Cancer on Five Dollars a Day* *(chemo not included): How Humor Got Me through the Toughest Journey of My Life (14 page)

Later I find out what it actually costs to live on the beach, and I say, “You know, living three blocks away isn’t that bad.”

But for now, I’m gone, lost in the spell of Inez’s chirpy voice, in the smell of the strawberry candles, even in me-owing Yanni, because I know that while crystal therapy will not cure my cancer, it, too, like Reiki and acupuncture and all the rest, takes me on an hour vacation from the horror of the chemo and the madness that surrounds it. And that’s why I believe in it.

I start keeping a journal.

I get the idea from Nadine, the nurse at the infusion center. As usual, I’ve brought in muffins and doughnuts for the staff to share. Nadine tears the top off a blueberry muffin and pops bite-sized pieces into her mouth.

“You have an unbelievable attitude,” she says, and then gives me a wonderful compliment. “We all look forward to seeing you. You brighten up the day.”

“Thank you. That’s very nice. I try. Some days are easier than others.”

Nadine pours a cup of coffee from a silver thermos she keeps handy. “Have you thought about keeping a journal?”

I’m intrigued. “What would I write?”

“I’m talking about an Oprah kind of thing. You wake up in the morning and you think of something good. Start your day that way. Write something positive.”

“You mean, instead of, ‘Well, good morning, I’m up, and damn, I’ve got cancer, I’m dying, and if the chemo doesn’t work, I’m finished?’”

Nadine smiles. “Yeah. Instead of that. Be honest. But look for something good.”

I look at her, and now I smile. “A journal, huh? Why not? I’ll try anything.”

I cover all my bases. I buy both a reporter’s notebook and several packs of three-by-five index cards. My idea is to write one positive thought per card. Frankly, I buy the index cards as a safety measure. What if I open up my reporter’s notebook and I have no positive thoughts? The blank pages will stare at me, depress me. Somehow the index cards are less intimidating. I needn’t have worried. The thoughts pour out of me unchecked, uncensored, unedited. I write until my fingers ache. The thoughts help me focus and keep me sane. I keep the cards with me. I read what I’ve written at various times during the day. I shuffle the cards, read them in a different order, find new meaning. In the course of my chemotherapy, I will write thoughts on hundreds of index cards. Here are just a few:

I change my relationship to food.

It begins with this card I write:
Eat healthy. Appreciate your food and don’t rush through meals
.

I buy a couple of books by Dr. Weil. I read them both in two days. His books are full of wisdom and insight and connect with me deeply. Among other things, I’m struck by his suggestion that you should make a ritual out of eating. Seems like we’re always in such a hurry. It’s tremendously unhealthy to sit down at the table, shovel the food into your mouth, and race toward your next activity as if the world’s going to end if you don’t take that phone call right then.

Take your time. Look at your food. Really look at it. And if you’re cooking, enjoy and experience each moment of the process, including picking out the food that you’re going to eat. Examine the tomato that you’re about to slice up and put into your salad. Smell and touch the lettuce you’ll be using. Cooking is very tactile. And, I discover, very sensual. Also, when you slow down, cooking becomes almost a form of meditation.

I create a sort of mantra. I write on an index card:
This food is good for me. It’s filled with vitamins and minerals and will nourish me. No more junk food.

I really get into my food. I see everything, especially fruits and vegetables, in a whole new light. I’m awestruck by an orange—the shape, the color, the touch, the smell. I hold it close to my nose, take it in, and, I swear, I imagine the orange grove. I even imagine the seed from which the orange grew. I picture the soil with just a seedling popping through the dirt, then the rains come and the seedling grows into a tree and the fruit swells and ripens. I feel connected to all of that. I don’t feel alone. And I don’t feel separate. I feel part of
life.

Ray, a friend of my brother’s who I know casually, calls me up after I’m diagnosed. Ray is a nervous, ferret-faced guy who spent most of high school camped out in the corner of my brother’s room getting high and listening to Canned Heat and Pink Floyd. He speaks in a high-pitched nasally voice that sounds like a dentist’s drill.

“Hey, man, I heard. I’m really sorry.”

“Yeah. Thanks, man,” I say.

“What a ream job,” Ray says. “You know, with the show and all.”

