Let It Bern

‘There’s no easy way out, there’s no shortcut home’,
Sung by Robert Teper, real talk with the situation going on,
Sitting here in lockdown, the fast train of life screeched to a halt,
That damn monster’s prowling, that fucking virus, only Lord knows when it’ll stop,
Government ordered a lockdown, it’s risky just to head downtown,
Nationwide curfew threw life to a loop and it ain’t ending any time soon,
Don’t get me wrong, I ain’t whining and complaining,
This born introvert’s sitting, chilling, recharging and thriving,
Times are uncertain, though, can’t deny the presence of nerves,
Squinting and straining to see the future, it’s hazy behind the mist of this virus.

Rewind to Last December, bad news touched down from all directions,
Decade ending on Armageddon, surely, seemed like the world was headed for oblivion,
Spilled into 2020, kicked off in a cacophony of disasters,
Bushfires, drought, floods, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions,
Continuing unrest in Hong Kong, discord within the royals,

The death of a much-loved baller, innocent lives taken by a drunk driver, it’s one tragedy after another,
But they were merely appetizers before the main course,
A savage monster awoke, hit the air guns blazing, spread faster than bad gossip,
Plundered, pillaged, murdered and conquered like a demonic Alexander,
Brought about a new world order, killed more than Adolf, Josef, Idi and Saddam put together.

Watching and listening to this shit on TV and radio, Gotta stay informed but can’t be passive with these media reports.
Facts and sensationalism can intertwine, conspiracy theorists also fighting for air time,
Time travelled back to the years of plagues and wars, it’s a disaster flick in here and we’re all unwilling actors,
Made doubly persuasive by my vulnerability as the doctor be claimin’,
Embracing my inner hermit, on most days I’m keeping it together,
Strong on the surface, not all the way through, immortal words from Chester that rang true,
Nerves, disbelief and anger, throw in some cabin fever, I’m only human sometimes I’m feeling ‘em,
Dumbbells and punching bag be my best therapists under moments of extreme turbulence,
Fresh air, sunlight, music and books as back up when the mind continues stressin’.

Reflecting while meditating to keep the grip of negativity loosened,
Reviewing the situation like Fagin, thinking ‘bout the people affected,
The death toll surpassing millions, condolences to those hit by losses,
Can’t give the departed their proper send-off, such is the cruelty of that fucking monster,
Jobs lost, schools closed, daily life halted, travel plans and celebrations cancelled, all that planning and anticipation came to nothing,
People stuck indoors, that monster poisoned the outdoors, cops gon’ get you for wandering too far,
Feels like Big Bro’s watching, Orwell was 36 off the mark,
Social and economic status don’t mean shit, kings, queens, paupers and commoners are feeling it,
Feelings of superiority are a fool’s errand, the entire population’s a sitting target.

Tough times exposing true colors, the good and the bad,
Masks and facades slippin’ as that monster continued its destructive path,
Stupid selfish morons clearing supermarket shelves like feds on a drug bust,
Left nothing for the disadvantaged as common sense and dignity bit the dust,
Racists and xenophobes emerged from their holes, Asians seen as the enemy,
“Don’t matter where they’re from, they a part of that monster’s army,”
Words of the bigots jacked up on fear and ignorance,
On the same boat as the ones flouting orders ‘cuz they’re too good for isolation,
Body count’s rising, health care pushed to the limit, front liners are exhausted but these fools stay blinded and self-centred,
Degenerates attacking nurses, cops and customer servers, what low life wastes of oxygen,
Don’t wish death on no one but no tears shed if that monster fades ‘em, they will surely deserve it,
Newsflash, fools, we’re all caught in this mess,
Y’all are part of the problem and not the solution, hatin’ and floutin’ will only hamper progress.

But not all are broken, there are heroes within the chaos,
Restoring faith in humanity, the whole race ain’t yet crushed by the obnoxious,
Led by the doctors and nurses and all others in the front line,
Risking it all to help others, it’s tough and it’s lonely but still keeping up the grind,
Scientists around the world working to bring that monster to justice,
Time’s ticking but they march on fuelled by a warrior’s stoicism and defiance,
Acts of kindness from citizens, they ain’t hard to find, from helping the weary and burdened to sparing a few dimes,
Others in lockdown unleashing their inner entertainers, delving deep into their creativity,
Slick and at times kinda cringy but always has the audience cheering vociferously,
Families come together for an extended period, it’s a full house situation,
Kids still need educating, reluctantly or willingly, parents forced into a crash course in teaching,
The lost and soul-searching can find their paths, gotta grab it with both hands,
All distractions cancelled, time to chase the dream, no more excuses,
Working from home as best we could, no need to get up early,
Changes are happening outside, this you have to see,
Nature’s finally healing, where it was once deteriorating,
Smog is lifted, the air is clear, the stars in the night sky are twinkling,
What a role reversal, humanity’s suffering while nature is thriving,
Rivers clearing up, translucent and crystal-like under that sun,
The rain’s finally pouring, fields finally sporting green, like a new season had just begun,
Can’t call that monster a blessing but there’s some good within the pandemic,
For every dark night the moon still shines, seek and you shall find.

2020 looks headed for the pits, can’t wait ‘til it’s over with,
Stronger minds see a gut check, life’s meaningless without overcoming adversity,
Can’t get hung up on shit I can’t control, when you’re stressin’ you’re weakening,
Strong mind and body, faith and positivity be my own Shield of Achilles,
Got hopes for the future once that monster’s finally eradicated,
Reunion with friends and fam are just the tip of the iceberg,
That shit don’t hit the fan once the powers start blame games and finger pointing,
Don’t want leaders going ballistic, it could take us back to forty-five, don’t want or need that kind of strife,
That personal hygiene will remain a priority, that Mother Nature will be respected,
That the scourges of society will be dealt with, put an end to their bullshit,
That freedom and precious time with loved ones will never again be taken for granted,
That we’ll be kinder and more understanding, everyone’s fighting their own battles,
That the affected can heal from tragedy and trauma before rising back up stronger,
That the heroes throughout will be rewarded for their efforts,
2020 looks like another annus horribilis, but from that fire emerges a new generation of warriors,
This is one for the history books, another story to tell the future generations,
Exhaling now, eyes open, all things come to pass including tough times,
We’ll get through this, that monster won’t last, even the fiercest tyrants fade away and die.

He is my hero, idol, confidant and guide,
That’s my big brother, just an all-round cool guy,
Dropped some truths in between small talk and acting the fool,
Had our share of scuffles but in the end we’re always cool,
He had him a little secret, became a master at hiding it,
Struggled plenty to contain it, reduced his soul to easy pickings,
It all started at 15, the unknown force creepin’ and spreadin’ quickly,
Caught up in a power struggle between madness and sanity,
He radiated sunshine and happiness on the surface,
Masked the dreaded feelings of self-loathing and hopelessness,
External forces played their role but most of it’s internal,
Ain’t no battle tougher than one with the man in the mirror,
Couldn’t do it alone, finally opened up to the parents then the therapist,
Many sessions later, he seemed to have finally tamed those demons.

Fast forward to a few years later, now I’m the one fighting,
The beast was stealthy, infiltrated the fortress, guards must’ve been napping,
Grapplin’ with emotions from both ends of the extreme,
Muscles straining, carrying the weight of psychological fatigue,
On the edge about everything, drowning in nervous premonitions,
Also made-up scenarios and people staring like I’m a fuckin’ freak show,
Can’t trust anyone, got me feeling like a convict on the run,
Tired of looking over my shoulder, this anxiety shit is no fun,
Then some days I’m wondering why bother? Fuck everyone and everything,
A herculean effort’s required to keep going, every step of the way my feet are dragging,
The sky’s bright outside but I only see grey, can’t hear the sound of birds chirping,
This empty void of silence is all-consuming, at times accompanied by muffled screaming,
A prisoner of my own mind, it’s real fucked-up, ain’t it?
Don’t care if the Minotaur kills me, just want out of this labyrinth.

