What I Did On My Summer Vacation

Remember going back to school after the summer break. And your teacher would get you write about what you did on your summer vacation. Do you remember now what you did? Way back then? Or just this past summer?

My memory is strange these days. I will reach back, looking for a name,or a word even. I’m scanning the inner Rolodex and…nothing. It’s like a wall that I can’t see over. I know there is something on the other side….but nothing. The more I force it, the emptier I feel. Yet at other times, dreaming, walking, washing a dish, usually some mundane physical chore, memories flood me. And that elusive memory I was reaching for before, it comes to me. The memory. The word. Like a memo from a previous me. You could say that is how memories have always worked, but there is something different now. Something about age and how it raises the stakes.

The stakes are raised, like a Joan of Arc build it at home kit! So you begin by building it stick by stick, until you are surrounded by sticks- kindling is what you would say if you were building a fire.

How do you build a fire? The same way you live a life. Stick by stick. Kindling. Excelsior. Crumpled paper. Should I throw that away? Yes. She says yes. She always said yes. And so we build.

We build memories like we build walls. Are we keeping something in or keeping something out? Do we even know what we are building?  Sometimes we build for the sake of building. The kindling is lit, a spark slowly grows. You add bigger sticks. You add a log or two. Poking at the …what is the word….pause for memory to kick in….fire, yes poking at the beast of memory, the wall. And soon you realize you have built a giant fire. And you are right in the middle of it, burning.

They said your mind was funny. It has gone off a bit. It doesn’t work so well. But then it works brilliantly. It flares, and ignites, and there is heat and such lights. Flickering, dancing, sparkling. You have built a fire.

But wait...something is amiss. You are not only watching a fire burn, but you can feel the fire burning. And what is that smell? It’s so close. Why, it is you. You are the smell. You are in the middle of the fire, tied to that first stake, the first stick, slivers, shivers, burning. You feel the flames. How it burns. Both skin and memory.

You need more words. Quick, throw some words in the fire. Throw some words on the fire. Are we feeding the flames or desperately trying to douse the conflagration?

It’s a real blaze, this one…it’s really going now, words building on words, in despair, in hope, it’s a literal bonfire. You can see it for miles. Even over the wall.

Remember the wall. The walls are collapsing, racing to a collapse. Everything is burning.

Who started this little fire, that threatens now to become an inferno. An evil inferno. Dare we call it a holocaust?

So many children slammed by the force of the explosions into walls and concrete and buildings collapsing. Their little bones, like sticks, the kinder, now kindling.

Kinder.

Kind.

How do we get back to kind from all this kindling?

What kind of people are we to stand and watch the fire? It’s a show. Fireworks. Flame feeding fucking flame.

This is the work of evil. This is how evil grows. From little sparks, we have built a fire we no longer can control. You hear the zeal in their voices, the dead eyes, shaking hands of old men.  They can barely remember their names. They grasp for the right words. They gasp at what they have built here.

It is the work of everyone, as we either watch the fire growing , or we tend the fire, or we feed the flames.

There is a passion to this violence. We have our positions set, the fire was built, and we can either watch it grow until it burns through its fuel of anger and hatred, leaving nothing but smoke. Smouldering. Still burning under the wreckage, under the ground. Those who are left feel the heat under their feet. The air is acrid, spent.  Some things never change.

You see I started this post over an hour ago. Remember? How I spent my summer vacation blah blah blah. We never got there, did we?

I was talking on the phone.

She said “I heard you were going away for a few months-a vacation.”

I said no.

I did not go away. I was here all the time. I worked through it, all summer.

How I spent my summer was cancer.  Fighting cancer. It’s another world. It’s just another word. It’s cancer.

It started at the beginning of the year. This year. At the beginning it was a lump. It had been building. Did I see it building, growing in the side of my neck? Or did I wake up one day, and it was just there?

It was noticeable. Thank God it was noticeable. It took three winter months before we got to Spring, and a small sample of cells from my neck showed the presence of a squamous cell carcinoma. There it was. Cancer slowly growing until it was not slowing growing, but something you could see. But the lump was not where the cancer started. The lump was on my neck, but the origin of the cancer was hidden. It was in my neck. In my head. Head and neck. In my throat, no, the back of my throat, no, my tonsils, no that’s not right. My tongue. The base of my tongue, which is in my throat, in my neck, in my head.

It was no vacation. There was no season of summer in 2023. Just cancer. Which I fought. Which ground me down to my very essence, leaving only my bare bones to rebuild upon. Bones like sticks. Like kindling.

Step by step. Inch by inch. Slowly he turned…..just like the old vaudeville routine.

Step by step. Inch by inch. Slowly he turned…

NIAGRA FALLS.

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