Wigs and Things

I used to love playing hackey-sack as a teenager. Not that I was very good at it, but it was something simple and fun to do to pass the time after school with my friends. As we would hang around drinking our slurpees from 7-11 and kicking a hackey-sack around, life was so...easy. I mean, sure, I had a job as head bus girl from as early as 13 years old, working at The White Whale restaurant down the road from my house in the harbor, with my freshly-ironed white collared shirt and black slacks, every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night. Sunday brunch was the worst; it was always old ladies who tipped poorly and required constant water refills as they all seemed to take their pills at meal time. And I had studying and homework, and picking up my little brother, Billy, from school. My mother had me dust the hardwood furniture with lemon polish until it shined, and I had to clean all of the glass and windows, too. So I was not without my responsibilities... Nevertheless, life was simp

Isn't it funny how we often find comfort in the unlikeliest of places? There was a song I used to listen to before I was diagnosed by The Antlers called Kettering. Being a  native New Yorker, it didn't take long for me to realize that it was referring to Memorial Sloan Kettering in NYC. And any New Yorker who is not completely oblivious will tell you that Kettering = Cancer. Perhaps it was my intuition, I don't know, but it was two or three months before my diagnosis when I first heard the song and loved it, despite it's dark angst. It was about a cancer patient. Little did I know that I was about to be a cancer patient myself. Oh, the days of naivety... Fast forward to my diagnosis on April 19, 2017. The day I stopped listening to Kettering. The day the world stood still. The day life as I knew it would never be the same. The day the began to live in two worlds, the real world and the cancer world. The day I tapped into a survival instinct deep within mysel

I used to always fantasize about far-flung places; picnicking beside the Eiffel Tower, climbing the Great Wall of China, hiking Machu Picchu, bathing in the Blue Lagoon under the Midnight Sun in Iceland, riding along Amsterdam's canals and seeing the floating flower market in spring. But when I had cancer, the most magical place in the world was home. I just wanted to go home, more than anything. Especially at Christmas. The thought of never seeing New York at Christmastime again sickened me. So I resolved that when I completed radiation at the end of Thanksgiving, I would get my strength up for a surprise trip to New York with my baby to visit my friends and family. We flew in a few days before Christmas, and left on Christmas Eve. I had a great time catching up with old friends, seeing my mom and little brother, meeting my Aunt and Uncle for lunch. I especially loved surprising my best friend with a night in the East Village, hotel and everything! It had twin beds, and she call

It's been over six months since my last post. What can I say? I have no good excuse except that I have been busy living, which after cancer is a wonderful thing to be able to say. I won't lie, though, adjusting to ''survivor-hood'' has not been the sunshine and butterflies experience I was expecting it to be. Quite the opposite, in fact; I often find myself feeling like a new person trying to fit in to their old life, which is impossible. My perspectives have changed in so many ways, and I cannot unsee what I have seen, in terms of both experiences as well as the behavior of those around me.  It was in October that I began to feel the beginnings of my struggle in survivor-hood. I had been planning the baby's 1st birthday party all summer, and it was going to be a big affair. Since I was too unwell to host parties for my 7 and 5 year old's summer birthdays, it was decided they could invite friends over to the baby's party, which would be in la