Tried to kill it my own way, through productive and destructive means,
Physical scars, rhymes and works of art the result from venting my spleen,
Still standing somehow, I guess I chose life in the midst of the chaos,
Took the same path as Big Bro and consulted with the pros,
Skittish as a baby deer at first, felt like I was regurgitating in their faces,
But the contents of this bottle are fermented, it’s been sealed for ages,
Time to uncap it, it’s on the verge of explosion, brace yourself here come the confessions.

Back to the present now I’m thriving where I was once surviving,
Can’t say there’s total healing, that’s tantamount to wishful thinking,
Want to part ways with this motherfucker, keep it buried forever,
‘Don’t get your hopes up,’ said Big Bro, ‘the war don’t end for us soldiers,’
That black dog’s still within him, just been slapped with a restraining order,
Might still breach it now and then, that canine defies restrictions,
Hard work, grit and determination, it’s a winning combination,
But the lows must come with the highs, the bright sun won’t always rise,
Perfectly articulated by Kurt, about the irony of all this hurt,
‘I miss the comfort in being sad’, he sang, now Bro’s eyes are tearing up,
Must’ve hit close to home, that oxymoron’s next-level fucked up

Can’t let those lyrics become life, Big Bro warned me to stay woke,
Can’t let the guard down or I’ll end up getting yoked,
‘Therapy will help you, but that beast might never leave you,’
‘Y’all are together for life, like some dysfunctional husband and wife,’
Talk about unholy matrimony but that shit was real spit,
Battled this curse for so long, feels like I’d be naked without it,
Uneasy under the sunshine where the children play, it’s a strange land to which I’m an alien,
In the deep levels of hell and suffering somehow feels like I’m in my element,
There’s still some reliance on that beast, yeah I know that sounds twisted,
Hate to compare it to codependency, but somehow it seems fitting,
It’s a part of my identity, who would I be if it was stripped off completely?
Grateful to experience the glow of happiness, yet the embrace of melancholy brings familiarity,
Maybe I don’t know better, I want to believe I can change,
Working hard day after day but I don’t know how long that’ll take.

“Not all will understand,” warned Big Bro, “They’ll say you’re hung up on some bullshit,”
“That it’s all in your head, suck it up and be done with it,”
“They don’t know what treacherous waters you’d navigated, always so quick to judge,”
“Focus only on yourself, don’t let ‘em bother you too much,”
Lucky to have a battle-tested vet by my side, likewise he know that he’s my ride or die,
Working together to be better than yesterday, we’ll get through this for as long as it takes,
Hopeful of breaking out of that bitter embrace and heading towards better days.

At the time of writing (in early 2020), my health has continued to improve and the ulcerative colitis hasn’t found a way back from remission. My haemoglobin levels were healthy once more, my weight on point and according to friends, family and my doctors, I was the picture of good health and vigor.
So it would seem that I’d been restored back to normal and rode off into the sunset in a flashy convertible but such wasn’t exactly the case. Not long after my January 2019 meeting with Dr. B a new challenger had stepped into the arena. This new challenger saddled me with floaters in the vision of my left eye, some subtle blurriness in my peripheral vision and a general feeling of irritation in the back of the eye, as though something – or someone – was tinkering around with the veins and nerves within. My watershed moment arrived when, sometime during the following month, I went to have my glasses upgraded which involved having to sit down for an eye test. The test results of my left eye revealed that while my vision had somehow improved (yay!) there was plenty of hemorrhaging within.

Uh-oh…….

The optometrist that tested my eyes ordered me to see an ophthalmologist and upon doing so, I was diagnosed with Central Retinal Vein Occlusion (CRVO for short) in my left eye. The central vein in my eye had become blocked, causing blood and fluid to leak into my retina and messed up my vision as a result. According to the ophthalmologist (let’s call him ‘Dr. Q’) it is a common eye disorder for people aged fifty and over with health conditions like hypertension, diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol and that cases among people my age in rather good health were extremely rare. I could only shake my head in disbelief upon hearing all of this, feeling betrayed by my own body all over again.

First colitis and now this shit? Man, what the fuck!?

The icing on the cake was when Dr. Q informed me that the treatment involved directly injecting some medicine into the affected eye that would ease the blockage and prevent the development of new veins that, while it would have kept the blood circulating through my eye, would have corrupted everything within, resulting in glaucoma or some other insidious eye disorder that could rob me of my sight. According to Dr. Q the blockage in my eye was serious enough to warrant a prompt injection, which he offered for free. I was naturally apprehensive about the idea of having a needle jammed into my eye but I was far less keen on the idea of losing my vision and Dr. Q had promised me that I would not feel anything. Might as well endure a minute or two of terror and discomfort rather than lose an eye.

Ok, Doc. Bring it on!

True to his word, Dr. Q numbed my eye with painkillers and eye drops multiple times over before driving the needle through. The procedure went ahead with no issues and pain but no amount of painkillers could spare my left eye from mutating into an ugly, bloodshot shade of red afterwards that Dr. Q assured me was not uncommon, merely a case of burst blood vessels that would heal in two weeks at most. I walked around with my eyes at half-mast behind my spectacles over the next fortnight to hide my mutated eye but I couldn’t keep it up forever. My parents and sister damn near jumped back in horror when they first looked me in the eyes post-injection, as did some of my peers at the Wing Chun Academy. Shoot, even Dr. G was startled at the appearance of my eye during a meeting with her one week later and I’m sure that she has seen and heard plenty of haunting and disturbing cases throughout her work as a general practitioner. I can’t say that I could fault any of them for their reactions, even I felt disgusted whenever I looked at my eye in the mirror. I looked like Kano from the Mortal Kombat series.

In addition to the jab in the eye Dr. Q also requested that I undergo a blood test and MRI in order to rule out other ailments within my body as possible cause(s) of that damn CRVO, both of which I did a week after meeting with Dr. G. Fortunately, the MRI found no irregularities in my body save for the swelling in the central vein of my bad eye while the blood test confirmed that my blood, cholesterol and hormones were top notch. I was healthy as a horse and it also confirmed that the medication I was taking for the colitis hadn’t set off a chain of nefarious activities within my body, much to my relief. Upon discussing my results with Dr. Q a few weeks later he tentatively cited my recent colitis battle as a probable cause, a residual effect if you will, although it wasn’t a definitive conclusion. He seemed just as perplexed as Dr. B had been when my father grilled him as to how I could have possibly been struck by colitis.
So within the space of a year and a few months I, a proud man that had vowed a long time ago that he wouldn’t see the inside of a hospital as a patient, had undergone a blood transfusion, colonoscopy, iron infusion, MRI, eye injection and more blood tests than I can count all because I’d been diagnosed with two sucky ailments that seemed to be the result of sheer bad luck and my body’s betrayal more than anything.

Someone’s out to get me.

That was the first of many more eye injections to come. My eyesight has since continued to improve and Dr. Q has gradually spaced out my injections with the goal of eventually weaning me off the treatment and I am confident that it will be all over soon.

Fortunately, it was more good news on the colitis front.

During my follow-up with Dr. B in June 2019 (on the day before my mother’s birthday, actually) he revealed that not only were my bowels in great condition but that I was also, statistically, the healthiest patient that he had. If you thought that I was a happy camper following the January meeting you should have seen the smile on my face after this one, it was wider than The Grand Canyon and the same could be said of my father’s. Sure, being told that my bowels were healthy was great but it was an unbelievable feeling to be told that among what I assumed was a rather sizeable list of patients, I was the healthiest one.
The top dog.
The head honcho.
The Don.

That’s right, get a load of me! I am the KING!!!!

