Oh, before I forget to mention it . . . the score is:
Vomitless Chemo Days—76
Vomitful Chemo Days—1
I can’t remember if I’ve brought up the likening before but
it bears repeating anyway . . . I liken the yarks of chemo days to the yarks of
a massive hangover. The poisoned blood,
the caustic guts, the brimstone saliva, the thrice-sized head.
The similarities are bad enough, but it’s in the
dissimilarities where the going gets especially yarksome.
Alcoholic hangovers have remedies. Aspirin.
Milk thistle. Pedialite. Dunkings in ice-water a la Fezzik to Inigo.
Sleep. And, of course, my
personal fav from the ol’ dipsomaniacal days . . . hair of the dog and try, try
again.
Chemo hangovers, on the other hand, are unshakeable. They settle-in and hog the couch for a week
with their fungalacious feet on the coffee table and their sweating tumblers of
moonshine on-the-scum-water-rocks staining the oak.
They are a week’s worth of crying babies beside you on the
red-eye to your frumpy Aunt Belinda’s late-life nuptials.
They are a week’s worth of ramshackle rollercoaster rides and
haggardly ring-toss barkers at the trash-heap-of-a-gypsy-carnival where the
freak show cast doubles as greasy-corndog dippers.
They are a week's worth of Vonnegut being read aloud by Smeagol over the constant simpering of Kubrick's Clockwork Orange strobing from the thousand screens of a Buffalo Wild Wings in Limbo staffed by the Lollipop Guild and under the new management of Charlie Sheen.
I could go on. And on.
For week or so, say. But I won’t.
Oh, and the vomit?
The vomit of a drunken man comes like fresh water to the sea-foundered
sailor. The vomit of a chemo-ed man
comes like the oasis mirage in the desert—the hope of relief that corrodes upon
arrival.
FYI.
Have nice days this post notwithstanding.
