I Spoke to Her Yesterday After Her Breasts Were Removed

I called my buddy to see how his wife was doing.  She had her breasts removed a couple days ago.

She didn't even have cancer in them.  Not yet, anyway.  But some kind of test, and looking at her family history, had the doctors tell her We suggest removal.

Karla and I said a healing prayer for her on Friday, the day of her surgery.  We toasted her good health with our Friday night martini.  And yesterday, Sunday, when I asked how she was doing, he said OK, then he put her on the phone.

I didn't expect to talk to her.  I wasn't ready.  I was, um, nervous.  I was wearing a sweatshirt and I began to sweat.  I'm only saying this now to get it out there because I'm a guy and I spoke to a woman who had just had her two breasts surgically removed 48 hours earlier--breasts that didn't even have anything wrong with them--yet.  We spoke and I paced back and forth but I swear it was great to hear her voice.

She told me how she told her kids.  And I can't imagine hearing such news from my mom as a thirteen year old boy.

She told me about the discomfort.  And as a guy I can't imagine that kind of discomfort in that part of the body.

But enough of this stuff.  I told you how I felt last night when I spoke to her and I know she's brave for what she went through.

El na rifa na la.  Thank you, lord, for healing x.

Last Week's NYT Was Abbey Road

Look at this picture:













Does it remind you of this one?













The top is from last Sunday's New York Times' cover story about M.D. Anderson Center in Houston and it's called "A Place Where Cancer is the Norm." The 2nd one is Abbey Road.

I thought of the Beatles with my cup of black coffee as I read about the hospital dedicated to all kinds of cancer. And today, the following Sunday, as I go through my ritual of throwing away the previous Sunday's NYT to replace it with today's, I think of Abbey Road again.

And I look up the song titles. And I see how they fit:

• "Something" (cancer)

• "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" (bang bang, MSH came down upon her head--radiation? surgery?)

• "(She's So Heavy)"

• "Here Comes the Sun" (this is the Kabbalah and Love part from the Hare Krishna guitar whiz who died from cancer. including brain.)

• "You Never Give Me Your Money" (the opposite of the truth when it comes to the health insurance companies and pharmaceutical industry, esp. when it comes to cancer)

• "Mean Mr. Mustard" (see above)

• "Golden Slumbers", "Carry that Weight", and "The End" (it's all too obvious, those three)

Ah, music. Music and cancer. Music and cancer and a photograph in the New York Times. Over coffee. On a Sunday morning. When I'm supposed to be resting.

You say you want a revolution? Too bad. That's the White Album.