But just when I thought I could finally let go of these chains and fly high into the sky like a bird, I fell back down to earth with a mighty thud.  
Shortly before my father and I departed Dr. B’s office he asked me a question that I had a feeling he’d ask sooner or later but was silently hoping he wouldn’t;
“When was your last colonoscopy?”
Fuck….where’s he going with this!?
“August of last year,” I replied, the nerves within beginning to stir from their extended hibernation.
“Ah yes….”
Dr. B took a deep breath before giving me a thoughtful look that, to be honest, made me rather nervous. For a split second he looked like a movie villain sitting behind his desk, peering through hands that were clasped right in front of his face, elbows resting on the table. What followed afterwards almost caused my heart to fall out of my ass.
“I think it might be time for a follow-up”, he said rather monotonously.
“Ok,” was all I could utter in response, wide-eyed as I tried to digest the fact that, months from now, I would have to go through that colonoscopy prep again though I did take comfort in the fact that I knew exactly what to expect and was hopeful that perhaps the prep will run smoothly this time as I would be in far better health.

We booked the procedure for early November and once D-Day had arrived following a rather easy prep the night before (yay!) my parents and I drove to the Lakeview Private Hospital, located not far from Dr. B’s clinic, for round two. Dr. B was already waiting in the operating room when they wheeled me in, dressed in his gown, mask and scrubs. Following an exchange of pleasantries he remarked that my arms looked muscular compared to the previous year.
“Oh, thank you,” I chuckled.
If he had said that to take some of the edge off it worked perfectly. The anesthetic kicked in not long after and before I knew it, I was waking up on the other side of the room from my medically-induced nap, feeling as though a building had collapsed on me.

I was chowing down on my post-colonoscopy meal when a nurse approached me to give a quick rundown of my results but first, she quickly explained that Dr. B had left before I had regained consciousness due to an extremely tight schedule and had asked her to discuss the results with me before making a mad dash back to his office. I would later find out upon e-mailing him when I arrived home that there had also been a power outage in the suburb where his practice was located, further exacerbating what appeared to be an extremely stressful day for him.
One of those days, huh?
Anyway, I am pleased to say that the nurse had good news for me and uttered the words that I’d been longing to hear for a long time.

“I’m glad to confirm that the colitis appears to be in complete remission,” she disclosed, a smile forming on her face

I almost choked on my sandwich. Had I not been groggy from the procedure and the lack of food and water I might have shot straight up from out of my chair and performed cartwheels around the room. At last, victory has been achieved!

YEAH BABY!!!!

“Thank you, Ma’am,” I replied, barely containing my glee, “I’m glad to hear that.”
“Dr. B says to maintain your dosages for the Imuran and Mezavant for now and to call him ASAP to book a follow-up appointment in six months’ time.”
“Ok, sounds good, thank you.”
“Well done again, Sir, on getting to this point.”
Ok, so my dosages weren’t reduced just yet but the confirmation of remission was still a massive weight lifted off my shoulders. Dr. B had mentioned during a previous meeting that there was a very real possibility that I may need to undergo a colonoscopy once a year for the rest of my life to keep my bowels in check and as sucky as that sounds, if that’s what it will take to keep the beast dead and buried forever then so be it.

You know, my mother told me not too long ago that, during a conversation she had with my father one day, he marveled to her how things always seem to work out for my sister and I whenever we run into a spot of bother. Sure, we experience our fair share of bad days and horrible situations but we would always manage to claw our way out of it relatively unscathed no matter how badly shit hit the proverbial fan. I put that down to our parents raising us both to always try to find a solution for every problem and also to stick it out during tough times but for me personally, I would say that my sense of humor also helped me navigate through the fiercest of storms and this ulcerative colitis battle was no different. Whenever I felt like punching walls in anger frustration I would think to myself, “Go on, tough guy. You finna kill that wall with your bare fists? Your sick ass prolly can’t punch through wet tissue paper right now!”
Whenever I felt like I was shitting out my entire digestive system from out my ass as those painful waves of cramps attacked during sessions on that porcelain throne I thought, “Oh bloody hell….literally!” or “2018 sure is turning out to be an annus horribillis – remove one of those N’s if you want to get literal!”
During my blood transfusion and then the first colonoscopy it was, “Heh, so this is what this feels like,” and in the case of the latter, “Ok, at least I’ll be a colonoscopy veteran once I am eligible for bowel cancer screenings”.

You’re probably also wondering if there are days where I find myself beaten down with fears that the colitis would return with a vengeance and perhaps evolve into an even greater monster like bowel cancer or toxic megacolon (go ahead and Google that one. It’s as frightening as it sounds). The thought does cross my mind every now and then, I can’t lie, but the belief that this body is strong enough to keep the disease at bay for good far outweighs any fears of relapse. At the worst of times, however, that same mind sometimes takes things to extremely frightening levels;
What if life decides to really fuck with you and slaps you with a cancer diagnosis or Motor Neuron Disease or anything else that threatened your ability to function and, perhaps, your life, forcing you to undergo tremendous, downright fucked-up levels of prolonged suffering before you finally take your last, agonized breath? You ain’t invincible, Buddy, and life can be a fucking jerk.
That fucking brain of mine, I swear to God. I’m fairly certain that I wrote somewhere in a past chapter that while my strength of mind has been a major ally of mine during hard times it does turn on me on other days. Consider this to be one of those moments where I wanted to rip the bastard from out my head and boot it all the way to Antarctica. To answer that twisted question, if I’m being brutally honest I can’t say I know for certain how I’d react to staring down such a grim diagnosis. As Mike Tyson once quoted, ‘Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face’. It’s easy to say that I’d fight back and win like I did before and I do believe that I would but truthfully I don’t think I’d know unless it happened for real and obviously, I hope I never find out.

Just as it seemed as though my head would explode from drowning in all of this shit my inner drill-sergeant sprang into action.
God dammit, why are you doing this to yourself!? Why are you wasting your time with these bullshit thoughts????
Good question. Why the hell was I flagellating myself like this? The weather looked nice outside and here I was sitting indoors working myself into an anxious mess.
Fuck living like Howard Hughes, I’ma head out.
I quickly hopped off the couch and headed out to the backyard and into the mid-morning sun to clear my mind. The morning dew on the grass glistened like tiny shards of glass, the leaves on the various fruit trees and plants that my father and I had planted and cultivated over the years shone a bright fresh green and the sky above could have easily doubled as the wallpaper of a baby’s bedroom, a resplendent blue populated by fluffy white clouds that resembled cotton candy. It had rained rather hard over the past couple of weeks and so the air was crisp and clean, seemingly immune from the fumes of passing cars.

My father, very much looking the part of a farmer with his sombrero, boots, shorts and old work shirt, was kneeling beside some of his shrubs and sorting through trays full of his latest harvest while my mother was inside the house taking a breather from morning chores and watching the news on TV. My father looked up at me with a big grin on his face as I approached him. He stood up and practically shoved the trays into my face.
“Check these out. Know what they are?”
“Erm….”
Geez, Pops, we have so many herbs and plants in this yard that it’s hard to keep track!
He gave me a few seconds to guess the contents of his trays before revealing that they were lettuce, basil, coriander, and parsley.
“Ah ok, cool.”
He then marched triumphantly into the house like a returning war hero as I began to wander around the yard like a chicken on a farm, once again alone with my thoughts but this time the dark clouds of anxiety were replaced by the bright blue skies of positivity. Where I was previously disappointing the ghosts of Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus in addition to other followers of Stoicism by fretting over scenarios in my mind that may never happen I was now basking in the knowledge that I had proven to myself during The Great Colitis Battle of 2018 that I did have some semblance of spirit, fortitude and toughness within me. We all go through trials and tests in life, clichéd as it sounds, and some tests will call on us to dig deeper than ever before. Of course, some have it far worse than others and that is not an excuse to minimize one another’s struggles. Everyone is fighting a battle that others are not privy to therefore we should all strive to be good to one other.

