Month: April 2007

Today was opening day at Yankee Stadium and boy do I miss my dad. With my chemo almost behind me, and a healthy and hopeful future ahead, today marks the return of one of the wonderful ways my dad and I used to communicate for seven months of the year. And now I am left with a wife who is a Red Sox fan, a mother and sister who know not from baseball, and a daughter who my father, so overjoyed at finally having a grandchild, gave permission to be a Red Sox fan. Would it be wrong of me not to honor my father’s dying wish? Absolutely not! I am writing off this alleged dying wish to cancer-related delirium.

So on this opening day I find myself alone. Yes, there are millions of Yankees fans out there, but none out there to comfort me with a phone call about the Yankees pitching problems, none who shared with me the joy of watching Thurman Munson hustle out a triple as I spilled an entire large coke on myself in the blazing summer heat from the first row on the third base line at Yankee stadium, none to explain to me that not all the Yankees (and not most people in the world) were Jewish, none on whose shoulders I rested in the right field bleachers at Yankee stadium as Reggie Jackson hit his second of three home runs in game six of the 1977 World Series, and none with whom I could argue about how George Steinbrenner was the worst thing to happen to baseball since the 1919 Chicago Black Sox scandal. None who are my dad.

The Yankees won their home opener today.

With my marrow worn down from seven rounds of chemo, my platelets have unionized and gone on strike until further notice, so there will be no chemo today. Negotiations with my platelets began in good faith earlier today, and we have assured them only one more round of chemo. This cannot be guaranteed forever, but we have promised at least 5-10 years chemo free. I have the best lawyers representing me, but my marrow has also retained fine lawyers, and, frankly, has the upper hand in negotiations.

I am threatening to postpone our trip to the Caribbean as a negotiating ploy, and that seems to have got the platelets attention. They walked out of our meeting just thirty minutes ago. Talks are set to resume Wednesday.