can you beleive i haven't had a cig in 18 days and counting?

sometimes when the clock strikes midnight, and the entire world shifts into a new time zone, even as i cling to life as i know it, all the hardest to avoid vices are so easy to walk away from....i can quit smoking...i can quit wanting....i can quit joking...but somehow, i can't quit needing a hug and friend or two to share my life with on a daily basis....why is it so hard to meet people as a grown up and not scare the hell out of them with the intensity and honesty of who i am and where i am in life?

i was so busy calling everyone i know to share my great news that i forgot to put it on the blog for all of you read.....

picture it if you can, october 2002, a phone call from the hospital to tell me that really serious tests i'd had six months earlier had been mis-transcribed while they filled in my g.i. chart history....

32 polyps removed during an unexpected stay in the hospital( for non-relevant reasons) had been biopsied. i was informed that while it was a high number and i was a particularly young age for such a polyp colony, it is also common for younger men and women to not have any reason to have their intestines, colon and so forth delved into yet alone searched by floodlamp and hidden camera) while a team of prissy nursing students and over confident first year residents sit watching from above on a wide screen tv in the surgical ampitheater....all said and done, the results had come back as all 32 polyps being benign and needing no further follow up other than a full g. i. series every 12 months due to my crohn's disease....

fast forward...suddenly, a beautiful and temperate october afternoon, i got a call from my friend and doctor, armando caccierelli who was the head of the g.i. area where i went for crohns treatment...he told me it was urgent that i get in to his office that day if possible as he needed to sit down with me and discuss the seriousness of something that had happened somewhere along the line between surgical theater and lab transcription folks and that idyllic indian summer day i was so far living up in my own meager and somewhat mild way....

when i got to his office several hours later, i could have been knocked over with a feather boa....he explained the error and subsequent consequences of the error in my polyp count and biopsy transcription...where i was told 32 were benign and end of story, in fact, 3 were MALIGNANT and due to the lapse of time and the area of my colon (about 14 - 17 inches in from the end of the road, so to speak), this loss of time for treatment was more than dangerous, it was potentially deadly....i was told that i would be having surgery 3 days from that exact day, armando had one of his friends from mt. sinai offer his assistance as the lead if armando would be his second in charge for the potentially radical and physically invasive procedure....

i was numb. i was not scared. i have cancer....i have colon cancer....i am 34 years old on this day and suddenly i'm told i may not live until next month for my 35th birthday because of cancer and human error....i did not cry....i did not scream....i did not have time to register what exactly this would mean and i did not have time to die....i did not have time to find mom and jim in wyoming and i needed them to be here. i did not have time to have a will drafted and filed....i did not think i would soon be so sick that fear would be secondary to wanting to be dead....i did not know that within months, i'd be so thin that people would want to help me with my addictions which were actually chemo and radiation....i did not know that chemo can send you flying on a delirious and acid like trip....i did not know that radiation is normally aimed only at the area where you are being treated...i did not know that my 3 MALIGNANT growths had had enough time to grow from individual areas ranging from 3 - 5 mm each into one intersected growth of over 17 mm....i did not know that when i told them to just perform the colostomy procedure while i was in that my friend, the doctor would hug me....and tell me that the difference between being brave and being alive is being healthy enough to make an informed decision when there is so much life to live still and so little happiness with knee jerk bravado....

the story goes on, but i will not bore you...it is pretty similar to most cancer patients, but one thing you should know is that colon cancer is predominantly a retirement age disease, with most cases occurring after the age of 62....younger patients, in the 40 and under range, have only a 17% survival rate because they so seldom have a reason to have any type of invasive testing done that area until they either experience such severe pain or horrible symptoms that they are rushed to the e.r. and generally don't last for many weeks after that trip to the hospital since the disease will have probably run it's course and crossed into the organs and other horrible things....

fast forward 5 years....i lost my home. i lost my possessions...i lost my friends...i lost my sanity...i lost my pride...i lost my youth...i lost my dreams...i lost my hope....i lost my will to live....i lost my mind (literally in 3 small areas, perhaps chemo related...) i lost my hair but i'm happy to announce it's come back to visit...i mean it's now on my back but i can visit it by turning and looking in a mirror on occasion....

