Bad

I used to smoke cigarettes and drink a lot of alcohol when I was younger. Had to maintain that infamous drunken sailor image that the navy worked so long and hard to develop. I quit smoking in 1990. I still miss cigarettes. I quit drinking in 2009. The day I learned I had leukemia. And … Read more

The Purpose of Pain

When it comes to physical pain, it’s purpose is hardly in question: It focuses us to where our immediate attention and action is required.

We accidentally rest our hand on a hot stove top burner and, without our sense of pain, our hand, if it weren’t for our sense of smell, would become cooked well enough to serve up at the next meal.

We could laugh at this, but sadly and horrifically there are some who do not experience the sense of physical pain due to a rare condition known as congenital analgesia.

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The Power of About

I may be mistaken, but it is my belief that we’ve all been to that dark, lonely place at least once or twice in our lives where we, and the lives we have led, seem… Insignificant. Less than. Pointless. It’s a scary place and one which I suspect, and hope, the majority of us visit … Read more

If You’re Here You Must Be Sick…

(OR CARE FOR SOMEONE WHO IS) I’d like to think that one or two of my three regular visitors (one of whom is me) come to this site to gain a deeper understanding of my creative writing by exploring my short stories, and poetry, and my insightful and sometimes witty flash fiction, and, most importantly, … Read more

Steroid Psychosis Blues

One of prednisone’s most annoying side-effects are severe mood swings. When I woke up each morning, I always had to wonder who I would be that day. Would I be one who was effusively overcome with happiness and joy? Or, would I be one who was trapped in a deep, dark depression? Or, would I be a paranoid, hypersensitive mad–as in angry at any little slight–man?

No Sense, Whatsoever

Without even mentioning my slowly deteriorating and dying lungs, it’s bad enough that I have lost most of the feeling in my lower extremities due to the neuropathy that was brought on by all the chemo I got juiced up with to treat my leukemia, or that I lost most of my ability to smell or to taste to only our tight-lipped God know why (my doctors sure as hell don’t know), but, because of the reemergence of GVHD due to my decrease in prednisone dosage, do I really need to now start losing my ability to see, as well?

Caffeine Therapy – Update #2

My recent appointment with my GVHD specialist was one of the most informative appointments I have had yet. Even though not all of the information was good, it all brought clarity to my treatment and came with a decisiveness of purpose. The good news is…

Caffeine Therapy

I was a late bloomer as a coffee drinker. Though I always loved its smell growing up—I still have vivid, fond memories of the bubbly coffee percolator sounds and the delicious coffee smells that I woke to every morning as a child—I found its taste repulsive and the heated spoiled crap breath that all coffee drinkers blast out even more so. I didn’t want to be complicit in that.

Stimulating News

Ever since mid-December 2010, I have been getting light headed whenever I stand or lean over. A couple of times I have come pretty close to passing out. The last checkup I had the doc took my blood pressure lying down and it was 135 over 70 something. He then had me stand up and … Read more