babe

There’s a comfort in writing a post almost fully one year after your last. Like wearing a pair of old shoes–worn and neglected, but loved completely, and filled completely with memories of a former life perhaps.

i went to see the doctor today for my routine blood check. thank God that all is still normal. and as things were normal, the medical content of my conversations were quite limited–i think my drs. would have preferred to text me the results, for in the intervening time it felt like they felt obligated to engage me in chit-chat, donning on a hat that doesn’t suit them as well–that of psychiatrist or even worse, dear i say, friend? i guess they felt guilty that i was spending money on “seeing them” and needed to fill the time. all this is to say, that when you’re talking about weddings and vacations and “plans” in a cancer ward, then things are “normal”; and normal is not something that fits in a cancer ward.

but Praise God who fills my time and my paths with His blessings. to be normal in His eyes is my delight.

i received three vaccinations–ones that i had when i was new born. i am still a babe. and i’d like to think that my skin and folds of fat (ok, i have no fat) are babe-like. best still, i like to think that my thoughts are new and child like because of Him.

yesterday, Easter sunday marks for us Christians the breaking of dawn in not just human history, but the history of creation through Christ Jesus our Lord. it marked the “first fruits” of the new creation, which i, am delightfully joined in.

And Now for Something Completely Different

I have been silent for several months now and there are two reasons for this.
The first is that there is nothing to report on the cancer/health front, which
is to say that there has been no sign of cancer from any of my blood tests and
that my lungs still suck. I know that for many of you who follow this blog,
this update is enough–and I ask you to forgive me for not writing that
everything is ok occasionally. Having said that, I know that we have been
operating under the tacit assumption that “no news is (pretty) good news”–
at least for this blog–that if something major happened, I would have
definitely written about it or told you about it face-to-face.

the second reason for why i have not written an entry in a long time gets
to the heart of the latter part of the last sentence–and that is talking to
people face-to-face. outside of updates about my health, which i recognize is
useful, i would rather talk about “things” to real humans rather than to this
blackbox where i don’t know who or what is on the other end (i’m looking at you
google indexing bot). suffice it to say, there are some who talk about
everything in their life on their blogs–from their cat, to friendships, etc.
equally sufficient is that i am not one of these. this is a blog about cancer
and particularly my cancer [full stop].

one of you, N* has suggested that i also write about cancer and more
(whatever more is–let’s just call it cancer++). because cancer is
not just about the hospital visits or the biopsies and tests–indeed,
these “physical” aspectes of being a cancer patient only capture the
tip: underneath this tip are a range of emotional and spiritual topics
which I have argued are more important than the physical
problems–i.e. cancer++.

and indeed, i have addressed some of those emotional and spiritual
things where i have felt that they were appropriate and perhaps helpful for
other cancer patients. i have written about death, pain, suffering,
sickness on this blog before, but always limited in scope.

but of course my wise friend N* saw that there was more: she and I talk alot
(perhaps not face-to-face, but over the phone–which is *much* preferable to
this by long!), and our exchanges are always enlightening. so why not
cancer++?

well let me explain. if you look at my dashboard, which is something that
allows you to see the *unpublished* blog entries i have written, you’ll see
that in this period of apparent inactivity, i have been quite active. i have
been writing about things, but i haven’t been publishing some entries because
of one reason: you. WHO are you?! no seriously, who are you? i know some
of you. but you can be anybody and anything.

suffice it to say, the blog entries that i didn’t publish assume certain
properties about the noun “you”. and so the world will have to get its
oral-hygiene slam poetry from some other source.

you are the problem. you are the problem. you, len, are the problem.

huh?

do you assume that you can retreat to the “simple” worlds of just the facts
and only facts (please)–of only test results and treatment options and be
forgiven about not talking about the things that matter most: your deepest
feelings and the deepest truths?

“Certainly no one,
not even for a moment,
ever lives without
performing action.”

you have held yourself back because you fear that you are giving too much
and you don’t know who or what is receiving it.

you have held back because you don’t want to offend.

you have held back because you may come off as condescending and arrogant and
supercilious–all which you are.

