cancer and charity

My actions are so complicated sometimes, it boggles the mind. My mind.

Yesterday, on my way back home, I saw two people standing outside the metro station holding a banner and a box. Donation box. For cancer patients.

I gave a hundred rupees.

I will now openly say, this is the LEAST amount I have donated towards a cancer charity.

Least.

Ask me why. Actually, don't ask me why. Let me just tell you that these guys and their box reminded me of something very similar that occurred about 8 months ago.

I was exiting the metro station one evening 8 months ago when I saw 2 people with a banner and a box. Donation box for cancer patients.

That evening, I had dropped in a thousand rupees. Ten times more than what I dropped in yesterday.

But my life was so different 8 months ago.

8 months ago, this blog had nothing to do with cancer. Now, I have so much to say. So much to say and so much that I choose to leave unsaid.

Asking me to donate for cancer patients is like - I don't know what it is like, okay? There is nothing like it. You don't have to ask. I just do it anyway.

Maybe now a hundred rupees to me means what a thousand rupees meant to me then.

Expensive stuff.

Let me just tell you that knowing cancer in the way that I have come to know it over the past few months has left me battling with my finances.

Let me tell you that being borderline broke helps nothing.
 
Having emotions can be so expensive.

little boy

Yesterday, I saw the little boy again at the chemotherapy day care centre. He was there again with his father, who sat facing him and didn't say a word.

I tried not to stare at them. I distracted myself with tea and a magazine. But tea and magazines are no match for a seven year old on chemotherapy. 

When I sneaked a glance in their direction again, I noticed that the little boy had disappeared for a bathroom break. His father remained seated in the chair, staring off into space.

Then I saw the little boy return. I saw him come up to his father's chair from behind. I saw him put his small arms around his father's shoulders. I saw him squeeze his father in a hug.

************** 

Little boy, you inspire me so much. You make me feel curious. You make me feel amazed. You make me feel happiness and sadness and hope and madness all at once. You make me want to walk up to you, you make me want to talk to you, you make me want to be your friend.

Little boy, you leave me tongue-tied.


 

the boy i used to know

The very first time I fell in love, it was with a boy who had leukemia. Leukemia, the fancy word for blood cancer.

I can't pin down the exact date now, but I think I met him 3 months after his treatment had completed. Or maybe it was a year later. The details of this are so hazy now, I can't really say. All of this happened more than 10 years ago.

The day we had our first conversation, it felt like pins and magnets.

It was electric, it was beautiful, and first love is so naive and innocent and powerful and heady.

We lived in different cities, it was the age of the internet, and we would only meet face to face a whole 2 years later.

He called me his angel, one he met after surviving a really rough time of his life. He called me his diamond, one he found amongst littered stones.

Eventually, our lives brought us together in the same city. We shared bike rides, walks on the beach, pizzas, dosas, popcorn, and arguments.

So many arguments.

I felt my life was like a movie. I thought nothing could stop us. I thought it would work out, no matter what.

But you know that it didn't; these things rarely do and that's just the way the universe works. And I am glad for it.

We did try to stay in touch even after it was over. The rare phone call or email or facebook inbox message did exist. Sporadic though it was, we tried and even though neither of us wanted the friendship anymore, I often got the feeling I was sitting next to him in a classroom, and it was just a matter of leaning over and exchanging notes on our lives.

I often got this feeling. I don't any more.

He's married, he lives in a different country and we no longer have each others' numbers.

I remember thinking that the only reason for me to contact him was if I felt I was having a life experience which only he would understand.

If there is someone in this world who understands the emotions with chemotherapy, I think it is him. If there is someone in this world who can talk to me about life after chemotherapy, it is obviously him.

And the odd thing is, I have no desire to re-connect. I thought I would. But I don't.

I guess that's life. You love, you get hurt. And then you just move on. Even if you fell in love over the internet with a boy who had cancer, eventually met face to face and kissed in the rain. Even if you spent many years volunteering at a cancer NGO because of him, even if you always donated way beyond your means to cancer charities because of him, even if now, several years later, you've seen cancer up close and you finally understand it. Even then. It is possible to move on.   

government aunties

They strictly travel as a pair or in a pack. Never does this type of species travel alone. There is no such thing as a government aunty. However, there is definitely such a thing as government aunties.

Government aunties are found on the Delhi Metro. Between the set of them, government aunties carry at least 4 plastic bags in addition to their individual handbags.

