... Trip.
Oh yes, lovebugs. The big day is finally (almost) here. The day I embark on an adventure of epic proportions that, again, began with a simple sentence: "You must come with us." Well, who am I to (ever) say no?!
So, off I go to South Africa - a land, to me, of mystery and struggle and majesty and elephants. No joke. With apologies to Mr. Mandela, this is the first thing I think of when South Africa comes to mind. I hope to see many an elephant on my trip, along with ostriches and lions and zebras and giraffes and all those other exotic animals that I've only seen on Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom, storybooks and that pretty awesome fake-safari I took while in Disneyland a few years ago. Do you think this safari will be better than that?! Hehe.
I have no real idea what to expect. I'm looking over my itinery and my head is shaking, my eyes all buggy. We're doing what?! We're going where?! I had no hand in planning this trip at all. Imagine that. I'm away for three weeks on (one of) the most exotic vacations I've ever been on and the only things I did to get me there were win yet another friend lottery and book a plane ticket. You know, when I'm feeling a little down can y'all just remind me of this: That life, overall, is pretty damn great and if you look for ways it's not you're bound to find them SO STOP FUCKING LOOKING.
See you soon, lovebugs. Because guess where we're going in September? That's right - TIFF! Yet another amazing adventure that, this year, I will have no hand in planning. What's happening to me? I don't know. But I like it. Yes, yes I do.
T is for ... Trip.
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Thursday, August 1, 2013
S is for ...
.... Soundtrack.
About a year ago I received some rather horrible news from a close work friend and colleague of mine. There's no way to sugar coat it, so here goes: Non - Hodgkin's Lymphoma. A 42 year old solid guy with 2 young children and a darling wife was now facing life in a tailspin as protocols and plans were being set out for his treatment.
We all took it pretty hard at the office. For all the prolonged eyerolling I do about the Type-A personality dudes I'm charged with wrangling, my workmates are pretty all right. We've worked together so long and seen each other through the highs and lows of life that, at the risk of sounding corny, it's family - lite. Adding to this of course is the harsh reality of capital C Cancer. I mean, Jesus Christ, enough with this fucking disease already.
He was off for awhile. Calling and emailing to keep in touch, but also to keep his mind off that other thing. The attitude was unreal - upbeat, positive, cheering us up that all was going to be okay. After some months, chemo and, as he referred to it, his "Lex Luther do" - it was okay. He returned to us - slighter in stature but absolutely stronger willed.
A few months after that, then, when he came into my office to tell me that his routine check up had discovered a stubborn node which had not responded to treatment, I was was frozen. When he quietly broke the news to a few others, they, too, were frozen. There would be more chemo. There would be a stem cell transplant. More drugs. More pain. More tears. He was obviously deflated. And scared. It's difficult not to project your own past experience into things like this - after five and a half years I still can't really talk about everything that my Dad and family went through during his second round of chemo - it's just too painful, full of sadness and guilt and regret and anger - but I remember what happened when it was over: he died. I wanted things to be different this time, obviously, but what control did I have over anything. What could I do? Everyone at work felt the same way - we were devastated.
And this is sort of the thing. We all felt like we'd been punched in the stomach - how does this happen? Why does this happen? What is going to happen?! In my office, we're all a bunch of action oriented people - we DO, and if we can't do we tell you what YOU should DO. This is just the way things are around here. But what when you can't? When you can't DO anything? I work with a good many arrogant people but even they know (fine, me included) that we can't cure cancer. We can't make the drug they give you to fix your cancer less of a killer. We needed to find a way - in our own hearts and minds - to believe that he was going to be okay. Whether we sought this out through God or Buddha or that little leprechaun on the box of Lucky Charms, we had to find it somewhere but even this wasn't enough. Our inate instincts took over: we needed to DO something.
So when one of my sweet officemates came to me with an idea of a Feel Good Soundtrack, I was all over it. Everyone in the office was charged with providing me a list of two or three of their go-to feel good songs. Songs that got them out of funk, got them grooving, got them feeling good, got them thinking of better days. I was going to then take these songs, put them on an iPod Shuffle and hand it over. It wouldn't change anything, but it would take his mind off things when he was sitting in that big chair for hours upon hours. This was the best we could do. This was good.
The songs came in fast and furious, some more nostalgically personal - feel good, others straight up dance your funk out - feel good, a few bang your head against the wall to forget your not feel-good, but they all meant something to each of us in some way. I learned a little more about my office mates based on their selections, which was an added bonus. I learned that iTunes is awesome, I mean, did you know their selection of Japanese pop is simply astounding? I learned that regardless of how easy a project may seem to be, I will find a way to make it harder because technology never makes sense to me - I had download issues and hard drive issues but I wasn't deterred - this was happening. I was doing it. And, in perfect karma timing, my laptop competely busted the day after I finished. Crazy.
When it was all said and done, there was 4 days worth of music on this Shuffle. It sat in my office for weeks as we tried to schedule a visit but between his up / down energy levels, appointments and new medicine that made it painful for him to get out of bed and my summer of sick (sinusitus, bronchitis and overall too many germs to visit a guy with a non-existent immune system) this was proving impossible. I waived the white flag and couriered it off last week. A day later, I received a phone call and within two minutes we were both in tears. The email he sent to everyone a day after that had us all in tears.