“[but] Not by avoiding action,
does a person gain
freedom from action”

so act! and trust that your audience, whoever or whatever they are, will
receive you just as you are–flawed but engaged in *this* world (whatever
cancer++ is); trust that they will forgive you–and though they may not
forgive you, know that your heavenly Father already has.

act, for action is better than inaction!

but why not just have another blog?

oh, because that’s dumb.
[end]

List of previously unpublished things:
on Grace
The Absolute Subjective
the high harmony in creation and evolution
smashing words
birthday
an insight from God
some unfinished things
observable universe
across the crevices

hmm…i guess there weren’t *that* many 🙂

The Absolute Subjective

Many of us take without question that our subjective experiences can not,
almost by definition, be “wrong”. Imagine, for example, that after hearing a
great piece of music, you exclaim: “Beautiful! How wonderful!” and then
moments later a big sign in the sky flashes: “WRONG!”

That, indeed, would be confounding to many of us, for we take our subjective
experience as the first principles of our universe–they are the TRUTHS in
which other truths are derived.

Well that’s completely wrong. and the truth is that our subjective experience
IS NOT RELATIVE. the fact is that the “truths” which we base other truths
on are wrong.

one way of going about this is to do what many objectivists have claimed
(especially in their anti-religious benders), and that is to establish
common, repeatable, experiences (i.e. the objective lands of science). but
except for the following, i won’t go there because i find that land of science
quite boring: science has established that you, yes, you, are a very imperfect
observer of your own experience (see psychology of memory and perception). so
when when you say, “i remember things being such and such…or it was
like this…”, science tells us otherwise.

but as i’ve said, i’m not going there. i’m going to heart of the
confusion, and claiming that even what you view as beautiful and right and
good is not relative–that subjective experiences have absolute measures, and
therefore, it is true that though the person may experience the symphony
as beautiful, that he can be wrong!

and the argument is simply this: just as science has shown us to be imperfect
observers of certain psycho-sensory experiences, we are also imperfect
observers of subjective experiences–i.e. beauty, goodness and morality.
(is it really that far of a stretch???) in other words, the assumption is
that the relativists make is that they are perfect observers of their own
subjective lives; and therefore, at least in the subjective realm of beauty,
morality, etc, that there are no measures of “better” or “worse”, right or
wrong. and that’s exactly what i’m going to attack.

[arg by example: morality- there is an absolute morality, and it is our sin
which corrupts this perception of that morality. that absolute, and all
absolutes come from God]

our subjective experience, i.e. our lives, are built on falsehoods.
specifically, we must understand that we are born into sin, and that this
sin blinds us to truths; it warps the truth; it obscures it; etc. sin
corrupts our notion of beauty for we take our own ideas of beauty as the
highest and not God’s. and sin corrupts our ideas of morality, for we
take what is convenient for us and not what God commands. and sin corrupts
all that is perfect, and we substitute our imperfect idols for the one True
God.

just as i was born with myopic eyes, so too was i born with myopic eyes of
perceiving TRUTH: that until i am corrected for the sin in my nature, i can not
see the TRUTH that God reveals: the Absolute Subjective Truth!

on Grace

i write better than i speak sometimes and when a friend of mine asked me what separated Christianity from the other religions, i thought immediately of C.S. Lewis’s answer: Grace. And proceeded to fumble through three acts of logical trapezee-ing and one act of pure thick-tongued-ness. sometimes i wish i were a child, that way i’d have an excuse.

but Grace is important–it is indeed central to the christian faith. and so i’d like to take it up again.

i’d like to say that Grace is simple, but it’s not. i’d like to say that you can detach Grace from Jesus Christ, but you can’t. the marvelously confounding ideas of Grace, as christians understand it, was born on the cross the moment Jesus died. At that moment, God showed his love for us by sacrificing his Son so that we may be reconciled with Him. This is what christians mean by Grace, which is distinguished from the “grace” we humans show each other.

And so what?

