The room is dark except for the glow of the dimmed sconces on the brick wall over the fireplace, and tiny flames flicker in a mason jar candle on a table nearby. I sit on a sectional sofa with my legs stretched out on the coffee table in front of us. It's quiet. It's after midnight and the light from my macbook glows on my face. Sully my 11 year old has fallen asleep next to me after our movie night together. He lay on his back with his arms stretched out over his head. His hair has finally begun to grow back and gotten just long enough to squirt some gel in. It's been a little over a year since he was diagnosed with B-Cell Lymphoblastic Leukemia. The look on his face and his reaction when I had to tell him he had cancer last year will haunt me forever.
He is slowly getting back to his old self. He is able to socialize now when his blood levels are up, and he has started exercising a couple times a week. Although he can't go
back to football yet as he would like, we are going to create a
protector plate for his medi-port and he's going to play soccer for
now.
The past couple months have brought up a lot of emotions as all of the memories from a year ago began popping up on my social media feeds. He has completed one year of treatment and has two more years to go. For the past year he has been at the hospital almost everyday for chemotherapy, blood tests, spinal taps, or blood transfusions.
He will need to complete two more years of chemotherapy and testing. The good news is he is cancer free and only has to visit the hospital once or twice a week for the maintenance phase.
After two years if everything goes well he will stop chemotherapy and just have to go for annual tests. It's a long program, but that's the treatment standard for young boys who have Leukemia to minimize the chance of it coming back.
My daughter graduated high school and I dropped her off at college in Alabama a couple weeks ago. It's just me and the two boys at home now. Once again I am in the middle of changes and transitions. I find my thoughts and emotions pulled in many different directions, as a dad, as a man, and as a human being trying to figure out the meaning of life.
Sully finally went back for the last two weeks of school and his friends and teachers gave him a warm welcome. It was a long time coming.
Now summer is almost over and he'll be starting middle school in September.
I took him for 6th grade orientation this morning, and although COVID has changed how they are doing things, it was great to see him back with his friends. We went for lunch at the diner afterward and a morning filled with our usual banter and humorous moments.
After lunch we pulled up the list of his school supplies on my phone and we headed to staples.
After debating which folders were the right ones and searching for a "stylus pen" we moved on to scissors.
Scissors: A dozen different types.
"Get these dad."
Sully handed me a pair of blue scissors for $3. I didn't even look at him as he placed them in my hand, I was still standing there entranced by the array of different scissors on the wall before us.
"What about these?" I asked.
I handed him a pair of $6 non-stick scissors.
"Okay" he said.
We stood there, my eyes still fixed on the wall of scissors.
"No wait, how about these."
I handed over a pair of "non-stick TITANIUM" scissors, my eyes still not leaving the rack in front of us. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Sully smirking and looking at me.
"Dad these are 11 inch scissors, the list says we have to get 7 inch scissors."
"Let me see that", I said.
"Oh shit you're right. Okay, I guess they're afraid of someone using them as a weapon."
He laughed.
I went back to the rack of scissors and over the next 10 minutes I worked my way through all of them, moving shit on and off the racks, opening and closing them, and trying to figure out why one pair was $3 and another was $29.
Finally I grabbed the $21 non-stick titanium forged scissors with LIFETIME WARRANTY.
"We'll get these. Look at these Sully, the Mercedes of scissors!" I said, holding them up and laughing.
He looked at me and we both started laughing as I was opening and closing them. It was 100 percent a
Larry David moment.
"Wait these blades have a nick in them and they don't close smoothly", I swapped them for a different pair.
We started to walk away and then I said "Wait! These have pointed tips! The list says the tips have to be rounded!"
We laughed our asses off and finally settled on a middle of the road pair of 7 inch scissors
with rounded tips, and agreed that what just went down in aisle 12 of staples was definitely a
Curb your Enthusiasm episode.
#FUCANCER
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