Me myself, I can’t claim to have been a graduate of the School Of Hard Knocks so maybe I needed to go through this journey in order to find out how I would react when I was thrown into the battlefield against a formidable enemy and I remain proud of never surrendering and fighting back to ultimately come out on top. Given the nature of ulcerative colitis, how the cause and cure are currently unknown and that some sufferers do experience relapses and the bleak possibility of a partial or total colectomy, I understood that anxiety may pop up from time to time but I was ultimately responsible for how I chose to live with it and there was no way in hell that I was going to waste my time – no, my life – sweating bullets. Living scared and paranoid would only weaken the body and encourage the beast to reawaken so I might as well keep myself strong physically AND mentally in order to prevent a reincarnation of sorts.
Count your blessings rather than your misfortunes, Kid. Warriors don’t live scared. 
But I couldn’t do it all alone. My family, friends and doctors definitely deserve all the credit and respect in the world for helping me get through it and pulling me out of the hole whenever I stumbled. It was my parents that encouraged me to see Dr. G when I finally came clean about my symptoms and it was Dr. G who introduced me to Dr. B and he more than lived up to the positive reviews that I read about him on Google. Yes, I know that it seems rather stupid on my part to wait until he was finally available to treat me, which took about a month and in the process allowed my symptoms to intensify, but I have no regrets over that. I wouldn’t have trusted anyone else to carry out a rather sensitive procedure on me and to this day, he and Dr. G continue to look out for me and make sure that my health remains at top notch.
Hell, Dr. Q is also familiar with Dr. G so thank God that, somehow, the optometrist sent me to him when he discovered an irregularity in my eye exam.
My sister visited every weekend to catch up with the family and to also make sure that her big bro was recovering just fine and my friends were also on hand to keep me from losing the plot, whether it was by sharing jokes, memes and stories from the world outside my home or just some good old-fashioned pep talk and virtual fist bumps and hugs. I couldn’t have asked for a better family and friends and thank God that I was treated by exceptional medical professionals.

I’m a lucky dude.

As for that other extreme scenario presented to me, all I can say is that I fought back from adversity before and I can do it again. And again. And as many times as I need to until they finally bury me in the dirt or spread my ashes over an ocean somewhere. To hell with being scared.

The morning dew soaked up my slippers as I walked through the wet grass, in turn also soaking my feet but I didn’t mind. I took deep breaths to lap in all of that fresh air as I admired the trees that sprouted from the wet soil and watched birds fly by, chattering as though they were discussing the daily lives of the strange humans in the big, fancy caves on the ground below.

It’s amazing, some of the memories that stay with you throughout your life. I’m not talking about those that had a profound impact and shaped your life as you know it. Rather, I am referring to the innocuous ones that may suddenly pop up into one’s mind many years later, leaving them wondering if it really happened or if it was just a dream. One such memory that I have is of an old cartoon that I watched on TV as a child. I never knew the title as I had stumbled upon it by chance while flicking channels one morning during the school holidays and my recollection of some of the scenes are rather hazy, but the way that it all unfolded is still clear in my mind.

The story begins with a beast of some sort passing by a complete stranger’s home during a morning stroll. I can’t quite recall if it was an anthropomorphic hippo, rhino, gorilla, bear or just some random monster conjured up by the artist, but he definitely wasn’t human. Having quickly surmised that no one is home he takes a quick peek inside through a window and spots an unguarded cake on the kitchen table, immediately triggering hunger pangs. He casually enters through the front door and devours the cake, enjoying every mouthful of it and if I remember correctly he then takes a page out of Goldilocks’ playbook and dozes off in the bedroom, having achieved food coma after scoffing that entire cake on his own.

Meanwhile the owner of the home, a creature similar to the intruder, returns to his humble abode following his own morning walk. He walks through the front door that he had failed to lock before leaving and was predictably furious upon discovering that a stranger had broken into his home and eaten his precious cake before sleeping on his bed. He immediately sets out to find the culprit, huffing and puffing with rage all the way.

Oooohhhh I’ma put hands on that fool!

Yeah well, serves you right for not locking up your house in the first place, buddy.

The hungry thief had conveniently left a trail of footprints in his wake as he fled into the surrounding forest and the homeowner follows the trail with vengeance on his mind and that brings us to the part that made me laugh as a child and is forever burned in my memory; The homeowner initially follows the trail on foot but sometime along the way, the footprints eventually became a trail of hand prints and the homeowner actually does a handstand and continues to follow the trail while walking on his hands! It then transitions into a combination of hand and footprints and so he drops down on all fours and bear-crawls the next few steps before the trail changes into single footprints that he hops along to as though he is playing hopscotch in the playground. The homeowner continues to follow this trail, his movements dictated by the prints before him, unaware that the thief is watching him from behind some bushes, laughing at the wild goose chase that he had set his patsy on while making him look ridiculous in the process. Talk about getting away with murder and then some.

And that was that. Following that short cartoon I switched off the TV and set off to play computer games. I never would have thought then, as a ten year old, that I’d still remember the best bits of some random cartoon that I ran into by chance many years later as a grown adult. The mind is quite an amazing thing, isn’t it? One thing’s for sure, that cartoon drilled home into my young mind the importance of keeping one’s home safe and secure. You just never know if or when some thief who is adept at walking on their hands and feet might be itching to steal something of yours.

Afternoon shift’s over, tired as hell and waiting for the train,
No more peak hour, gone are the wild crowds, spared me from needless pain,
Checked the time, it’s six-thirty in the early evening,
On a winter night too, zipped up the coat it’s so fucking freezing,
Paced up and down that platform, train’s coming in ten,
Commuters sat on benches reading, texting or just feeling zen,
Some standing and leaning on posts yawning, that shit’s contagious,
Had me following suit like a hippo chillin’ in the rivers,
Everyone dressed for the cold, wrapped up like urban eskimos,
All but one big fella sitting by his lonesome,
Dressed in singlet and shorts oblivious to the cold and in the mood for mayhem,
Looked like a seasoned guest of prisons, maybe solitary confinement,
Was more Carl Panzram than Mr. Rogers, abused all that wandered close,
The body was built for war, dude was looking swole,
Bulging pecs and biceps, legs and calves were poppin’
Big ol’ keg in the middle, dude must love a drink or ten,
Unnerved the station staff with those bloodshot eyes,
That stink-eye ‘bout to be tested, the cops had just arrived.

They happened to be at the station, staff probably been snitchin’,
Eyed him with a sense of familiarity, that rap sheet must be longer than the Yangtze,
Made their way to the hulking monolith, 120 kilos and not afraid to use it,
Onlookers held their collective breath, that beast is fixin’ for a killin,’
Smart move to come in a small group, gonna take multiple dudes to tackle this deranged fool,
His eyes met theirs before the questioning started,
What he’d been doing? Is he impaired? Why’s he raging and belligerent?
The answers are short, sharp and slurred, dude’s on the verge,
Slowly he stands, cops now seem unnerved,
Questions come in all directions, this guy’s ‘bout to lose it,
Answers fired maliciously, laced with profanities, his eyes bulging out their sockets,
Agitation reaches fever pitch, the monster starts swinging,
The pepper spray was more decisive, he couldn’t finish what he’d started,
It’s St Elmos fire on this guy’s eyes, plans for destruction just went belly-up,
Still took three men to keep him down long enough to cuff him up,
Back to the slammer for the big fella, so much for tastin’ freedom,
Train arrived not long after, took my seat as it pulled from the station.

Another visit to the doc, find out the results of those tests,
Hopeful of a further reduction to these meds,
Shining brightly now, that proverbial light, I can see it in the distance,
Gotta choreograph that victory dance, plan the celebrations,
Second-to-last chapter, inspired by that Ice-Cube banger,
Sincere thanks to fam, friends and those three angels, this was a team effort.  

23/1/2019

It didn’t take long to rouse the drowsiness from my eyes on the morning of the twenty-third of January. On an average day I would drag my half-asleep self into the bathroom to splash cold water on my face over the sink in order to wash away that zombified state but on this day, I was as alert as a guard dog as soon as the alarm went off, practically jumping out of my bed like a professional athlete that had been ordered by his coach to get up at the break of dawn and run several miles.