Well it didn’t hit me either until the following pieces were revealed to me:
1. the nature of death
2. the nature of Christ

i didn’t understand christianity until i saw what death was/is. it is not that one can’t be a full christian without first having a harrowing experience, but rather that i am bone-headed–and that only the shock of death could pass through my thickness. i don’t think i can explain exactly what death is like–but i just want to say that death is indeed black (exactly as they say), and you will feel it in your room–the closing in that is. it was what every fiber of my being chaffed against, but was helpless against. i hope it isn’t vacuous to say this, but death is anti-life–the closing in that is. this was, at least, my vantage point.

i also didn’t understand christianity until i realized who Christ was. some take it as a matter of belief that Christ is God, but until you take this as a matter of fact, then you won’t understand christianity either. For if you do not hold, as fact, that as God, which by definition is the spring of Life, Christ died for us, then how would you see the marvelous perplexity of that fact: For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. If Jesus were merely a man, then Christianity is baseless. But I know, as fact, that Jesus was God–as He claimed himself to be (lemma).

And this is when it hit me: I understand the depths of God’s love for me in Christ’s act–God Loved us so much that He did the thing which was against every fiber and conception of His Nature–that is to die. And that is the Christian idea of Grace: what separates Christianity from other religions is that God sacrifices Himself for man. He does not say we must atone 100% for our iniquities; or that he would meet us half way; or even the 99% mark–and that we must do some token praying etc–No–the confounding distinction of Christianity is that God bore it completely Himself, and in a manner completely against Himself, leaving us with nothing else to do but to be in complete awe of this act and to be so humbled by it that we fall to our knees. That is when Grace hits you. And when it hits you, it hits you profoundly and you are profoundly saved.

“He did what??–for me????!!! what???! why did he even bother? honestly, i wouldn’t even bother.”*

That is Christianity. It is hinged on Christ, for if Christ is not God, Grace and Christianity does not work. If Christ was only a man, then Grace is a conflation. But Christ is God, for on the third day he rose–and this is not a matter of belief, but of fact: hundreds saw first hand the resurrected Christ, individually and en masse for many days before the Assumption.

*seriously, i wouldn’t.

the high harmony in creation and evolution

“For what would I say, O Lord my God, but that I know not whence I came
into this dying life (shall I call it?) or living death. Then immediately did
the comforts of Thy compassion take me up, as I heard (for I remember it not)
from the parents of my flesh, out of whose substance Thous didst sometime
fashion me. Thus there received me the comforts of woman’s milk. For neither
my mother nor my nurses stored their own breasts for me; but Though didst
bestow the food of my infancy through them, according to Thine ordinance,
whereby Thou distributest Thy riches through the hidden springs of all things.”

Thus begins St. Augustine’s musings on his creation, which he immediately
admits is a history tied to truths beyond his purview–with some accounts tied
to his “parents of [his] flesh”, but almost all of the rest, bound “through
the hidden springs of all things”. We are caught up with St. Augustine in
this same moment–*aware* of ourselves and our personal histories, and yet
also marveling at that which is beyond us.

He continues: “This I since learned, Thou, through these, Thy gifts, within
me and without, prclaimin Thyself unto me. For then I knew but to suck; to
repose in what pleased, and cry at what offended my flesh. Nothing more.
Afterwards I began to smile, first in sleep, then waking: for so it was told
of myself, and I believed it; for we see the like in other infants, though of
myself I remember it not. *Thus, little by little, I became conscious where
I was…” Tracing his life from what “we see the like in other infants” he
sees his development as being guided by God–instincts built up into
predispositions (of being a “smiling” child), which led to personality, and
“little by little”, ultimately into consciousness.