“Yeah.”

“Are you sick yet?”

“Oh yeah.”

“What are you doing for the nausea?”

“Basically, throwing up.”

“I hear you, man.”

“My doctor says I can smoke pot.”

Ray brightens. “Really?”

“Yeah. He says pot helps with the nausea.”

“I can get you some pot, man,” Ray says.

“I don’t think so, Ray.”

“I’m talking about some really good pot. Not the crap they sell in Compton, man. I’m talking about some serious West Side, rock star weed.”

“I don’t want it, man. But thanks.”

Ray’s dental whine revs up into ultrahigh speed. “Robert, please. Don’t deprive me of this. I want to do this for you.”

“I don’t really smoke pot.”

“But if it helps with the nausea, why not try it? Why
not,
man?”

“I don’t know—”

“Robert, I’m begging you. I want to do this for you. I didn’t know what I could do. Now I know. Please. I just want to do this for you. Please let me do this for you.
Please
.”

I feel as if Ray’s whiny voice is about to drill through my skull. At this point I’ll say anything to shut him up.

“Okay, fine. I’ll try it.”

“Oh, man, thank you
so
much. This really means a lot to me. I just want to help you, man.”

“Thanks.”

Ray arrives at my house early that evening. I answer the door and Ray bounds in. He throws his arms around me in a wrestler’s clinch, intermittently massaging my back in slow circles as if he’s kneading pizza dough. I’m unsure if and when he will release me. Finally I break his clinch. Ray nods solemnly.

“Robert,” he says. “Man,” and bear hugs me again, nearly breaking a rib.

He pulls away, wipes at a tear that’s trickled down to his chin, and slaps his right coat pocket. “Got the goods.”

I lead Ray into my room. This whole evening is rapidly turning bizarre. It’s as if I’ve never left high school and I’m sneaking Ray in to smoke grass while my parents are waiting for me to join them at the seder table. Although in this case I’ve sneaked Ray in under Vicki’s nose while she’s in the shower. I close the door behind him.

“You don’t know what this means to me,” Ray says. He pulls out of his pocket a small, folded-over plastic Baggie a quarter filled with pot and presses it into my hand. “Here, man.”

“Thanks, Ray.”

“That’ll be sixty-five dollars,” he says.

I stare at him. “What?”

“That’s how much it costs.”

“I’m not giving you any money. I didn’t want it in the first place.”

“You’re gonna stiff me? That is cold.”

Ray inhales massively and crouches into a catcher’s stance. He seems frozen there, injured, betrayed. Now it appears that I have two choices: pay him or take the chance that he will stay locked in that position forever as if he were a potted plant.

“Jesus, Ray.” I grab my wallet and fish out four twenties. Ray whisks them out of my hand like a train conductor.

“I don’t have change, man,” he says whippet fast, pocketing the bills. “I’ll put the difference toward your next bag.”

I wave him away. I’d like nothing better than for him to leave so that I can flush the contents of the Baggie down the toilet and crawl into bed alone with my spiritual self-help books and my nausea.

“So let’s get high, man,” Rays says, popping up out of his crouch and cracking his knuckles so loudly I cringe. He reaches into another coat pocket and produces a pack of rolling papers. “Pass me the pot.”

“What are you doing?”

“Rolling a joint.”

This doesn’t feel right. First, I don’t even want to smoke a joint. Second, I definitely don’t want to share a joint with Ray. I’ve started chemotherapy, my resistance is low, and while I haven’t discussed this with Dr. Mehldau, I’m pretty sure he’d advise me against sharing a marijuana cigarette with a drug dealer.

Ray finishes rolling the joint. He licks both ends, holds the cigarette up to his nose, and takes a long slow whiff. “Man, this shit is fine. Let’s fire this baby
up.
”

From a pocket
inside
his coat (the guy’s got more pockets than Coco the Clown) he produces a plastic cigarette lighter. With a magician’s flourish, he flicks the lighter’s top, releasing a violent blue
broosh
that would make a blowtorch proud, nearly searing my eyebrows. Ray leans into the flame. He catches the joint’s fat end, inhales a mighty chestful, holds it in for an agonizingly long thirty seconds, then exhales a thick brown cloud that hovers Hiroshima-like over my bed.