Good quotes from email and letters
Anonymized to protect the innocent
3/25/03 On the question: which matzah balls cure tumors better - floaters or sinkers? “Floaters vs. Sinkers. Of course, this is a topic long debated in the Talmud. Far be it from me to weigh in on such an existential issue.”
“Your life right now contains both way more stress and more ice cream than mine.”
“Hurray for halfway! Chemo to the left, chemo to the right, scoop a bowl of ice cream and *unnnh* take a bite!!”
“I just learned this week why I haven’t seen you around your cube recently. And here I thought you were just being a slacker.”
“Good luck (with today’s chemo) - I hope Sheila does not have any surprises for you. Tell her to save the surprises till May 10th - and then, to make them in the form of ben-and-jerry or deBeers!”
“I hope it keeps going well with the chemo. My mother always says, if you get nauseated, drink hot chocolate (or in my case, soy hot chocolate), the reason being that even if you have to throw up, it’s not so bad on the way back up. My mother is a nut.”
“Thanks for dinner and conversation. I run into so few people who can carry on a conversation about both Buffy and oncology.”
From a postcard, postmarked London “Jill — Greetings from Hogwarts! Harry and I are working on a spell to help you. We tried “Occipita Illuminatus Repairum”, but that only performed laser eye surgery. Now Harry doesn’t need his glasses, and the marketing department is quite upset. Perhaps we ought ask Hermione. Get well! — Ron Weasley”
3/7/03 “As an engineer with an E.Q. roughly comparable to that of a peanut, I never know how to express myself when I hear news like this. But please know you’re on my mind and I’m thinking good thoughts for you.”
“As for role models, of course, Lance Armstrong wrote the book, literally. But a better example for you is Mario Lemieux, who also battled Hodgkins. Last week, I read that Mario was ejected from a game for beating the snot out of somebody, so he seems to have recovered well. :-)”
“Yours is the kind of news, I think, that calls for ice cream. I can probably arrange to have some delivered from Big Alice’s. What flavor would you like?” Editor’s note: Big Alice’s has gone out of business. SERIOUS bummer.
“I got two wigs early on, similar to my own style. One was a little lighter in color than the other. I learned, teaching second grade, that this was not a great idea. Best comment came from a darling little boy in my class. It was a Monday in the school cafeteria, and Robbie said, ‘Did you color your hair over the weekend? Maybe you can’t make up your mind!’”
“I wish you and your family strength, hope and continued good (gallows?) humor - you always were tough and I have great hope that you’ll come thru this just fine.”
“I’m also working hard on creating a joke about you having removed a chip on your shoulder, but it just isn’t coming… :)”
“Good luck today. Frankly, I think the bureaucracy is a lot more dangerous than the cancer. And I *know* that you can handle bureaucracy :-)”
“Subject: Visit to Jill Gets Better Website. OK, our niece has been diagnosed with Hodgkin’s and we are laughing. Either we are really weird or you are particularly wonderful. Since we are only partially weird, it must be you.”
“‘Question: is a tumor board like a bug council?’ If so, tell them that we are changing our bug system, and they are welcome to have a free copy of the new one, no charge.”
“Just wanted to say congratulations on being non-bulky (BTW: Of all the people I know I think you’re among the last with whom I’d associate the word “bulky”) and negative for malignancy (same parenthetical thought as before, but that goes without saying)!”
February 3rd, 2008 at 1:31 pm
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