2/25/09

"How are you doing?"

We ask that a lot around here lately. KD asks me, I ask him, people ask us... never ending. It's easier to respond with symptoms or schedule complaints or mundane issues. Or just a nondescript "Okay."

There's no way to start talking about how strange life has become lately. And no way to tell if the person asking just wants general confirmation that you're alive and plan on continuing to be so. Or if they want a philosophical treatise on spiritual realizations on the journey through the shadow of death.

And beyond that is the desire to keep private a little bit of yourself. What KD goes through with dozens of people at the hospital interested in everything from his brains to his bowel movements, to the molecular contents of his blood... he must want to protect what little privacy he's got left. We all know KD's never been a chatterbox (unless he's had a beer or two more than necessary). 

That guy in the black heavy metal t-shirts and long rock star hair is not an enigma wrapped in a puzzle wrapped in a conundrum really. It's just one of the sides he shows. I know the other sides of him. I won't go there because he gets cranky when I talk about him (yes, i get the irony of that statement in a blog ABOUT him). But the point I'm getting at is that when life changes like this and suddenly you're in unfamiliar territory without a map and in a car that won't get out of first gear, you have only the stars to navigate by. He is only able to come back to "Okay" by the points of light guiding him. And yes, by points of light I mean his family and friends (I know that sounds soppy).

I cannot say strongly enough how appreciated it is that people still reach out to him .. call or email.. and ask that question "How are you doing?" You probably get a mundane answer to the question. Maybe you only get "Okay." But from where he's standing, "Okay" is the best place to be, and the only way to describe in less than ten thousand words how he is really doing.

So for sitting through my monologue on something having nothing to do with cancer itself and everything to do with being a human being, here's a picture of another side of KD not many people have seen. It's one of my favorite portraits so far: