In an interesting twist to my own situation, I was told last week that I actually have a different kind of cancer than what they thought before. Instead of “Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma,” the diagnosis of which came from the hospital where I had the lymph nodes on my neck removed, the pathology lab at Johns Hopkins reports I have “Follicular Large Cell Lymphoma with Diffuse Features.” Apparently they look very similar under the microscope, and my doctor told me that they did the test four times because they didn’t want to overturn the earlier diagnosis, but that now they’re pretty sure.

Turns out the treatment are the same for each, but there are some slight differences in how they work in the body. For instance, the “large B-cell” kind is an aggressive lymphoma, meaning it can grow and spread rapidly, but can also be killed rapidly. The follicular lymphoma is called an “indolent” type, which means that it typically grows slower (it might have been in my body for years) but can at some point become aggressive, which may be what happened to me, and in some cases it may be harder to wipe out completely. After looking up “indolent” in the dictionary, Edna and I have come to calling this my “Lazy Lymphoma.” The other downside to this is that there is a chance that it will reappear 10–15 years down the road, even though it’s apparently fairly easy to treat if you catch it early enough.

In any case, I’ve pretty much decided that no matter what type I have, I will have to keep a close eye on my health in the years ahead, even beyond just getting the usual cough-and- “thump-yer-stomach” physical every couple years. Frankly, I’ll always have to consider myself a cancer survivor and someone who is at risk, even though I plan to live as fully as possible with that situation.

Again, for all of my friends who are in their 30’s and 40’s, I can’t stress enough: GO GET A COMPLETE PHYSICAL. It could save your life. Don’t be like me, getting one in junior high so I could go out for tennis and then another one when I was 33 for my company health insurance and thinking that was probably enough.

There have been so many of those friends who have been sending me cards and letters and calling, and I can’t tell you what that has meant to me. I’m saving all the cards in a big pile, and some of my favorites are the hand-made ones. One charming card came from my young friend Grace down in Georgia, who had the wonderful advice that I should watch more TV and eat more ice cream to get well. Believe me, I’m following THOSE doctor’s orders. I’ve also gotten a wonderful response from the many friends I’ve made that started out as clients! One couple sent me a card from their honeymoon — even though I didn’t end up shooting their wedding — and another great organization in Baltimore called Friends of the Family sent me a picture of the whole staff that everybody signed.

The Basement Gallery is now up! Enjoy. There will be many more additions as more of you stop by in the coming days and weeks. Generally I seem to be doing a little better each chemotherapy session (knock on wood) so I will increasingly be able to have visitors if all goes smoothly. Even on my weakest days, I’m trying to do a few laps on the deck. My neighbors must think there’s some sort of bizarre guard duty going on as I slowly circle the railing. If you do want to visit call me before you come, because I’m still sacking out a couple hours each day for my nap, and now that I’ve got my iPod all loaded up I may not even hear you if you’re knocking at the door.