now/then

yesterday plus 4 yrs ago i began radiation treatment for the residiual bit of brain tumor that was unresectable, attached near the carotid artery. today i walk down the street, outwardly normal, inwardly heart aching for friends in turmoil, recently plunged into darkness. around me those w/ the good fortune to remain untouched by trauma of any stripe wander oblivious, but i can't really blame them. i would too. how could i not if i didn't know? today i am wearing giant bose earphones and my ipod is on shuffle and mary oliver pops up to read 'her grave' which concerns, mostly, a dog's death. these lines cut me down:

Do the cranes crying out in the high clouds
think it is all their own music?
A dog comes to you and lives with you in your house, but you
do not therefore own her, as you do not own the rain, or the
trees, or the laws which pertain to them


and the last line hits my face.

Finally,
the slick mountains of love break
over us

proton beams in the ny times

was alerted to the fact that this appeared in the ny times
a couple days ago. if there is a financial imperative to use something
will it be overused? used improperly? i am biased naturally, as a recipient of proton beam therapy. perhaps that speaks to a broader problem in modern healthcare, ie the financial imperative but i'm not well-read enough to speak to it.
all i know is that some 2 years ago, held in place by the face for 35 radiation treatments at MGH (10 photon, 25 proton) for the remaining bits of a two-time surgically resected brain tumor, (a skull-base chondrosarcoma)i was grateful and thankful that the technology existed. it didn't 20 yrs ago. which begs the question, at least in my own mind: who knows where i'd be if that was the case.

today is the penultimate day of our san fran xmas extravaganza. got to see friends last night, which was awesome. the other days/moments are the stuff of future novels for margaret. which is good. in a way i suppose.