Three months ago, after undergoing an endoscopy, a CT scan, and then a PET-CT, I was told that I was suffering from advanced, metastatic, stage 4-B esophageal cancer. Though my oncologists avoided making predictions, statistics indicated that my chances of surviving for another 1-2 years were grim, making, say, surviving 5 years little more than a wish-fulfillment fantasy. Since, apart from frequent bouts of heartburn, I was symptom free but also because of my life-long bouts of moroseness, I took this shocking news better than might be expected while at the same time making plans for my imminent demise. These included creating a website so that my works and days might be preserved for future reference by interested others; doing estate planning with my wife and making an appointment with our lawyer to revise our will; and even providing my wife with a list of internet passwords and automatically renewed subscriptions so that she could react and respond quickly to messages and payment requests sent to my posthumous self.

As is commonplace for me, I soon managed to transform the fears of my imminent demise into consistent day-to-day habits. Monday morning chemo at the local cancer center where I would spend roughly four hours receiving intravenous infusions of anti-nausea meds, steroids, immuno- and chemotherapy; carrying the 48-hour plastic bag of chemo around with me in a fanny pack or embracing it in my sleep so it wouldn’t slip away; returning to the cancer center on Wednesdays to get unplugged; and then bracing for the 3-5 days of after-effects, which, for me, mainly involved immersion in a foggy, fatiguing chemical cloud, with small bouts of nausea relieved by sucking on a growing supply of THC lozenges (easily the best part of this particular trip.) Off weeks were startling in their utter normality, as if the chemo weeks were nightmares from which I had fully awakened. A constant throughout was exercising as much as possible and receiving constant demonstrations of love and support from family and friends.

The result? Increasing peripheral neuropathy but no loss of hair or weight. Indeed, I steadily regained weight I had initially lost, possibly because my infusions of THC made me hungrier than usual. Though the aftereffects of chemo became more pronounced after my fifth and sixth sessions, I never lost my appetite, and in those wonderful off weeks spent as much time as possible outdoors, even venturing down to the Florida Keys for a week of swimming and relaxation with my wife, who seemed more burdened by my condition than I was.

The standard practice for a 6-month chemo regimen is to have a second PET-CT after 3 months or 6 chemo sessions, and mine was scheduled for Monday, February 13, my wife’s birthday, with a follow-up with my oncologist scheduled for February 14, Valentines Day. Less anxious than I should have been, given my now established submission to the inevitable, I responded to my oncologist’s assessment of the scan—“Complete remission. Cancer free”—with more skepticism than elation, as did my wife. Cautioned by a second oncologist at Fox Chase Cancer Center that cancer cells could roam undetected in the blood, we both resisted Dr. B’s assertion that I no longer required chemo but should be put on a 9-month regimen of immunotherapy (Opdivo) instead. In the end, we agreed that I would undergo one more chemo session—which commenced a week later–before consulting with Dr. D at Fox Chase at the end of the month.

Why such resistance to news that bordered on the miraculous? Surprise—possibly closer to a state of shock—seems, in retrospect, only a small part of it, especially since, despite my pessimism, I had actually harbored the idea of full remission in the back of my mind, given how strongly and steadily my body had weathered the intensifying storm of chemo side effects. Could I conceivably have been disappointed at this premature glimpse of recovery and the possibility of a life extended even beyond the previously fantastical prospect that five more years at best might be left to me? Was I already missing the recently established cessation of responsibilities and obligations that the imminence of death carried with it? The emergence of the idea that a kind of vita nuova may be granted me brings with it—for me at least—an imperative that something substantive must be done with it, something that will take energy and imagination and commitment to bring to fruition. I am, after all, only going to be 72 in a matter of weeks, a number I had become morbidly accustomed to assuming would be the last age I would reach (as in b.1951-d.2023). What should I do to seize what may become the thousands of days now afforded me (barring a cancer recurrence or fatal accident)? The short answer would be “relax and enjoy them, travel, take pleasure in family and friends.” The longer one—no doubt dictated by my lapsed Catholic recall of the remission of sins—is to do something productive, possibly something that benefits others instead of squirreling myself away with my books and my poetry and my good intentions.

 I thought of this two days ago as I entered the now familiar confines of the Hunterdon Regional Cancer Center. How could I, a possible survivor, be of future help to my new tribe of fellow sufferers, with whom I had not shared a single word in my six previous weeks of therapy? This wasn’t a tribe I had ever expected to join, sharing the shameful bias of the healthy that such fates are mainly visited on the already weak and vulnerable, and “Lordinges, that am not I,” as my constant Muse, the Wife of Bath, likes to say. But, of course, that’s exactly who I was and am—a damaged body now permanently reliant on the kind ministrations of conscientious doctors, nurses, and physician assistants (bless each of their compassionate hearts), and on the pharmaceutical industrial complex that manufactures the chemicals that are now flowing through my veins, fighting the good fight against too fast-growing cells, helping to make my remission durable as well as complete.