"It's a tumour, it's malignant, it's cancer" - Everyone is fighting a battle I know nothing about...

We can be so judgemental. I say 'we', and i very much include 'me' as a ringleader of unjustified assumptions.

I've shared many a laugh, or rather many a cackle, with people about people, at the expense of people I've never met, most likely merely caught a glimpse of and shot a brutal narrative of some kind in the name of a giggle. More often a giggle than scorn in my experience, but from my observation, many people pass scornful judgement as a matter of fabricated fact about anyone who doesn’t fit their demographic ideal, which is usually themselves.

The day I got diagnosed with cancer, I had the closest thing I’ve ever had to an out of body experience (and believe me, I’ve tried very hard to make it happen at all different times of the day and night). My main man, maxi-facial surgeon to the stars Mr Altman, sat me down and laid it out in pretty much the most heavy 7 words anyone can ever hit you with; “It’s a tumour, it’s malignant, it’s cancer” is a sentence that will haunt me for ever. At that moment and for maybe the next 24 hours my whole core shifted. I was carrying knowledge of my reality that only very few other people on earth knew about. It’s hard to explain, but I kind of shut off my motor senses. I got on my scooter and went to the pier in Brighton for some Fish & Chips. Two of us, the only people in my real world who knew, in total and utter disbelief at what was happening.

An overwhelming sense of vulnerability and total detachment from the hoards of people passing by, some glancing over, some just happy to enjoy the vibe. I remember so clearly the feeling that no-one cold possibly imagine what I had been told only minutes earlier. I can only describe the sensation as it was like I was looking in through a window at myself, not really in control or within shouting distance, but kind of aware of what I was doing. None of these happy people could possibly understand what it is like to have cancer, to be this frightened, to be looking death square in the face and having nothing to say.

It’s this thought that I’ve been considering for the past few days. You see, when I’m cracking a joke at the expense of someone who I have no understating of, that guy could be me. To have been aware that anyone on the pier that day had noticed something about me to ridicule would have totally destroyed me. That day I felt no malice or bad intent. That’s why Brighton pier has something special for me. Everyone was kind to me, whether they knew it or not, they gave me time to pull myself together and take my battle to that tumour. I’ll always be grateful for that hour or so of out of body living.

So I’m asking myself to remember that everyone is fighting a battle that I know nothing about. Surely I have to live deeper into my belief, into my core and ‘Be Nice’, always.

One Love

Jez

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