But St. Augustine does not stop at the development of his self-consciousness–
self-awareness was NOT his point, but he goes beyond it and finishes this
train of thought–this strange musing, with the following: “And, lo! my
infancy died long since, and I live. But Thou, Lord, who for ever livest,
and in whom nothing dies: for before the foundation of the worlds, and before
all that can be called “before,” Thou art, and art God and Lord of all which
Thou has created: ***in Thee abide, fixed for ever, the first causes of all
things unabiding; and of all things changable, the springs abide in Thee
unchangable: and in Thee live the eternal reasons of all things unreasoning
and temporal.*”

His point is that his creation was a development of an awareness of his
Creator. And indeed, the KEY point is that ALL of creation, of which his
personal development is a recapitulation of, leads to one point: an awareness
of God. He caps this remarkable statement with the reason for this
creation story: that we may praise God: “I acknowledge Thee, Lord of heaven
and earth, and praise Thee for my first rudiments of being, and my infancy,
whereof I remember nothing, for Thou hast appointed that man should from
others guess much as to himself…Whence could such a being be, save
from Thee, Lord?”

Through St. Augustine’s train of thought, I want to explain the high harmony
that I see between the creation story as explained in Genesis, and the natural
mechanism of evolution which I hold as scientific fact–just as I, and St.
Augustine hold/held our personal creation stories as fact.

Indeed, I am addressing this essay to those Christian brothers and sisters
who see evolution as an affront to God’s purpose for man: Those brothers
and sisters hold humanity in a special class, of which, being derived from
“lower” forms such as “chimps” or “bacterium” is not only an insult to the
word of Genesis, but also contradictory to God’s purpose set out in the first
book: that “he be made in Our image”. For in what relation does a chimp or
a bacterium “look” like man?

And I will first start my argument with this: in what relation does man “look”
like God? Who among us has seen the face of God? And could he step forward
to tell us how similar we are envisaged? Indeed, in our multiplicity, of
ethnicities and sub-species, which of us is “closer” to resembling our Father?

Let us put petty shallow things away, and adopt the Truth of Genesis, which
is simply this: that we were created to be aware of God, that we may marvel
(at) and worship Him.

For if we, as St. Augustine, can see through to that end point, then the
natural mechanisms which abide in Him, are indeed *from* Him and *of* HIM; that
the Truth is one must suckle and then crawl, and then babble and then little
by little does one gain consciousness, and God willing, one’s ultimate state–
the awareness of God. And if you
can contemplate this in your own creation story, then it is easy to see
how this story is recapitulated on larger scales: from unconscious and
unaware things to crawling bugs, to scurrying creatures, to chimp-cousins and
then ultimately us: the only species with THIS awareness of Him*. Indeed, a
species made in His image.

In the beginning, God had a purpose. Athiestic scientist who promulgate
evolution say that evolution is a mechanism without purpose. And indeed,
I agree, that God created nature to show these characteristics. But rather
than fear creeping atheism, I know that nature is of God, and that she, along
with all things, must abide in her Creator s.t. the word of Genesis holds
high truth: that we are all made in His image so that we may worship Him.
As I meditate on that statement, and reflect on my own development, my
awarness of Him is heightented and I marvel at His work, for
I know that THIS moment was in His mind’s eye at the beginning; that
the course of the universe and other long histories beyond me ran along to
lead to THIS moment of awareness, and that it was/is all HELD perfectly in
Him, and I am compelled to worship! Amen!

*Note to my scientific brothers and sisters: i originally intended to also
address you in this essay, but i saw that you were the harder sell: indeed,
with our anti-evolutionist Christian brothers and sisters, it was a matter of
changing perceptions. But in your case, how can you see high harmony, when
you don’t even see God at all?

You and I know, however, that science is not Truth. Indeed, its purview is
quite limited, and doesn’t explain, for example, what your / our purpose is.
Some of you may haughtilly brush this question of purpose aside–almost
accepting that there is no “purpose”. But I know that this is wrongheaded
for I had once held this exact view–if not championed its [bravado] side.
I only became acquitted of this shallow philosophy when i faced death–and
i pray brothers and sisters that you take my clamoring for purpose at that
time as evidence that though the most bravado of us may proclaim that there
is no purpose, that when faced with death, these same people, who feel the
true loneliness of that statement, will hastily retreat into the arms of
He who is the fountain of Purpose.

