Reconstruct This...

It's not about the bike...it's about the hair. But you already know that, as I go on endlessly (and some would say annoyingly) about it. In the event that you live farther than 75 miles of my house--and therefore cannot hear me every morning at 6:30a.m., sobbing and spewing profanities in front of the mirror as I wield a giant round brush, a 2000-horse power blow dryer, a pricy flat iron and four different hair potions in a harried rush to get my chemo curls (only kind of) under control before racing out the door to work--here’s a hair update: It absolutely defies the laws of gravity. Most people don’t believe me when I tell them my hair grew back in a fro. Ergo, the faux-finish fro foto. I’m not quite ready to debut the fro without the help of Apple’s Photo Booth effects. And Ocho was kind enough to join in the foto fun. I don’t have a good transition for this, as it has nothing to do with my hair, but I rode my mountain bike up Mount Montara with Ocho today. The bike trail is...

Like most couples, Ocho and I recycle arguments. In fact, we've totally flattened the cans on a few topics. So I was delighted when we recently got into it about something brand new. Ocho was at his house in his bed watching a movie on his Macbook. I was at my house making an Excel spreadsheet of my expenses. I called Ocho, looking for a distraction. "Who's in the movie?" I asked. "It's the guy who was in The Mod Squad ," he said. "He also was in The Matrix ." "Dude," I said. "You are so not the man when it comes to '70s pop culture. Lawrence Fishburne was in The Matrix , but it was a totally different guy in The Mod Squad ." "Same guy," Ocho insisted. With that challenge, I opened another browser window and googled a photo of Lawrence Fishburne. Then I googled The Mod Squad . This is one of the photos I found: All of a sudden, it didn't matter whether the actor in Ocho's movie was Lawrence Fishburne or...

I called Sam yesterday afternoon. That's what I do when I hate the world. Sam and I live on opposite coasts. We believe in opposite things (she believes in Jesus; I believe in good therapy). And we use opposite brain hemispheres (she teaches math; I manage a magazine and a company intranet). But the one thing we do share is the ability to laugh at the absurdities in our lives. And there have been a few... I met Sam at Coco's in Sandy Springs, Georgia. We both had the late shift one night, and I was cleaning the soup well while she was "marrying" bottles of Heinz ketchup. "Are you happy with yourself?" she asked me. Surprised by her question, I lied (of course) and told her that I was ridiculously happy with my agonizingly self-conscious 18-year-old self. She wasn't buying it, but instead of challenging me, she admitted to having deep feelings of unhappiness herself. A difficult statement to believe. Sam had the charisma of a Kennedy, stratospheric intel...

It never rains in California. And that’s a drag because what I could use right now is a cold chardonnay, a depressing Neil Young CD, and a rockin’ good thunderstorm. What’s my problem? I’m done. I just had my reconstruction, which marks the end of my cancer road. No more side trips to the oncologists for chemo or radiation, to the cardiologist for EKGs, to the plastic surgeon for expander fill-ups, to the physical therapist for myo-fascial release, to my primary for Wellbutrin refills. I’m done with all that. So why am I sad, scared and more than a little pissed off, when instead I should be happy, relieved and grateful? After I was diagnosed in May 2006, the wheels started turning, and they turned fast. I motored through a double mastectomy, five chemos, 28 radiations, and the related side effects of all three: complete hair loss, the inability to construct a thought, abrupt menopause, severely limited range of motion, fatigue, weight gain. I also had just gone back to work after rais...