The 27% Solution.
I WONDER IF THERE IS A SEASON FOR IRRATIONALITY? If, at times life presents one with such contradictory evidence that the only sensible course of action is to be nonsensical? The commitment to empiricism can leave one at the mercy of a dictatorship of probability; a reasoned set of expectations that, supported by evidence, imply inevitability. To resist such predictions is as productive as shouting at a gale to change direction. There are times, when predictions are so utterly disagreeable that to accept them would feel like nothing short of betrayal of the self; a solemn acceptance of futility, or in the face of cancer, frailty.
When my last round of Chemo ended and the long state of Détente I currently endure became the order of the day, I promised myself that in early 2020 I would begin to rebuild my professional life. Limited by the reality of treatment having closed, albeit temporarily, the door to 16 years of working on set as a cinematographer and 1st Assistant Cameraman, I sat with my grief. Once it passed, the choice of where to strike out next was clear. See Cancer as a blessing in disguise, an opportunity; like the Phoenix, arise from the ashes renewed, and live. I hauled myself out of a well of grief, back onto my feet, dusted myself off and strutted to the horizon, to whatever lay in store for me... plowing head-on into the concrete wall built of my own expectations. The same closed doors, dead-air thick with apathy. These are the carcinomic cycles, the semiotic roots of my disease. It wasn't long before the irrelevancy-based despair set in, ye olde familiar Zeus-style "so what," caterwauled down from the stormy peaks of Mt. Who Gives a Fuck. In the face of Nihilism, so prolific that if it had form “Made in China” would be stamped just under the seam, how does one know that the path trodden is the right one? That the task is meaningful?
The choice is clear: operate from first principles, the position of what is fact and so I revisit my diagnosis; metastatic adenocarcinoma stage T4 N2 Mx. "Tumour invades adjacent organs/structures or through the visceral peritoneum, including Prostate gland" "Metastases in ≥ 4 lymph nodes." 1 5-year Survival (%) = 27%.
Translated into the Queen’s, people with my diagnosis survive five years (after treatment) 27% of the time. A small number, but not vanishingly small. A hair over 1/4. A small number to arrest a life; what to do? Do I let 27% determine what I do next? Do I allow it to put me off writing books? Returning to set? Finding work? Start a new business? Allow myself to fall in love; start a family? Do I move forward, assuming I have time, gambling that I’m going to be in that 27%? What promises can I make? What contracts can I keep? What odds are necessary to determine one's will? To believe that I am one of that 27% requires something that flies in the face of my empiricism: irrationality. A stalwart resolve to stick two fingers up at the data-sets and cry, "Not me! Not today!"
I step back a moment, rain beating down on the roof crescendos, each drop part of a chorus of urgency that can be either friend or foe. What I am most critically in need of now is not more radiation or more chemotherapy, but two intangibles: A sense of purpose and reliable metrics that I am engaged in something meaningful in the world.
Owing to recent developments in my life that I am not currently at liberty to discuss, I feel in true visceral fashion, that I have so much more to lose. I have adenocarcinoma itself to thank for it in a way. I don't know if I have more or less time to work with, but I do know the next five years will be a life lived at the fire-wall, right where it should be.
#cancer #cancersurvivor #cancerwarrior #cancerphilosophy #memoirs #thoughts
Footnotes & References
“Colorectal Cancer: A Review.”OncLive, www.onclive.com/publications/contemporary-oncology/2011/fall-2011/colorectal-cancer-a-review?p=3.