Two years

When I was diagnosed with my brain tumor, I quickly decided - with the encouragement of a couple of friends - that I would not waste my time poking around online, looking at survival rates and tales of symptoms and the like. One quick look was enough to make me realize that doing so would be a sure path to madness, because by obsessing about my diagnosis, I'd be ignoring all of the other things that were good and right in my life.

As we all know by now, not everything on the internet is true. In the case of personal stories of cancer - or even population-level mortality rates - it's more that not everything on the internet is or will be true for me. A diagnosis, like BMI, is just one piece of the puzzle. It's information, but incomplete. 

The gray day I was diagnosed - October 12, 2010, sitting in neurosurgeon Peter Heppner's posh office at Ascot Hospital in Auckland, overlooking the Ellerslie Racecourse - I was strangely calm, but told Peter I hoped that when the time came, I'd meet it with grace. He assured me that we weren't there yet. Moreover, he told me about paleontologist/evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould's excellent essay "The Median Isn't the Message," the main point of which is that statistics don't tell us everything, and even if the median survival time for a particular illness is short, there are people who live far beyond the curve, way out into its trailing right tail. This was true of Gould after his diagnosis with incurable mesothelioma, and I have every expectation and intention that it will be true of me, too. 

So I couldn't tell you what the 1-, 2-, and 5-year survival rates are for grade 2/3 oligodendrogliomas - but nonetheless, I am so, so happy to say that I have now passed that 2 year milestone. I still get anxious, of course, and my worries upon this last visit to the oncologist weren't helped by the fact that my allergies have been dreadful the past few months, leading to sinus pressure and weird twinges in my head. Plus, the lower lid of my left eye has been twitching (fatigue, plus I need an eye exam). And then I smelled burning rubber... (Time for a new flywheel and new tires!) Finally, my blood pressure was higher than it's been, but it seems like that probably has to do with the fact that I'm only just now returning to running...

But it was good news. I dressed up for my oncologist visit, as always. Since it's fall, I was able to rock a couple of older and a couple of newer seasonal secondhand purchases. 

Ruffled black silk blouse: Rendezvous for Paul & Joe Sister, eBay. 

Skirt: Nanette Lepore, Second Time Around. "Capelet": Trina Turk, Second Time Around, 2008. 

Boots: Sigerson Morrison, Into the Wardrobe. Bag: Gilda Tonnelli, Takapuna (NZ) consignment, 2010. 

One of the things I really love about that "capelet" is how "Sherlock"-y it looks. Benedict  Cumberbatch! What a name - it sounds like some old English nana's version of a cuss word - but what an actor. Moreover, I've been utterly smitten with supporting cast member Rupert Graves ever since he played Freddy Honeychurch in A Room with a View (link to a gay fan site; mildly NSFW). That floppy hair!

Life moves forward, then, and the world keeps turning; as I write, the winds and rain that signal the imminent arrival of Hurricane Sandy are growing stronger, so we're all hunkered down inside, anticipating the loss of electricity soon and enjoying a quiet day of puzzles, reading, tea, and napping. And the election is nearly upon us and I fear for us as a country, quite literally, not because I think Obama is so great but because the alternative seems so much worse for the poor, for women, and for those of us with illnesses and pre-existing conditions. And I fear for us because at the end of the day, we're not the democracy we think we are. If we were, we'd allow third-party candidates at our presidential debates and not arrest them; we'd have some alternatives to the two-party system and the status quo. 

But I am relieved by maintaining the status quo with my health. Two years. It's a milestone, and one I'm happy to celebrate.