i did not lose my family...i did not lose my smile...i did not lose my ability to step beyond my own problems to help someone else with theirs - they call that escapism....i did not hurt anyone....i did not make any promises i couldn't keep. i did not forget i was sick for a minute. i did not live. i did not ignore death, but found that i had embraced it long ago....in fact, i recalled every day for the last five years that when we are born we come into life screaming while the world around us is joyous with music and dancing but when we die, the world beats its breast at the great injustice suffered by dying so young, yet dying brings us full circle into our own moment of joyous music and peace....i did not lose my sense of humor....god makes me laugh - she's a funny guy!

friday night, my doctor called while he was driving home for the weekend. i have had ongoing extensive, invasive and not so comfortable tests done nearly every week since november 1, 2007...i had been unable to find a single result from any source which leading up to my december 24th anniversary for having finished chemo and radiation was making me a bit paranoid....december 24th came and went with no test results....

december 24th should have been a major milestone...it was 5 years....i was sick the entire month of december and thought it was cancer related...december 25th i sat alone in my apartment for christmas and i cried because i felt that i'd been beaten and would finally have to admit i've lost this battle with an enemy that is part of my own body....new years came and went. i slept through it and barely left my apartment, i had nowhere to go and no one to see and no will to seek any opportunities out....the grim reaper is less than cooperative when you really have your life in line for his convenience....

i am officially, a cancer SURVIVOR....i am 5 years clean of colon cancer....i am 100% cancer free....if i wasn't pickled by chemo and radiation, i'd probably be labeled organic....i am now going to live....and i must say....i'll be damned if i'm going to let life and those who run it and those who administer it stop my making up for the life i've already lost....i will never live the last 5 years again....i hope to never revisit much of the last five years again...but i am going to wear my badge of survival as a license to live for all the world to see....i can't believe that i've been from the top of the world with education, careers, travels, loves and possessions, yet, only when the planet took a sudden shift, and made a quarter turn to the right without me, did i learn that by losing everything that ever mattered in the world to me, i not only gained strength and wisdom, but i got every single thing that will ever truly matter back while i was sleeping at some point...you see, a job is good, money would be nice, tailored clothing is pretty and who doesn't like to be at home in their own cozy nest, yet when everything is dark and you are alone, you find that no one has ever made wishes come true with magic....wishes and dreams and hopes and love and life and anything you will ever truly want or need or cherish beyond belief, is simply right there...it's in your heart and in your soul, and no one can take that away from you for any price or any reason....you might give your heart or share your hope and if you're truly blessed even further, you may share you life, but these things that are so valuable and undeniably precious only increase as you possessions for the simple act of giving and sharing them with others.....

i am so blessed and i am so thankful to the universe that has given me everything i could ever need to survive, including all those fucked up lessons on how to do without, because today, i sit in tears while i share this with you, i know that my life has more beauty, love, compassion and hope than any one person could probably realize is possible....

sometimes life and art are as one and adults become their inner child again.....

you are like puppy

when i see you

thru a window

i want to bring you home

with me

again and again.

somehow

every wet sloppy kiss

makes me love you

more and more.

you deserve a treat....

let's go for a walk.

oh this year is going to be so long...why do we always need a year built on 365 days?

i think if barack or hillary, or heck even mccain or romney win the next election, they need to change us onto an american calendar instead of the roman calendar that is oh so blah and accepted as the universal standard (that is unless you're chinese or jew....then you count your chickens when they hatch as a year or a monkey or whatever, and the jews. good grief, are they even up to the disco era of the 1970's yet on their offbeat calendar? thank goodness for manashevitz wine....atleast you can nosh and slosh while waiting for the era of poly blend and tie dye to end and the era of shoulder pads and even longer dreidel curls and yarmalukes of neon green to hit the pages of Hasid Today Magazine...kind of like highlights for children, only it's for jews, children wouldn't be caught dead reading it and the bazooka joe comics from the back once coveted by kids the world round would be replaced a stick figure named mordachi awaiting the messiah...high art and drama at it's lowest ethnic ebb....)