There's much to be said about the power of music, but that's an obvious. There's much to be said about the crummy cards we're often dealt in life, but that's depressing. All I really want to say, and I realize I'm taking a very long time to say it, is that regardless of how powerless we feel, how hopeless things might be, how insurmountable our struggles are, we can always try. Try to do something. Try to make things better. Try to see life outside ourselves. Try to do something for someone that may not make sense to us, but will mean the world to them. We have to take care of each other. Our Feelgood Soundtrack is not going to cure his cancer. But if all it can do is take his mind off that fucking cancer - and let him know that our minds are never far from him - I think that's a good thing.
S is for Soundtrack.
Because he always feels good after hearing The Boss.
About a year ago I received some rather horrible news from a close work friend and colleague of mine. There's no way to sugar coat it, so here goes: Non - Hodgkin's Lymphoma. A 42 year old solid guy with 2 young children and a darling wife was now facing life in a tailspin as protocols and plans were being set out for his treatment.
We all took it pretty hard at the office. For all the prolonged eyerolling I do about the Type-A personality dudes I'm charged with wrangling, my workmates are pretty all right. We've worked together so long and seen each other through the highs and lows of life that, at the risk of sounding corny, it's family - lite. Adding to this of course is the harsh reality of capital C Cancer. I mean, Jesus Christ, enough with this fucking disease already.
He was off for awhile. Calling and emailing to keep in touch, but also to keep his mind off that other thing. The attitude was unreal - upbeat, positive, cheering us up that all was going to be okay. After some months, chemo and, as he referred to it, his "Lex Luther do" - it was okay. He returned to us - slighter in stature but absolutely stronger willed.
A few months after that, then, when he came into my office to tell me that his routine check up had discovered a stubborn node which had not responded to treatment, I was was frozen. When he quietly broke the news to a few others, they, too, were frozen. There would be more chemo. There would be a stem cell transplant. More drugs. More pain. More tears. He was obviously deflated. And scared. It's difficult not to project your own past experience into things like this - after five and a half years I still can't really talk about everything that my Dad and family went through during his second round of chemo - it's just too painful, full of sadness and guilt and regret and anger - but I remember what happened when it was over: he died. I wanted things to be different this time, obviously, but what control did I have over anything. What could I do? Everyone at work felt the same way - we were devastated.
And this is sort of the thing. We all felt like we'd been punched in the stomach - how does this happen? Why does this happen? What is going to happen?! In my office, we're all a bunch of action oriented people - we DO, and if we can't do we tell you what YOU should DO. This is just the way things are around here. But what when you can't? When you can't DO anything? I work with a good many arrogant people but even they know (fine, me included) that we can't cure cancer. We can't make the drug they give you to fix your cancer less of a killer. We needed to find a way - in our own hearts and minds - to believe that he was going to be okay. Whether we sought this out through God or Buddha or that little leprechaun on the box of Lucky Charms, we had to find it somewhere but even this wasn't enough. Our inate instincts took over: we needed to DO something.
So when one of my sweet officemates came to me with an idea of a Feel Good Soundtrack, I was all over it. Everyone in the office was charged with providing me a list of two or three of their go-to feel good songs. Songs that got them out of funk, got them grooving, got them feeling good, got them thinking of better days. I was going to then take these songs, put them on an iPod Shuffle and hand it over. It wouldn't change anything, but it would take his mind off things when he was sitting in that big chair for hours upon hours. This was the best we could do. This was good.
The songs came in fast and furious, some more nostalgically personal - feel good, others straight up dance your funk out - feel good, a few bang your head against the wall to forget your not feel-good, but they all meant something to each of us in some way. I learned a little more about my office mates based on their selections, which was an added bonus. I learned that iTunes is awesome, I mean, did you know their selection of Japanese pop is simply astounding? I learned that regardless of how easy a project may seem to be, I will find a way to make it harder because technology never makes sense to me - I had download issues and hard drive issues but I wasn't deterred - this was happening. I was doing it. And, in perfect karma timing, my laptop competely busted the day after I finished. Crazy.
When it was all said and done, there was 4 days worth of music on this Shuffle. It sat in my office for weeks as we tried to schedule a visit but between his up / down energy levels, appointments and new medicine that made it painful for him to get out of bed and my summer of sick (sinusitus, bronchitis and overall too many germs to visit a guy with a non-existent immune system) this was proving impossible. I waived the white flag and couriered it off last week. A day later, I received a phone call and within two minutes we were both in tears. The email he sent to everyone a day after that had us all in tears.
There's much to be said about the power of music, but that's an obvious. There's much to be said about the crummy cards we're often dealt in life, but that's depressing. All I really want to say, and I realize I'm taking a very long time to say it, is that regardless of how powerless we feel, how hopeless things might be, how insurmountable our struggles are, we can always try. Try to do something. Try to make things better. Try to see life outside ourselves. Try to do something for someone that may not make sense to us, but will mean the world to them. We have to take care of each other. Our Feelgood Soundtrack is not going to cure his cancer. But if all it can do is take his mind off that fucking cancer - and let him know that our minds are never far from him - I think that's a good thing.
S is for Soundtrack.
Because he always feels good after hearing The Boss.
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