If government aunties happen to find a place to sit, it is against the order of their species to allow only one of their kind to sit. Either they must all squeeze in to the same space, regardless of how much is available, or they must all egg on one another to occupy the space and then scowl at the one non-government aunty person who finally dares to sit down after watching their politeness match.

If seated, government aunties like to eat their lunch or do their knitting.

Government aunties strictly wear salwar kameez. It is against the order of their species to wear any other type of clothing. If it is winter, government aunties strictly wear woolen monkey caps. The colour of the cap can be black, brown, maroon or on a particularly wild day, dark green. It is against the order of their species to wear any other coloured woolen monkey cap.

Government aunties always board or de-board the metro from Patel Chowk, Central Secretariat or Udyog Bhawan stations.

Government aunties talk about the sun. If it is summer, they discuss how not to sit under the sun. If it is winter they will talk about how to sit under the sun.

If it is raining then I suppose they run out of conversation. Or maybe the metro runs out of its supply of government aunties during the rains. Have you ever met a group of government aunties inside the metro during rainy weather? Neither have I.

Do you belong to a group of government aunties? Would you like to tell us more?

cancer people

Today at the chemotherapy day care centre the youngest patient was 7 years old. He has leukemia. He was quiet and shy and smiled at all the nurses. But he didn't say a word. He fell asleep during the chemotherapy. It must be hard to be so young and spend your winter vacations feeling tired and sick. It must be hard to sit still in hospital for hours at a stretch, doing chemotherapy while your friends run and play.

He came with his father. His father kept quiet and sat opposite him and stared at him the whole time. He didn't say a word either.

Father and son spent 5 hours today, sitting across from each other, not saying a word.

But what is there to say? Chemotherapy teaches you that words can be empty. When the silence is filled with so much meaning then there is no need for words.


********

Each patient at the chemotherapy day care brings at least one other person along with them. At least one. At the hospital we go to, there is no outer limit on the number of people a patient can bring along to keep them company on their chemotherapy days.

Patients themselves are silent creatures. Most are too tired to be noisy. 

But the noise levels escalate.

One boy who had come to keep an eye on his father declared within 5 minutes of entering the day care center, "The noise in this place is like the sound of drums. My ear drums are beating drums."

**********

The bravest woman I saw today had breast cancer 7 years ago. Now the cancer has resurfaced, and this time it is growing on her kidney. This time, because the cancer is on her kidney, the oncologist has refused to do a surgery. She needs to be treated with chemotherapy alone.

Her daughter said they do not know yet whether she can be treated successfully or not. The doctors haven't told them anything yet. This time around, for the cancer on her kidney, she has had 15 chemotherapy cycles so far.

Chemotherapy is hard. You have to watch someone you love doing it know exactly how hard it can be. I've seen 3 cycles so far and I can tell you it definitely doesn't get better with practice.
Her daughter is my age. She was calm and composed and matter of fact as she talked about her mother.

**********

I know exactly what that calmness feels like. I know exactly how much effort it takes to treat the fact of death like a fact of life.

But I have no idea what this girl told herself this time around, 7 years later and with no words of hope by the doctors.

No words of hope except the words you speak to yourself inside your mind. 

how to mind fuck

Wake up in the morning.

Do a session of dialysis.

Go to the hospital.

Visit the cancer ward.

Spend your day there.

Worry that the dialysis isn't getting done on time.

Fight with the insurance guys.

Return home.

Wash clothes.

Go grocery shopping.

Clean the toilets.

Do another session of dialysis.

Don't study for your exams.

Don't meet your work deadlines.

Think about the future.

Realise you have no money to afford your future.

Realise you have no time to earn money to afford your future.

Perhaps there is no future.

Sigh.

Go to sleep.

Repeat.

Elvis & Alice

When I lived in Chennai, I used autos a lot and a place I needed to go to a lot was ELLIS Road. ELLIS. ELLIS. ELLIS. 

Anand, who took a special interest in hailing my autos for me, INSISTED on telling the auto driver that I had to travel to ELVIS Road.

ELVIS. Like the singer.

Not ELLIS. (Ellis, like the road).

I tried many times to correct him but failed, and ultimately gave up.

Then suddenly, a few months back, I remembered he used to call Ellis Road ELVIS Road. Why did I suddenly remember this? Because I'm simply that awesome.

I said to him, "You used to always say Elvis Road instead of Ellis Road."

He said, "Yes. Because that SHOULD have been its correct name. I mean, atleast everyone knows Elvis. But Ellis? Who the fuck is Ellis? And anyway, it's Alice.  Who the fuck is Alice. Not Ellis."