Can’t snooze now, Buddy, you’ve got another meeting with the doc. Get up off your ass!

Well, I didn’t hit the road like Forrest Gump but following the de-zombification process I returned to my room to do some mobility drills and also stretched out my body, still smarting from the previous day’s workout and teaching session at the Wing Chun Academy. It was one of those days where my creaky body once again saw it fit to remind me of my advancing age and I winced during a few movements, feeling the sting of muscle tightness in my legs, back and sides. This ageing vehicle had certainly accumulated plenty of miles and no longer shook off the effects of a hard training session as easily as it did ten years ago (five years ago, too, for that matter).
But I was far from ready for the scrapheap. My back, knees and shoulders would gripe every now and then but I remained strong, fit and free of any chronic ailments that hindered my mobility and balance. I’d like to think that once I am retired and living out my twilight years I’ll be like Jack Lalanne, still capable of performing crazy fitness feats and outclassing younger lions in athletic endeavors at an age where most people would be content to sit in their recliners all day. As tempting as a life of rest and leisure sounded, I preferred to still be able to throw down.

Ok, we’re going off-topic here. Time to regroup.

Following that stretching and mobility session I headed to the kitchen for a breakfast of banana, porridge and boiled egg and washed it down with a ‘glass of ambition’ as Dolly Parton described it in that Nine-to-five song, though I am not a coffee drinker so for me it was a glass of warm water and a vitamin D tablet. Boring, I know, but it did the trick. I rested up afterwards, allowing my meal to digest adequately before heading to the showers to get dressed, head-banging to the song by Ice Cube that inspired this post as it rang on high rotation in my head. I took that as a sign of impending good news. 
Oh yes, today IS going to be a good day!
I carried that confidence with me as my father and I drove to Dr. B’s clinic, for once not feeling the nerves within swirling in my stomach as though I was a human blender. I felt like a kid on Christmas Day waiting to open his gifts as we took our seats in the waiting room.
Today IS going to be a good day!
Rinse and repeat. It was probably the first time in a long time that I was visiting the doctor without feeling queasy.

Upon arrival, it hardly mattered that the lights in the waiting room were kept at a relatively low dim, a stark contrast to my mind where it was all sunshine and good vibes. There appeared to be five new pictures added to the small collage of children’s drawings that were tacked to the wall in the back of the room, just above the play area in one of the corners. If I recall correctly there were also two elderly couples in the waiting room with us and they stared at my father and I during most of our time together, trying to figure out who was the patient and the support system. I’ll bet they would have been just as stunned as the others that I’d crossed paths with throughout this saga if they knew that it was the young bull, not the old bull, who was the patient. If there’s something I learned during this journey it’s that younger folks are not immune from sucky illnesses and health conditions that required them to undergo a totally invasive and embarrassing medical procedure. Colonoscopies were not just for older folks with an increased susceptibility to bowel cancer.

At least I’ll know exactly what to expect once I am ordered to undergo bowel cancer checks every few years when I’m older.

Dr. B called us into his office following a twenty-minute wait, the result of my father and I arriving rather early and Dr. B’s previous patient taking their time during their meeting. Upon entering the office a younger doctor, fresh-faced and probably aged in his early-to-mid-twenties, was standing beside Dr. B’s desk waiting for our arrival. He was Dr. B’s understudy, his protégé if you will, and I have to admit that I felt a sense of relief when I shook his hand. It was great to know that Dr. B, the genius that had restored me back to good health, was passing his gifts and wisdom down to the next generation, so to speak.
Both men were dressed in business attire that day, suggesting that neither had to rise earlier than the sun to oversee a colonoscopy prior to our meeting.
The young would-be doctor sat on a chair beside Dr. B’s sprawling desk that was still stacked with cards regarding different bowel disorders and surrounded a model of the digestive system, not far from where family photos and one of those ‘World’s Best Dad’ mugs were placed, while my father once again took a seat on one of the chairs lined up on the side of the room, facing the massive window that looked over an impressive view of the rooftops and green fields in the nearby suburbs. There was a cool breeze outside set against the backdrop of the sun’s full bloom, which I took as a good omen. Dr. B sat down on his desk and after exchanging pleasantries with us uploaded some files on his computer before turning towards me, eyeing me with a smile on his face. His understudy might as well have started a drum roll at that moment.

“I am pleased to say that you are now in clinical remission,” he announced rather triumphantly.

Man, if he had said anything else following those words I didn’t hear it. I immediately froze, wide-eyed and paralyzed with shock and awe, betraying the euphoria and excitement that immediately washed over me like a sandstorm rolling over a barren desert.
I think this is what being ‘gobsmacked’ feels like. Or maybe a delayed reaction.
Nope, no delayed reaction. I sat still in a trance for a rather long time, like someone that had won a million dollars but couldn’t quite wrap their head around the fact. It was a completely different story inside my mind where the music was turned up at full blast and all guests at the party were dancing and celebrating at levels that would have put Brazilian Carnival to shame but I didn’t let those emotions explode out of me like fireworks on New Years’ Eve. I didn’t want Dr. B’s understudy to think that one of his mentor’s clients was a total lunatic and Dr. B himself probably would have been left wondering what kind of monster he’d just created. Still, it felt like those moments during the conclusion of a boxing match, where the referee calls the two combatants to the center of the ring shortly before the fight’s outcome is announced and the challenger hears the words, “the winner…..and NEW……” you never hear anything else that escapes the announcer’s lips as he is immediately drowned by the sound of cheering and jubilation as the winning fighter and their supporters celebrate wildly.
Meanwhile, you would have needed a chisel to remove the wide grin that took over my father’s entire face. He was just as pleased as I was.

Dr. B gave me a moment to take in the good news before continuing on. He wasn’t done spreading good cheer just yet.
“I think we can now reduce your Mezavant dosage by one,” he added.
That meant three Imuran Tablets and three Mezavant tablets. It was not exactly an astronomical reduction but it was still one pill less and another step towards a normal life that didn’t involve having to take medication in order to shit like a normal human being. This date instantly became a very early candidate for the ‘best day of 2019’ and I was glad that Dr. B’s understudy had a ringside seat to it all so he can see first-hand just how good his mentor really is.
You’re in good hands, Kid. Your teacher pulled a broken-down man from the depths of severe pancolitis and restored him back to normal. He’s the fuckin’ Don!
That’s Don with a capital D.
Dr. B then turned his computer screen towards me and on it were the results of my recent blood and stool tests. Little did I know that the celebrations were about to be temporarily halted to make way for a final serving of shock and horror. Dr. B annotated on the screen the relevant areas of the test results and revealed that my haemoglobin levels were still at healthy levels.

So far so good!

Hold on tight, Cowboy. There’s more.

Dr. B turned his attention towards my faecal calprotectin levels, which measured the amount of calprotectin in my stools. Elevated levels would have been consistent with the migration of neutrophils to the intestinal mucosa, indicating an inflammation of the bowels. Well, the results of the previous week’s stool test indicated that mine was at a level twelve, a healthy result, but according to Dr. B my past tests had indicated that it had been in the thousands when my health was at its worst. That’s right, THOUSANDS! Four zeroes territory.
Holy shit……!
My jaw almost hit the floor while my father gasped in disbelief. That was pretty fucking elevated!
That little revelation sure did put the trials and tribulations from the previous year into perspective and a part of me wondered why Dr. B had kept that rather startling statistic under wraps until now. Was it to surprise me with how far I’d come? Or did he choose to withhold it from me until I had recovered sufficiently so as not to burden me with more disturbing news as I was already overwhelmed by my initial diagnosis? Either way, I felt proud to have left all of it behind in less than a year.