my personal suggestion would be a very slight but easily managed change which would segment a year into periods of 50 days....yeah the months would be off and who cares, most of them suck rocks anyway...and with seven years to ever current one of the accepted variety, perhaps we'd get that next idiot out of the white house in a mere 400 days instead of the more acceptable version of when hell freezes over....

that said...maybe i'm cranky because it's been 11 days since i've had a gosh darn cigarette and dagnabbit, so far, no one has been injured but in all fairness, i've been afraid to really stray from the apartment for fear of having a panic attic or an anxiety meltdown or perhaps a bit of a mental migration from sane to not....thus necessatating smoking 10 butts all at the same time to hit my system with oft missed rush of nicotine which we all know does make the world go round....

today i think i will buy some of the cheap cigs that i have never smoked because they taste like ass....this is of course to help dimish, disguise or dissolve the owe so unpleasant odor bombarding my entire kitchen as the house of mouse has become the melting mouse mortuary....trouble being all that poison that they finished 4 months ago seems to have had it's desired affect and i've not seen hide, hair or turd of a mouse in atleast 3 months now...unfortunately they are slow to explode and they had plenty of time to be pissed about they internal ruptures and excessive ability to dissolve while walking the floor of the place....so they've obviously hidden where i'm unable to find them, yet alone reach or neutralize them....i.e. i think under the flooring of my new kitchen cabinets....i've asked anyone i know to help me figure out how to get rid of that oh so summery scent of a scene right from "deliver me from a trailer in wyoming" and all to no avail...if the scent continues to fester and apparantly spread (what the hell, are they melting in there thus allowing the scent to continuously roll further around the kitchen? i'll be a monkeys uncle!) i'm about ready to rip out the cabinets but i'm afraid of what i'll find if i do so....live with the spreading and oh so liquid stench of melting mice? or stay in my bedroom and eat take out in front of the window where the fresh air comes in regardless of opening or closing the glass....

any suggestions?

one last quote for 2007: "i love kids, but i can hardly ever finish one......"

fast away the old year passes....fa, la, la, la, la, tra, la, la, la, la.....

it's new year's eve morning and i've been up and unable to sleep since 4am already....day 5 in a row....

has given me plenty of time to think about all the things that this year has brought me and how grateful i am for the family, the friends and the passing fancies that have graced my days and nights over the last 12 months....

i've made friends with folks from europe to the americas, both north and south, but i'm particularly happy to know and love those of you in the wild, wild west that i was so blessed with meeting this summer....i think of each of you every day and even in the midst of struggle, it brings a smile to my face, my heart and my soul. those of you in the west village and the west of hells kitchen in my own little playground of nyc, i know it isn't always easy to love me, but the things you bring to my life are invaluable from the companionship to the conversation, to the simple homemade meals where finally none of us has to eat alone for a night. thank you for the many moments of meals and the millions of sparks of pure childlike joy that have been missing from my life for far too long.

now for the resolutions that i refuse to make each year since they're useless if you won't stick to them....this year, instead of my annual letter to myself, i thought i'd post a few self-improvement areas up here so you can all call me on them and perhaps help keep me in check...(i just read my letter to myself from last year and must admit, i did pretty well on the list - i moved, i started eating at home and cooking again, i started following up as required with regular health care with new doctors, i asked for help from the professionals who could help me and insisted on respect from those who have in the past treated me like i'm less than human because i've not always been able to do the best things for myself).....

