The easy part

15 YEARS AGO, I was into my first month of chemotherapy.

As it turns out, the easiest part of being on chemo – was receiving chemo.

I’m referring to the actual procedure in which I get a bunch of mad poisons injected into my body. There are other times for worrying about paying on the deductible or dealing with side-effects or other aspects of life with cancer. But when it was time for my treatments, it was fairly simple and easy.

Fortunately, I had Gwen to come with me to the cancer clinic, and more importantly, to drive me home. During my treatment she occupied herself in the waiting room.

The clinic’s treatment room had a couple of beds and a couple of recliners. I would usually get into a recliner, making myself comfortable in the position I would be in for at least the next hour or so. Then comes a bit of discomfort, as one of the professionals there finds a vein on my hand and inserts the IV. This became harder as the treatments progressed, due to the damage the chemo did to my circulatory system (formerly the owner of jump-up-and-say-hi veins, to this day I’m now a “bad stick”). The nurses -- or whatever their technical titles were -- had to be very good and careful, as they not only had to find tricky veins, but get the needle solidly in so that the corrosive nature of some chemo ingredients wouldn’t leak and damage the flesh of my hand.

After I’m hooked up, and the bags are put in place, then gravity and my circulatory system do the rest. I think there are anesthetics involved at first, so that I don’t feel the harshness of the drugs. There’s a TV up on the wall for us to watch, but I haven’t the foggiest idea what was on. It wasn’t long before the space-time continuum no longer applied to me. During the first treatment, time leapfrogged a bit, but I think I remember Gwen helping me to the car and driving me home. On other visits, both time and space were affected, as I would find myself teleported to my own bed. How did I get home? I frankly didn’t care at the time.

One treatment like this a week for two weeks on, two weeks off. This was my life for the next few months.

But while I was getting drugs, Gwen acquired an addiction. In the waiting room, she would read the clinic’s copy of Entertainment Weekly. Never finished, she slipped it into her purse as we left. The next visit she would bring it back and take the more recent issue, and so on. When my course of treatment ran out, she would be left without her fix, so she mailed in the subscription card.

She’s still hooked, with no intention of kicking the habit.

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