Dr. B got back on track with the good news. “Your rate of recovery from this has been quite impressive,” he added, “clearly your fitness and strength have served you well. You didn’t feel any side effects from the medication?”
“No,” I replied proudly and it was the honest truth. Not once did any of the ugly side-effects that Dr. B warned me about rear their ugly heads.
“Well I’m glad to hear that,” he said with a smile, “you really are a tough guy.”
He then eyed me up and down and grinned.
“You’re working out again, right?”
“Yeah, I am.”
The shirt that I wore for that appointment was rather tight-fitting and hugged all the right places, particularly my chest and shoulders. I was in far better shape than I had been when he first laid eyes on me, back when I was skeletal and anemic.
“Well keep it up,” he mused, “it’s nice to see that you’re in much better shape now.”

Music to my ears. Thanks, Doc!

“I think we’ll be able to gradually cease treatment within the next couple of years.”

If the confirmation of the remission was akin to winning the lottery then this was winning the lottery plus the Nobel Peace Prize to boot, not that I thought I was ever going to win either one any time soon. If this was a game of Mario Kart that annoying Lakitu dude would have pulled up on my screen and held a sign on my face that read ‘Final Lap’, the light at the end of the long tunnel was finally manifesting itself in the distance.
“We’re glad to hear that, Doc,” my father added, “so it’s down to three of both?”
“That’s right,” he answered, “whatever it is that he is doing, just keep doing it.”
“I’m just eating healthily, staying active and trying not to stress too much,” I said.
“And he’s taking his medication religiously,” echoed my father.
Dr. B chuckled. “Yeah, just do more of that.”
“Ok.”

We booked a follow-up appointment for July, later changed to June due to conflicting schedules, before my father and I drove off in very high spirits. I texted my mother and sister my results and they were just as stoked, it was definitely a good time for me and the family.
‘I am pleased to say that you are now in clinical remission’.
Man, those words stayed with me for the rest of the day and a week later, an envelope arrived in the mail from Dr. B that contained a copy of the letter that he had delivered to Dr. G confirming the remission. I’d like to think that Dr. G jumped up and down and did a happy dance in her office upon reading that as she, too, played a major role in my recovery and deserved credit. She and Dr. B made one hell of a team and with additional help from Dr. R and that iron infusion, helped me conquer that disease. The favorable results were the perfect early birthday gift and definitely worth the early wake-up.
In addition to Dr. B’s positive news that song by Ice Cube continued to reverberate in my mind for the rest of the day, and I was more than happy to keep it playing on repeat.

I gotta say it was a good day.

Visited the Great Barrier Reef not too long ago,
Thought I’d try out snorkeling, feeling confident but haven’t done it before,
Been swimming like a shark since I was an itty bitty kid,
Slapped on a mask, snorkel and flippers, never mind that I looked ridiculous,
The ocean looked inviting, a safe blue haven from the broiling sun,
Donned my flippers before joining the others, ready for some fun,
It was anything but, got more than I’d bargained for,
Looked less like a duck to water, more like an amateur fighting Floyd Mayweather,
Swimming with flippers was a first, swallowed so much water I thought I’d burst,
Fucking saltwater went down like acid, burned the esophagus and spewed outta my nostrils,
‘Don’t open your mouth so wide!’ I implored myself,
Brain’s pleas go unheard, body just ain’t feeling it,
Gagging hard on that snorkel, wondering what the hell I’d gotten myself in,
And now my stomach’s rumblin’, it’s a lot of water I’m swallowin’,
Hope it’s no colitis flare-up, can’t run to the shitter wearing flippers,
Abandoned my swimming technique as I retreated to the bleachers,
Contemplated packing it in, couldn’t stand being humiliated,
Tried and failed, maybe I could live with it.

But the mind had other ideas, remembered the lyrics to an old song,
‘In the warrior’s code there’s no surrender, though his body stops, his spirit cries NEVER!’
You a grown-ass man, quitting ain’t a good look,
You’ll catch shade for that shit, regrets will leave you shook,
Thought about what it took to get here, had to pay to rent this equipment,
Plus the $70 price tag on that rental water-proof camera, lots o’ money to be wasting,
I done come this far, backing out now would be cowardice,
Slapped on the goggles, readjusted that snorkel, this mountain must be conquered,
Dived back out there, stayed close to the edges, practicing my breathing,
‘Calm down’, whispered I to this beating heart, ‘you’ll get through this thing,’
‘Small steps, Baby, no need to be rushing,’
Took off like Michael Phelps, camera in hand, had those flippers churning,
Finally found my rhythm, now I can start filming,
Waterproof camera in hand, admired the coral reef,
Flippers and fingers working overtime as I danced with all the fish,
Felt so wild and free, stayed away from other swimmers,
Sure was a welcome relief from the boiling-hot weather,
Embraced this newfound skill, could’ve swam around forever,
But time flies, soon it was time to leave, sailed back for shore after handing back the gear,
A chisel couldn’t wipe that smile, felt proud as can be,
On the verge of quitting but soldiered on, in my mind it was greatness achieved,
Didn’t matter in the grand scheme, this wasn’t no Alexander The Great shit,
Just another holiday memory, but still confirmation of my fighting spirit,
It was a lesson in perseverance, one that I was proud to take part in,
Passed it with flying colors, it was a day and money well spent.

The sun’s retired for the evening, put an end to heat and perspiration,
In the midst of all the smoke another year drawing to a close,
Another decade, too, color me mind-blown,
Standing outside, lapping up the cool breeze like an explorer awaiting daylight,
Deep in thought underneath the moonlight,
Seemed like only yesterday that it was January,
The past ten years still fresh as a daisy in this treasure trove of memories,
Time moves at warp speed, faster than Justin Gatlin when he was juicing,
If life’s a speeding car then Schumacher’s the one driving,
Took a seat under the verandah, like Marcus Aurelius I’m meditating,
On what’s changed and what’s remained constant since twenty-eleven,
Began aged mid-twenties, leaving it on the cusp of mid-thirties,
Metamorphosed from angst-ridden insecurities to wisdom and maturity,
Heavy duty thoughts swirlin’, thank goodness for these soothing beats,
Got Shiki No Uta pumpin’ as the reflection goes deep,
The clock ticks on, got me musing on the concept of time,
Can’t reclaim it when it’s gone, there’s no reset or rewind,
Finally opened the gates to this citadel, they’ve been closed for a good while,
Welcomed some new peeps into this life, others were sadly left behind,
Ain’t nobody’s fault, everyone got their own road, not all will stay for the long haul,
Can’t place expectations on anything or anyone, enjoy ‘em as long as they’re around,
Can’t cry over what’s been had and lost, life only moves forward,
Change is inevitable, some less comfortable than others,
This ten-year gauntlet brought about a variety of experiences,
Took up wing chun, mind and body scrambled at first,
Eight years on I’m still lovin’ it, while forming special bonds with fellow teachers and students,
Saw parts of the world, from the US to Japan and NZ, also reacquainted with my homeland,
Re-learned my mother language, perfection can wait but continuing to make improvements,
Even the working out’s changed, I ain’t immune to the ravages of time,
This vessel carries the scars from countless voyages in the high tide,
Gotta tone down the bluster and flash, that’s a young man’s game,
All about maintenance and strength, keep the body tight well into old age,
A long-time gig in Penrith came to a halt, ten years was long enough,
Had to leave the shores of familiarity, I guess, can’t grow without a little adversity,
Can’t forget the horrors of twenty-eighteen, mind, body and soul were tested,
First-time experiences of the hospital kind, guess I couldn’t duck and dodge ‘em,
Can’t say that I enjoyed it, but I can smile at the memory,
Proved that I had it in me, to go to war and come out with the victory,
Won’t always be a smooth ride, mishaps are part of the journey,
Some of my own making, we humans are extremely flawed beings,
Can knock you down or be your best teacher, gotta treat it like the latter,
The great ones always learned from mistakes and failures,
Time remains undefeated, can’t out-swim a white pointer,
Gotta ask myself what I want ‘fore facing off with the reaper,
‘What will be your legacy? Hate it or love it that shit matters,’
‘You can be defiant but can’t live life as an island,’
‘Someone’s bound to remember you as long as you’d existed,’
‘Find your purpose and pursue it, fuck the haters and doubters,
‘Forget about opinions, everybody’s got ‘em,
It’s your life, Bruh, chase the dream as long as you ain’t violatin’ or killin’,
Small steps every day, no matter how long it takes,
Walk alone if need be, if it matters you’ll always find a way,
This inner voice reverberates, the moon’s bloomin’ unabated,
Tomorrow’s a new day, year and decade, a hat trick of clean slates,
Drawing up a list of goals for the following year,
Make the most of it, got nothing to lose or fear,
No temporary fix, gotta contribute to the future and test the character,
Something to take along the journey ‘til the casket’s six-feet under,
Headed back indoors, the wind’s getting chilly,
Not long now before we ring in 2020,
Bring on the new chapter, time to spread these wings,
Fly high, Soldier, a new dawn begins!