lungs lungs lungs

i’ve seen some of you recently, and by the symetric relationship of “being seen”, some of you have seen me. and what you saw was that my lungs are still in bad shape. many of you asked if things might get better, and i honestly don’t know. but i tried to leave things on a hopeful note, though i have given up on my lungs: it’s sometimes good to be a little unhealthy.

i remember last year, just as i was preparing for the transplant, going through the “informed consent” interview with the radiation dr–basically we talked about what the radiation treatment could possibly f* up. (in case you’re wondering, the answer is everything).
>”Do you have any other questions?”
>”um, nope.”
>”Ok, please sign here”

that night i played the morbid game of what i would sacrifice. dry mouth- OK!, skin that would make me look like a freak, NOT OK. sensitivity to sunlight- OK! kidney disease?-DEFINITELY NOT OK!

of course all of my vital organs were all clearly in the DEFINITELY NOT OK category. but i think my playmate felt gipped with my answers. (the last time i had dry mouth was when i had to give that speech at that moustache convention). i’m sorry dear lungs–i should have answered brains, because they aren’t doing us any good.

smashing words

the anniversary of my transplant has come and gone and i was powerless
to capture into any precise words of how it felt. the best i could do
were to record some passing impressions–nothing i could grab onto and
perhaps distill into a mantra; nothing i could use to explain why i am
still here.

and i almost did it again–any point beyond this and i just spin my
wheels (i just deleted a paragraph of another impression). the truth
is that i don’t know why i am still here. the truth is that i may not
be here for long.

and i’m quite ok with both of these truths because who could explain
the causal links that led to their existence? (was not my transplant
my re-birth?) who remembers their formulation in the womb? who can
fix their childhood impressions? who can know their end?

there is none like God, who is the steward of our development. he
conceived of us before we were in our mother’s wombs, tending to us as
a shepard to his sheep so that we may one day grow and become aware of
him, that we may worship him.

i humbly accept the limits of my mind and smash my powerless words. i
bow down to the author of all things, whose words breathe truth and
life.

birthday

O God of infinite grace and mercy, i praise you for this day, my 30th birthday
which a few years ago, during the beginnings of my trials with cancer, I
doubted that i would ever see. Oh lord how you guided me from those dark
nights in 5a-room20, to this blessed morning of today. i was 27 and unsure of
whether i would even live to see the end of the year. But how you healed me
of leukemia for the first time–how you saved me from imminent death, only
for me to rebel against you once more. for after being saved the first time,
although my heart was bending toward your insights, my heart was not
completely yours; it was infact still infected with the self love which
boasted of itself. indeed just as the cancer was not eradicated the first
time, according to your infinite wisdom, my self love was left to remain so
that THE FINAL cure could be applied–so that the shattering of the self
be so complete that there would be no turning back–there would no relapse
into sinful self love. had i just been saved then, i don’t know how much
my faith would have been counterfeit. but now i know that my love for you
is TRUE–for it has been through the crucible and all else has been burned
away. so i praise you, o glorious God for your hand in my relapse and I
thank you for teaching me to put all of my trust in your sure hands: oh how
dark those days in the ICU were–and how death, and the sounds of death
that surrounded me scared me. But yo were with me and you taught me to
put my faith in your perfect timing and your perfect plan.

oh lord, it was according to your perfect plan that i received my transplant
when i did-for the delays which initially frustrated me, were for a sound
reason: to make time to chelate the iron from my blood. and your timing was
perfect, for you arranged this apartment which we moved into just days before
my transplant. i stand in awe of your wisdom and mercy; of your patience
and love. and tonight, i especially praise your tenderness for comforting
me after my release from the hospital on the 27th of march last year. oh
how weak and nauseous i was–only you will know how sick i was; how i
almost fainted everytime i stood up; how weak my voice became; how showering
insulted my weak body such that i would at many times almost fall in the
bathtub. LORD only you know! and probably only you remember things, for I
have indeed forgotten some of the worst bits!!!

