A friend of mine mentioned my blog address in her Christmas newsletter. This friend has a world-famous Christmas newsletter, no doubt read by thousands. (I am not being sarcastic, here. I really do imagine her mailing it to thousands of people.) It just came in the mail the other day, and I spent a few days walking around, feeling important, wondering if all of these thousands of readers of the Famous Christmas Newsletter were actually going to visit my blog.
Then panic set in when I realized that the first thing they’d see is an unexplained photo of Jon Bon Jovi and the President singing an acoustic duet of “Born to Be My Baby.” At least, that’s what I like to imagine they’re doing in this photo:
BARACK: Light a candle, blow the world away!!!JON: Table for two on a TV tray!!BARACK: It ain’t fancy, baby, that’s OK!!BARACK AND JON TOGETHER: Our time!!! Our way!!!
Anyway. I decided I should go back and explain the Bon Jovi thing in case anybody new ever visits my blog.
I have cancer. I love Jon Bon Jovi. My type of cancer is an odd type of cancer (just as my love for Jon Bon Jovi is an odd type of love). My doctors and I have decided to manage it like a chronic disease (the cancer, not the Bon Jovi love), so I take a pill every day and I go to the doctor every four weeks to make sure the pills are still working. You’d think that after years of getting test results every four weeks it would be no big deal, but I still get really nervous when I get The Monthly Phone Call from the nurse. We track something called the M-spike. Low M-spike = good. High M-spike = bad. I spend the next four weeks feeling happy if the M-spike has gone down, or feeling freaked out if the M-spike has gone up.
One month, the M-spike went up, and I was feeling really depressed. I decided to post a photo of a shirtless Jon Bon Jovi on my blog just to cheer myself up. I mean, who wouldn’t be cheered up by this?
After that, I made the Bon Jovi photo a monthly tradition. If my M-spike went down, he’d get to put on more clothes. If it went up, and I was depressed, he’d have to take them back off. The Bon Jovi photos are a visual aid to how my disease is progressing. More clothes = less myeloma. Fewer clothes = more myeloma, but at least we all get to look at shirtless Bon Jovi.
And even when he puts the clothes on, it could still be fun. I mean, leather pants:
So now, as you can see, I am doing so well, myeloma-wise, that Jon Bon Jovi gets to put on a turtleneck and a jacket and sing* with the President:
*Again, that’s what I like to imagine they’re doing in this photo.
BARACK: If we stand side by side!!JON AND BARACK TOGETHER: All night!!JON: There’s a chance we’ll get by!!!JON AND BARACK TOGETHER: And it’s aaaaaaalll riiiiiight!!!
They totally need to record that. I’d download it.