New Year’s up and runnin’, sun turned this land into a furnace,
The heat continue slayin’, under the shade still feel like I’m fryin’,
Another meeting with the doc looms large, pleased to have come this far,  Another milestone could be ‘round the corner,
Hoping to be off these meds sooner rather than later.

Warning: This post contains some shitty references and stronger-than-usual coarse language

16/1/2019

The Christmas ornaments were eventually boxed up and stored once more and the New Year festivities drew to a close. Much of the early days of the year were spent sweating like a pig, painting the ceilings of the living room and kitchen and celebrating my father’s birthday – in that order although the sweating was a never-ending cycle rather than an isolated activity. January was the peak of the Australian summer and boy, did it deliver. Painting the ceiling in that heat and humidity was a trip, I found myself having to constantly wipe my forehead and eyes in between coating the ceiling with fresh paint. I also took quick breaks once in a while to allow my neck to relax as staring upwards for long periods of time could lead to some rather gnarly head and neck pain and I can only imagine how Michaelangelo must’ve felt while painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

The project took up almost the entire day, beginning with collecting the paint and necessary equipment from the tool shed in the backyard, moving the furniture around, laying down the drop sheets, mixing the paint, carrying out the project and then finally re-arranging and packing everything away hours later. Strategically laying down those drop sheets in order to spare the wooden floor below from any drops of paint in addition to moving and covering furniture was probably the most excruciating aspect of the task at hand. Every inch of that dark brown wooden floor had to be protected from any drop of that white ceiling paint as my mother would have blown a gasket if any drops made contact with that wood.
But in the end, the sweat and sore neck, shoulders and back were worth it as the ceiling shone a nice, bright white as though brand new once more. It was a day well spent.
Aside from sweating like a child nervously waiting to confess their sins to their parents and giving the ceiling a much-needed make-over, the family and I also celebrated my father’s birthday. A naturally laid-back man, he was content to spend the day with the family for a rather hearty pizza party at my sister’s apartment rather than go buck wild and paint the city red, not that he was ever the party like a rock star type in his youth. Mind you, Dominos and Pizza Hut didn’t get a cent from us as my awesome and amazing sister made two different pizzas from scratch and we as a family damn near ate ourselves into food coma for the next few hours. We spent the entire afternoon in one space but it was time well spent.

It was back to business a week later, though.

Once the sixteenth of January rolled around it was back to the matter of my health and ongoing recovery from Ulcerative Colitis. I had a meeting with Dr. B scheduled for the following week and he had requested that I submit a stool sample and undergo another blood test one week prior in order to get a better idea of the state of my health and bowel functions. The significance of this meeting could not be understated – positive results could see a further reduction in my Imuran and Mezavant dosages and my birthday was also during the following week so I was looking forward to an early birthday gift from one of the good doctors that had played a major role in helping me conquer this damn disease.
But first, I had some shit to attend to, literally, as well as another pesky needle in the arm to endure.
And so on the morning of the sixteenth, following another trip to that porcelain throne, I donned on a disposable glove, took a deep breath and…….yeah, I’ll spare you the details. Let’s just say that I went mining for gold and came away with a decent-sized nugget that I placed in the small container provided to me by the pathology clinic located close to home.

For the record there was no blood or abnormalities so eureka for me! Not that I ran down the streets naked to announce the good news like Archimedes did.

My father and I drove to the pathology clinic that was located inside a small shopping center not far from home at around mid-morning. I submitted the container that held the stool sample to one of the receptionists, who in turn took it to the appropriate lab, and my father and I then took our seats in the waiting area, accompanied by a decent number of patients who were intermittently watching the morning news on a television screen behind the front desk. The sweet smell of coffee and donuts wafted through the automatic doors whenever a patient walked in or out due to a small Donut King stand situated not far from the clinic.
I was called in by a nurse after a fifteen minute wait and took a big drink of water before following her into one of the clinics, a rather tight space that, once the doors were closed, would have made a claustrophobic feel uneasy. I took a seat and answered a few questions regarding my contact, address and medical details before the nurse asked me to present my left arm, on which she strapped a tight clamp to raise a vein on the crook of my left elbow. She disappeared into another room for a while before returning with the needle plus a few tubes to place blood samples in.

Oh boy, here we go…….

I braced myself and gritted my teeth as she drove that needle through my arm and drew a few tubes’ worth of blood before placing a band aid over the wound. The nurse neatly packed the tubes away before giving me the green light to leave.
“No strenuous activity for at least two hours,” she instructed, “especially with that left arm.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I nodded, “all good.”
“Have a lovely day.”
“You too. Thanks.”
And that was that. Another jab done, another load of crap submitted. Recovery and monitoring life is fun, ain’t it?

I’d also kept up the blogging throughout this time, still recounting the trials and tribulations of 2018 in addition to churning out stories and poems based on random anecdotes from my childhood and past experiences and some that I conjured up from my imagination. I have a rather good memory when it comes to occurrences in my lifetime and while I can’t say that I lived a life that rivaled that of Forrest Gump’s there were more than a few interesting stories in that enormous storehouse to tell. I had a rather good momentum going, writing whenever I could spare at least half an hour in a day and posting at least one entry per week and giving readers a glimpse of what I can do with words although recalling some of the more brutal months of the year 2018 still made me shudder with discomfort and shame. I didn’t mince any words and kept it raw and honest as I wanted my posts unfiltered and to come straight from the heart.  

One day as I was writing, something within me began to stir. No, it wasn’t a need to rush to the can, rather, it was old, familiar feelings that I hadn’t been acquainted with for more than ten years. You see, I had set my sights on becoming a writer of some degree sometime towards the end of high school, mainly because English and writing were my strongest suits in school and I’d always been told that I was a rather good storyteller, plus I enjoyed putting pen to paper or fingers to keyboard and allowing my imagination to run wild like streakers on the football pitch prior to being apprehended by the long-suffering security team. I’d written several poems when I was younger for fun, but also as a means to combat anxiety, depression and other ill-feelings, and along the way I also decided to write some stories that I contemplated turning into books one day but none of these projects took off as I was crippled by both fear and a slacker’s lack of drive and no one was willing to slap me across the head and tell me to quit fucking around and focus. I was also my own harshest critic and would pack it in whenever I found myself trapped in that desolate place known as ‘Writer’s Block’ and would give up far too easily if a particular story seemed to be heading nowhere rather than gut it out and make adjustments. I was a different beast back then, an insecure little wuss with a chip on his shoulder, a stark contrast to the determined fighter that stared colitis in the face, flipped the bird at it then kicked its ass and was once also voted by the Wing Chun Academy as its Instructor Of The Year.
Anyway, as I typed out the colitis stories a voice in my mind wondered if maybe I could rekindle the whole ‘I wanna be a writer’ thing and turn this tale into a book.

Holy crap, did you just go there!?

