points out that a lingering malady is a great blessing from the Almighty), and one of the things is this: y'all are amazing. I am overcome by your kindness, by your love.

That's all for now. Whether or not the blog continues (and whether or not *I* do), we'll see. In the meantime, know that I love you all, however inadequately. In the off chance that I see Jesus before you do, I'll definitely be putting in a good word for you. Promise.

Love,
Bill