1. cut back on the smoking....i was doing so well for so long....but like everything in my life that i find dangerous and /or bad for me, i simply will turn my back on it and walk away for my own self preservation (and financial windfall too boot)....i only smoked one or two the entire time in wyoming and only since late october, have i been puffing away on a daily basis...it's the stress, but i know i can stop and i know i can't stand the taste or my breath any more than you probably can.....
2. continue to push myself to rejoin the human race....granted, it's not a race and i can take my time, but i must increase my social standing and my oh-so-limited local circle of friends....every time i leave my apartment it's a struggle, but i will continue to triumph over the demons that have left me so awkward.....
3. continue the effort to be a more contiguous part of my genetic family....i love my brothers and sisters and my parents and as we're all getting older, i'm finding it more and more important to have any sort of interactions with them....they are who i truly have in this life even when i feel totally alone....
4. move again....as much as i love this huge apartment, i am too far removed from any of the "real world" in which i can try to function and being in east harlem seems to make me g.u. (geographically undesirable) for dating and friendship....i must sacrifice my personal space and perhaps suck up and join the legions of minions that have roommates in this world....
5. get my sorry and sad butt back to work...anything will really do....an income is necessary to suplement the lack of finances provided by my social security disability....
6. try to get back into school and finish the hair licensing if i don't need to re-work all 1200 hours of training...it's a cash business and i can be good....i just need to be able to stay healthy long enough to show up daily and stand for 8 hours of class....it's a social thing too....
7. get back to the beach....try to find my personal possessions and see if i can reclaim them from two summers ago....that said...work on letting go of the fact that i no longer own the possessions left at the beach after my big accident and subsequent return to the city and the hospital on doctor's orders....atleast my skin grew back where i was so badly burned and unless i'm naked and you're right near me, you'd not even know that i have discoloration and scarring from where that hideous mug of boiling chai tea latte melted away my tan and almost crippled me for life....
8. get back to the gym....i've put on weight since august, and i've lost weight since december...now it's time to re-proportion the weight and make my body back into the really nice one it used to be...i used to have shoulders and traps and delts and abs that you could wash laundry on....now i have a washboard stomache, but someone forgot to take their towels when they were done with them it would appear....
9. give something back...i had the chance to see my holiday card hanging at someone's home the other day and when i reread it, i was really happy with what i'd written and how much my sentiments really rang true to my personal spirit. my soul is only ever full when it is giving something to help someone else....
10. find love in a minute and treasure it for a lifetime even when the moments are passed, they are what keep us warm and allow us to believe that good will conquer evil....i have forgotten that in the past and today i'm putting it in writing so i can look back and search for the truth in myself and accept nothing less in others....i'm worth it and any relationship based on lies is only hurting the person or persons who stand to lose me in their lives.....
11. sleep in heavenly peace on a nightly basis and enjoy the days while the sun shines.....
12. be less sappy....
13. no number thirteen....unless you want to be less superstitious.....
14. end on fourteen and let you all go about your way....happy new year.....
    

it's hardly a charlie brown christmas, but here's my version of the holiday tree for 2007......

this is an attempt at the choreographed snowflake/music show at saks fifth avenue tonight.....

i'm not sure what this video clip is at rockefeller center tonight....

it's definitely an experiment, and according to the upload thingy, it's 2M of 5M....whatever that means....far as i can tell you it's 24 seconds of un-edited excitement and pure un-adulterated joyousness....yeah, right....you've met me, haven't you?....

over the river and through the woods to tavern on the green we go.....

you'll kindly notice the piles of snow (albeit, diminishing even as i type) and the cheerful demeanor of the hack....the photo was going to be my holiday card shot until i tried to print it and it kept coming up too dark....live and learn...it's still quintissential new york city for the holidays if you ask me....and if you have $40 to ride through the park....personally, i choose my battles and my rides more carefully....i'd prefer to take a $7 cab ride that leaves me right at my door than enjoying the hind quarters of of a steed way past his prime!

and of course i took this super blurry one...which i totally intended to have be this blurry....in my world, i consider this to be an artful shot....

i do believe this is what we in the photo-snapping circles might call "diffused lighting"....or "confused fighting" is more like it - an elbow in my groin, a knee in my backside, a swift kick in my shins all while trying to gracefully avoid getting any of the unattractive holiday guests of the city in my potential christmas card shot....you'll be happy to know i gave up on that whim last night and used a clean, clear, crisp and non-color-re-touched snap from wyoming this summer as the card shot....that's what i call cowboying up the city slicker way....

so i looked at that damned tree again....talk about bored....

when i was unable to find nourishment for my body, i thought, so, ok, i'll take nourishment for my soul.....

