March 17, 2002|
What is a Neutropenic Diet?
Last week I wrote of my 100 days. Well, you were probably asking why I can’t eat certain foods. Below is link that will give you the details.
http://www2.mc.duke.edu/9200bmt/NeutropenicDiet.htm
It’s interesting and somewhat intuitive for my case. As you will read, hot dogs from vendors, WAY out of bounds. 84 more days, 84 more days – we will have to have a hot dog party on day 100. Just around Memorial Day. What better way to celebrate?
Was I Really A Bubble Boy?
Not really. Those pictures of me in the bubble were simply of a pentamidine treatment that lasted all of 20 minutes. Because I have a new immune system, I am very susceptible to a host of diseases. Pentamidine is a drug that is inhaled, coating the lungs in order to defend against a few types of pneumonia. In order to get the full effect, I had to go in the bubble. I thought it was hilarious. I couldn’t help but think back to the classic Bubbleboy Seinfeldmepisode. “The Moors!” “The Moops!” “The Moors!” “The Moops”
Hanging By A Moment
I have been asked the same question by dozens of people in the past week. It basically goes as follows: “Now that the insurance battle is over and the hospital stay is complete, what next? What are you going to do in the future? Where are you going to be?” It’s a very legitimate and important question. Very. I never discredit it. I have the answer, but it’s not always for me to admit.
You see, I was (am) a typical Type A dominant male. There is nothing that us Type A males like more than long-term strategic planning. We relish the chance to do it, on our own lives and other’s lives. I (used to) bristle and cringe when I met someone who didn’t have his or her life planned out for the next 5 years. “Get yourself together son! Where’s the initiative? Where’s the drive? Where’s the organization? Pull yourself together man!”
Now. Hmm. My Type A-ness has been eroded. It wasn’t by my own choice, that’s for sure. I have gone down kicking, scratching and screaming. Eventually Providence won out, like He always does. To assure and console me, though, I have a constant reminder.
The number 1 song of 2001, according to Top 40 radio, was a simple, catchy three and a half minute tune by an unknown 20-something alternative band named Lifehouse. They and the song essentially came out of nowhere. It was the first major hit for SKG Dreamworks records and very much a fluke.
The first time I heard “Hanging By A Moment”, I ran out after work to the Virgin Megastore in Union Square and snapped it up. I can’t tell you how many times I have listened to the CD since. I never tire of hearing the song, even though I can only imagine most of America has. To me, though, it encapsulates…me…my story…what I believe. It also holds the answer to the question of “my future.”
Desperate for changing
Starving for truth
I’m closer to where I started
I’m chasing after you
I’m falling even more in love with you
Letting go of all I’ve held onto
I’m standing here until you make me move
I’m hanging by a moment here with you…
Forgetting all I’m lacking
Completely incomplete
I’ll take your invitation
You take all of me
I’m living for the only thing I know
I’m running and not quite sure where to go
And I don’t know what I’m diving into
Just hanging by a moment here with you…î
You can totally interpret it as a human love song. Jason Wade, the lead singer and writer, writes on www.lifehousefans.com: “This is a love song that can be interpreted in a bunch of different ways.” I can really only picture this as a deeply spiritual love song that transcends human love. It has to. Can mere human love be that deep, trusting and intricate? It has taken me until now, a year after the song was released to fully grasp what I believe is the real meaning.
My life right now is “hanging by a moment.” I can’t plan out a month in advance in my life, let alone a year. Who knows what could happen to me? In a month I could be back in the hospital battling pneumonia or some other infection. In a month I could have a relapse and be back in getting more of Billy’s cells. In a month I could be fine and outside rollerblading in Central Park. Who knows? I certainly don’t and any long-term planning I try to make is in vain. Instead,
…Letting go of all I’ve held onto
I’m standing here until you make me move
I’m hanging by a moment here with youÖ
I’m living for the only thing I know
I’m running and not quite sure where to go
And I don’t know what I’m diving into
Just hanging by a moment here with you…
Application for yourself? It’s easy to get into the mindset that we control and can plan our own destiny. It is. I certainly have fallen into the trap many a time. Instead things happen that are out of our control. Look back at your life. What do you see? Were you able to plan everything that happened to you? If you are really honest you will say “hecks no.î”We can’t control that things that happen in our lives, we can only really control our reactions to those things.
I like to think that we are all in some sort of story. The plot surrounds us at all times. What do we want to do? We want to plan out the plot. (There is a Type A-ness in all of us I have come to find. It is in our inherent nature that we want to be in control. It’s just part of being human.)
This afternoon I was talking with some friends about the whole marriage thing. It’s funny how us single people love to dream about how we will meet the right person, how their timeline and goals will fit into ours, and how ‘realisticallyî we have it all planned out to work. We think we have the best plot line worked out. As I have observed, though, it never ever works out that way. That’s a good thing though! God’s plot lines are so much cooler than ours will ever be.
Do you believe that? I finally do. Just my last month has proven that. The weekend I was approved by the insurance company all of my homeboys just ‘happened’to be flying in from across the country to visit. We had planned it out months ago. What a better way to celebrate! The weekend I was released from the hospital? It just so ‘happenedî that one of my best friends from college flew in from San Francisco to visit. We had planned that out months ago. What a better way to celebrate! How about me moving to the Peds floor? Moving down there was the best thing to happen to me- I got out in record time because of their care. Could I have planned that out? Would I have been able to orchestrate the logistics of it all? Could I have created a better storyline? Hecks no.
‘…There’s nothing else to lose
There’s nothing else to find
There’s nothing in the world
That could change my mind
There is nothing else, There is nothing else, There is nothing else
Just hanging by a moment here with you…î
It annoys me to think that many believe we on earth are a mere product of chance. Do you really believe that your life and everything that has happened in your life was mere coincidence and not the perfectly detailed plot line that it is? What a depressing existence! What do you have to live for? I can’t help but know that there is something more out there. I can see it. That is what puts my mind at ease and gets me out of the Type A controlling mindset. Yep, I certainly am ‘hanging by a moment,’ but the difference is that I am in the care of an Author who is writing the most amazing plot line for me and for others. That’s why I have no need to plan out and try to control my future. That is what allows me to answer the question about my future. “Frankly,” I say, “I don’t know and I don’t have anything planned out.”
‘…I’ll take your invitation
You take all of me
I’m living for the only thing I know
I’m running and not quite sure where to go
And I don’t know what I’m diving into
Just hanging by a moment here with you…î