I had to laugh. Even this older, wiser version of myself dismissed the idea as a pipedream. Me? A published author? Yeah, good one, dude!
But what if you succeed?
Well, there was food for thought. I wouldn’t know unless I tried, right? A cacophony slogans and clichés instantly ran rings around my mind.
Give it a try; go hard or go home; be brave and be strong; live with no regrets; it’s now or never; go out in a blaze of glory…….’
Yadda yadda yadda and all that jazz.
And let’s not forget the ol’ Bruce Lee quote, ‘Don’t fear failure. Not failure, but low aim, is the crime. In great attempts it is glorious even to fail.’

The more I thought about it the more it seemed to light a fire in my belly. Shit, right then and there I felt that I could run up and down Kilimanjaro without a break before circumnavigating the globe on a paddle board! But every yin has a yang and voices of doubt suddenly began to speak up, going toe to toe with that inner drill sergeant that had pushed me to fight on during times of strife. Anxiety kicked into overdrive and I felt as though I had regressed back to being that fucking kid again, the one who was bullied almost every day of his life in school and made to believe that he was a nobody.

Go ahead and try, Chump. They’ll all laugh and boo at you and you’ll crawl into a cave and suffer until the day you die. No one will look for you or miss you, and it’ll be archaeologists, not your loved ones, who will eventually discover your rotted corpse, still sitting balled up in a corner with his face in his hands like the motherfucking loser that you were.

Brutal, ain’t it. The mind can be our own worst enemies sometimes but it can also be our greatest strength. Amongst those voices of doubt, my inner drill sergeant was fighting his way through to gain my attention and once he got it, he immediately and aggressively slammed in his two cents like the would-be victor of a dice game throwing out their winning hand.

Where your balls at, Fool!? Didn’t you learn anything from your past? You kicked severe pancolitis in the ass in the space of a few months, the Wing Chun Academy voted you Instructor Of The Year a couple’a years ago and you’ve lived to tell the tale of every shitty day that you’ve had since you was a little kid, even the darkest ones that should have broken you, so why you still selling yourself short!? Don’t you fucking tell me that you’re scared shitless of daring to pursue your dream! You’ll kick yourself for the rest of your life if you don’t try and you’ll be letting those jerks that picked on you a long time ago win. You bitch-made motherfucker, listen to that Nike slogan and JUST DO IT!!!!

Domino, motherfuckers! Man, if that drill sergeant was a living, breathing person I’d imagine that he’d look and sound exactly like B.A. Baracus from The A-Team. I wasn’t about to disrespect a direct order like that and as I wrote and posted one blog after another I began to listen more to that drill sergeant’s profanity-laden pep talk. Turning my story into a book did seem like a rather wild idea for now but it wasn’t totally impossible. I didn’t even care if it garnered bad reviews, if it didn’t become a top 10 best-seller or if readers decided to mock me for my symptoms rather than learn something while being entertained. I’d been called plenty of nasty names and was on the wrong end of many insults and taunts in my youth so no amount of shit-talking and harsh feedback really fazes me anymore. I just wanted to get my work out there and fulfill that goal. It didn’t matter when and how long it took, I just wanted it done before they bury my ass in the dirt or scatter my ashes. I had all the motivation in the world to do it – I felt as though not enough people knew about this disease and there is presently no real cure for it, maybe I could make a difference by telling my story. Thinking about it conjured up that ol’ quote from Tupac Shakur;

“I’m not saying that I will change the world, but I guarantee that I will spark the brain that will change the world.”

No, I’m not suggesting that anything I write will alter the course of human history but maybe retelling my battle in raw, no-holds-barred form could spark the minds that will set about putting this disease to justice once and for all and save many bowels and anxiety-riddled minds everywhere. At the very least, it was worth a shot.

Driving down the highway, all by his lonesome,
Silver steed shootin’ straight like a laser beam, no explosion,
Admiring the ever-changing scenery, mountains, fields and trees,
Tempted to pull over and capture it, this shit’s Instagram-worthy,
Got Without Me soaring from the radio,
Not the Eminem song but the one by Mac Demarco,
The serenity washes over, got him thinkin’ ‘bout her,
How life’s been treatin’ her, been two years since he’d seen her,
Funny how life works, ain’t no guarantees,
Can’t take nothing for granted, regret’s one vindictive seed,
People included, even the tightest bonds aren’t immune,
Best friends become strangers, ‘together forever’ seems like empty platitudes,
Some folks gotta learn the hard way, been an interesting few years,
How’d it come to this? They were thick as thieves.

‘Twas at a crossing on the way to the train station, complete strangers that got to talking,
Two lone wolves headed down the same way, it was a welcome change, alleviated the work-induced headaches,
Parted ways through different trains, that was the end of that,
Fate thought otherwise, built up something ‘fore knocking it down flat,
Reunited not long after, they might as well had been stalking,
Same way, same place, didn’t see this Groundhog Day thing coming,
Decided to hang for a while, long days can work up an appetite,
Shared a meal, nothing special, just two friends grabbin’ a bite,
Must’ve looked like something more, had onlookers clutching at straws,
Opposite genders can hang platonically, sorry for the spoiler, y’all,
Called it a night after an hour and a half, walked to the station once more,
And just like that, a new friendship was born.

That’s the way it went, nothing more nothing less,
Don’t get y’all’s hopes up, they ain’t anything but friends,
So it seemed before things started to feel differently,
Might as well had heard that little jingle from Love Actually
So much for keeping it platonic, this couldn’t be happening,
It’s the end of the friendship if it ain’t reciprocated,
Sure looked that way, she wasn’t having none,
Good luck scaling that wall, must’ve been funded by Trump,
And so it went, two years riding that fucking carousel,
Round and round it goes, got him feeling sorry for himself,
Donned the mask daily, hiding his true feelings daily,
She ain’t playin’, in the Friendzone he will stay,
That cold and brutal, barren place,
Fake-smiling and feigning neutrality, ‘twas an incel’s nightmare come to life,
Cursing fate for its cruelty, didn’t ask for all this pain and strife.

Two years spent playing a role to which he was resigned,
Beginning each day thinking of her with a sigh,
Eyeing a promotion that will never happen, it’s lonely when feelings remain unrequited,
Life ain’t easy in the Zone but there was a welcome reprieve,
Work and life got them separated, allowing a recharge however brief,
Chopped it up, still, whenever possible,
Difficult proposition with the different time zones,
He finally got over her, that was a relief,
The burden’s lifted, it was the sweetest kind of freedom.

But it couldn’t last, wasn’t long before they were reunited,
Picked up where they left off, forbidden feelings rekindled,
Once again on that sick cycle carousel, Jason Wade sang about this shit,
Crushing on her once more, she remains painfully indifferent,
Sick of living a lie, of feeling torn up inside,
Gotta come clean, though it could blow the friendship to smithereens,
Couldn’t see her in person so planned the next best thing,
Gonna do it by phone, soldiering on reluctantly,
Called her that night, D-day began with chatter and laughter,
‘Twas like old times, past two years had been like no other,
Time to get serious now, will the union come undone?
Got kinda emotional, no lie, now it’s out in the open,
Told her the truth, no bullshit, just like peeling off a band-aid,
She remained composed, thankfully handled it with grace,
She didn’t reciprocate, but promised that they’d stay friends,
It was too good to be true, it was the beginning of the end.

Continued to talk periodically, hangouts ended effective immediately,
Takes two to keep the ship afloat but one half’s bailin’ on the lifeboat,
Maybe she’d moved on, had she found someone else?
‘Fine by me,’ says he, wished her nothing but happiness,
Can’t keep what ain’t truly yours, might as well let her go,
Hurts like fuck but time heals open sores,
Slowly drifting apart now, sailing off to different straits,
No parting words or tearful goodbyes, maybe this was fate.

Back on the freeway, headlights on as the sun starts fading,
Two years now since they’d drifted, five since the first meeting,
Will they cross paths again? Maybe if pigs start flying,
You’d played your roles well but that chapter’s done and dusted,
Smile at the memories, look back with fondness and nostalgia,
But don’t flog a dead horse forever, living backwards can’t be good for ya,
Drive on, young man, the future’s still bright,
You’re still breathing, still living, still driving, you’re still very much alive.