and thus i trudged my way along fifth avenue to saint patrick's cathedral where i knew they were having midnight mass and communion (hey, a little body bread and jesus juice goes a long way if you're truly starved!)....that said, the line for the mass was around the block and down madison avenue behind the cathedral....this was at 9:45pm....i thought of sneaking in with the choir boys through the rectory entry on the north side of the church but then i figured i'd be spiritually and physically hungry and i'd probably need to go to confession to boot....so i settled for staring at the line up that had wisely requested tickets for mass a year ago....suckers!!!!

with over 3/4 of a million pick pockets and rugrats in the general area i was loathe to get a non-blurred photo.....

but this one came kind of close....closer than many i've taken recently....it must be my camera dying because every photo i've taken for months has come out with an extra special hazy quality about it....but this was pretty good in terms of managing to avoid all the heads, arms, bags, thiefs, and general crap vendors surrounding all the harolds....you know, harold's the angel...they ignored my request, in triplicate, to just call them bob....they'll learn....

saks fifth avenue....hate the store, love the snowflakes....

yes, i'm bitter, ever since i worked in the visual merchandising (i.e. window display) department of saks fifth avenue about a million years ago, i won't set foot back in the store to save my life or anyone else's....that said, i love the snow flakes they've got illuminating the facade which is directly in front of the tree at rockefeller center....the flakes are illuminated to a random syncopation of music (carol of the bells maybe?) and it's really fun to watch...i took a video of it and will try to post some of it on here for you to enjoy or be annoyed by...you decide....

bloomingdale's - like no other store in the world.....

their holiday windows are sure as shit ugly, but the cascading waterfall of lights that surround the building for 9 stories top to bottom make it worth overlooking the nasty use of gaudy and glitter...i think the theme of their windows must have been jihad.....better luck wasting your cash on window display next year bloomies!

the last minute christmas tree

when you buy your tree at the last minute, it helps to bring the tree lights with you...you can cut the tree, wrap the lights and then plug them into the cigarette lighter for the trip home....the packer i barely caught in the throngs at saint patrick's cathedral was a beautiful throwback to a simpler time....circa the mid 1970's - you know when the waltons had all those cheesey christmas specials.

all creatures, great and small.....

this creature was super great! in fact, if it was easier to read and i could have made the colors print more clearly, he would have been the front runner for the holiday card that i made and sent out (yes folks, there is a wadey-klaus, and indeedy, i managed to get my handcrafted photo cards printed, signed and mailed at 5am on the 24th of december...if you get one, please let me know what the postmark reads....if you don't get one....well, just blame that on the post office....so undependable....)

if you can't read it, the thing i love in this photo is that his hat reads "i've been naughty".....me too....no, not really, mine would have read "i've been miserable...."

Christmas Eve at Rockefeller Center....

i waited in line to circle the ice rink....this after seeking nourishment and sustenance for my body....can you believe every foreigner in the country was in times square and rock center tonight for christmas eve....not a single restaurant or grocery store was open....after nearly 3 weeks without a real meal, you know i was jonesing for a sit down and atleast the brief conversation with another human being provided by the waitron....damn the bad luck....that said, i finally got to the front of the rink under the tree to find the line wasn't circling tonight so i had to turn around and force my way back thru the masses and the asses...good grief, it's christmas people, how about leaving those little urchins and their strollers home with the nanny, the granny or better yet, you and your fat fanny? i'll tell you, after 20 minutes of kicking and screaming and scratching and clawing, i'll bet those foreigners don't get in my way again anytime soon!

here is the card that i wrote and had intended to send out, but in case it doesn't happen, happy holidays from me to you!

• Let us break down boundaries,tear down

walls, and continue to build on the foundation of goodness inside each of us • Let us look past our differences, gain understanding, and embrace acceptance• Let us reach out to one another, rather than resist • Let us better the world in which we live, by nurturing, and replenishing the beauty of nature • Let us express gratitude for that which we have, rather than dwelling on our needs • Let us seek cures for the sick, help for the hungry, and love for the lonely• Let us hold hope for a better future very tenderly in our hearts• Let us love with our whole hearts – for that is the only way to love•