and day by day you strengthened me; each day molding me into the creature
you intended me to be: re-creating in me a heart that loves nothing more
than you! and you protected me–keeping the leukemia away as well as keeping
sin at bay. and in those nights, how you gingerly rescucitated my body and
my spirit O Love! at the right points, you opened my eyes to correct my
thoughts–teaching me that there is nothing on this earth worth loving–
especially not myself. you guided me through your word and opened my
eyes to the wisdom intended for me. and how i have changed!

i am reborn in body and spirit, and i pray that i never lose you. i have
told you many times, and i repeat it once more, that i would rather die
than to lose you–for losing you IS DEATH, and i don’t think i can withstand
it. and just as i write that, i am reminded of the cost you paid on the cross
for me–the exact thing which i fear most–of losing you, that was what you
yourself bore to save me from my wretched self! Oh my God! Why did you do
this for such an unworthy creature? Why did you do this for an unworthy
species? Why did you do this for an unworthy world? This is why the depths
of your love are unfathomable, and why i am in awe of your love, and indeed
compelled to love you wholly with all my heart and all my mind and all my soul.

please keep me from temptation and deliver me from evil, for my story is not
yet finished, and second to losing you, i also fear disappointing you–oh how
overwhelmed with guilt i would be if i repaid your grace and mercey and love
with SIN! and betrayal and unfaithfulness! oh let me then die lord and
suffer all that is my due–for you are RIGHTEOUS, and even now, i am so
mortally afflicted with sin and self love! the possibility scares me!

but you are sure-handed in your guidance and have prepared me–indeed you are
preparing me to submit all that is within me which may lead me to betraying
you: first, you have asked for my life, and after a mini-ceremony for myself,
[june 6th 2010 photo booth video] i submitted it to you; you then asked for
my future–on my career on whether i will have a family, and that too i brought
to your altar. in this season of lent you have asked for my chastity and that
i promise to you. search my heart lord root out the things which may lead me
to sin against you, and help me to bring them to your altar for sacrifice.
i say to you that i submit all to you, but i know that i am sinful and that
there are many things which may be very hard for me to give to you–my
vanity being the most incorrigible among them. help me lord to bring ALL that
i am to the altar so that my heart may be melted into a pure love for you.

should i do that everyday for the rest of my days, then i know that i will never lose you and never betray you–that i will be yours forever and forever in your bosom.

i pray this, in your glorious name, Amen.

an insight from God

[An insight from God]
Trust in the unseen;
Distrust what you can see
For your eyes are corrupt
————————-
Shall I distrust my faculties?
The faculties which you endowed me with–
to trust in the unseen and
distrust what is seen?
A: Yes, for your eyes are corrupt!
Then what is TRUE Lord?
A: Your faith. rely on me.

[03-28-11: this was probably written in the fall of 2010–oct? and after
reading it again, my heart says AMEN!]

some unfinished things

i have not been able to finish things recently–the past three entry attempts being just examples. i have felt that i’ve left many things left on the table and many things unsaid. all of them are centered around the one year anniversary which i passed recently with my family and friends. *i am thankful to God*. but the moment i try to explain how or why, i get lost in a maze of ineffable emotions.

i don’t want to leave you with the wrong impression. yes! i thank God for being alive! but being alive subsumes the suffering that life encompasses–namely the pain of being separated from the Creator; the pain of still living in sin. and even if i could forget about my own sins and pains, how could i turn blind to the sins and sufferings of this world? how do i not despair at how lost everything seems to be?

all cancer survivors must also die.

and then i am reminded that this world will pass away and be reborn; and then i am reminded that i will pass away and be reborn. (soon Lord, i pray).

all cancer survivors must also die, but we have been given a foretaste of our rebirth.

for i have been reborn–or have had a foretaste of it (and i am thankful for that!) but my eyes are dazzled by what i have seen: the ineffable which will all be made clear–which will all be resolved when the curtains finally go down on this (exhausting) show.

but for now, my life–evermore, is an unfinished thing. strewn among the heaps of unfinished things of this world, where it may be lost. what gains a man if he beats cancer only to lose his soul?

Praise be to our Lord who finished it!!! Praise the Lord our God who promises to finish unfinished things.