An Interview With Rick Fields On Living With Cancer
My attitude is “I’m going to live until I die,” which is all anyone can do. I don’t see the value of having someone say, “You have four months to live.”And I don’t want to give that much weight to any one person’s opinion, whether they’re a seemingly enlightened, spiritual person or a super Ph.D. or an M.D. — fortunetelling has never interested me.
It took a long time, but, by the following summer, I could get in and out of my car without hyperventilating. I could walk calmly down main streets in the daytime, although I still avoided parking lots and alleys, and rarely went out alone at night.
“With all due respect, Rabbi,” I said, “you are wrong. If I understand the term correctly, a megalomaniac thinks he is God. I, on the other hand, know I am God.”
A man I like is coming for dinner tonight. This means I don’t sleep very much, and I wake disoriented in the half light of dawn, wondering where I am. I look at my naked body stretched diagonally across the bed; I look at the untouched breasts, the white belly, and I wonder. I don’t know if this man will ever touch me, but I wonder.
We have to get out of here fast. It’s now or never, especially since we could run into Dag getting off work. It’s dangerous, but on the way out of town I stop by his cabin to drop off a goodbye letter.
Wind from passing trucks rocked the car hard. He opened the door and got in without speaking, wedged the bag and blankets under his feet. The smell rolled across to me, far worse than I’d imagined: creosote, vomit, rot.
*NOTE: Original copies of this issue are no longer available. Unbound, laser-printed copies will be provided for print orders.
Miscarriage, divorce, electroshock therapy
Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.
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