Rick’s “Cancer Story” – Part 1:

So I go from getting pounded on every day to winning most of my school yard fights; from being the shortest-kid-in-school pariah to making out with the hottest girl on campus in front of pretty much the whole student body.  I’m reeling still from my Mom’s sudden death, and nothing will ever change the fact that I’m the only Jew in a parochial Catholic school, but one day a welcome thought of relief comes…  “Hey, I think I’m getting popular.”  I’m still thinking that thought the next day, as I’m sitting in the Doctor’s office, my right ball blown up to the size of a large walnut, and Urologist Leonard Goldman saying, “This is either a twist, a tumor or an infection, I’m not sure. But one thing is for sure, and that is this thing’s gotta come out tonight.” Boom.

Pathology comes back quickly and it turns out that I have a malignant tumor. Doc Goldman says they got the whole thing. The tumor and my ball. A huge battery of tests is ordered to make sure all is clear. Brain scan. CAT scan. Dye injected everywhere. Bone marrow pathology (fun, think of the sound Rice Crispies makes when milk is poured over it, and you know how it sounds to have the cartilage in your lower back broken so they can take your marrow sample. Fun!). The results come back. My other ball is gonna stay intact! But the malignant tumor has spread to my right lung, and by all accounts, it’s running rampant. They want to check my lymph nodes, but that’s going to require a surgery. A radical one is planned; a lymph dissection, beginning just above my groin, and a partial thoracotomy (fancy for cutting out your lung) to excise the tumor, running to the top of my chest. Two operations for the price of one! About a two foot long scar. UCLA Specialist Dr. Donald Skinner is called in. Aptly named, as I’ll always refer to Skinner as “The Butcher.” In concert with my primary Oncologist, he prescribes an aggressive chemotherapy “protocol” to shrink the tumors as much as possible, pre-surgery. Cisplatin. Belomycin. Velban. Actinomysin D. A pure poison cocktail. Look ‘em up. The stuff is so toxic, I have to be an in-patient while undergoing chemo. If there’s a silver lining in all of this, they admit me to the Pediatrics Ward at Tarzana Hospital, under the care of my newly appointed primary physician, Dr. Peter Falk. (No silly, NOT “Columbo,” for those who remember THAT Peter Falk).

I’m several months into chemotherapy treatment when Ken, Kevin, Jack, Gregg, and Randy all get hired by General Cinema Centers in the Northridge Fashion Center Mall. God bless the brain trust that chose to hire five resourceful, intelligent, “entrepreneurial” best pals, and then schedule them so that they run the busiest shifts WITHOUT ANY OUTSIDER “INTERFERENCE.” I look back, remembering with envy that I was not well enough to join them in their pursuit of gainful employment. But at least, I am the beneficiary of complementary movies, and of popcorn, sodas and snacks – when I’m not so sick that the very thought of Raisinettes makes me want to throw up all over the already –and always—gook-covered floors. (Guess nobody wanted to pull janitorial duty). I love my friends’ camaraderie on the job. The joie de vivre they exhibit when the ticket-taker high-fives the ticket seller. (And hands him back untorn tickets, for “resale.” And extra pocket money).  The obvious brotherly love, evidenced in frequent embraces between the after-movie theatre sweeper and the concessionaire (Masking the handing-back-of-recently-used-popcorn and soda cups-also-for-resale). Indeed, envious I am. Hey, General Cinema Center! Ever heard of INVENTORY? No? Well, of course not… you’re out of business! No small surprise.

Most of all of this takes place while I’m a poster-child Stage 4 victim/fighter/”terminal” patient, whatever. I’m diagnosed in January of 1977 and go into my final remission one day before my nineteenth birthday, in November of 1980.

It’s hard to believe, looking back, that of those 1000 and some odd days, I spent probably 600 of them in the hospital. I suppose, even then –without so much as saddling myself with the “live each to the fullest” bullshit/mantra– that I’ve always been geared to just get up and go.

I remember a photo of me. Probably taken when I was 17 or 18. About 85 pounds. Ghost white. Not a hair on my body, eyebrows included. A real concentration-camp-survivor kind of thing. A place in time. I’d like to find that photo. But I suspect that Dad long since disposed of it. I sure would love to see that photo; simply as evidence –that terminal, ‘dead” at 17 (or 18), — that three-some decades later, with 30+ years of use and abuse behind me since that time, that somehow, I’m still here. I know that damned photo must be SOMEWHERE.

Dr. Falk is a Junior Partner at the offices of Doctors Sheldon and Norman Lavin. The Brothers Lavin, Sheldon primarily, have been mine and Ken’s pediatricians since birth. Even as a teen, and completely overwhelmed, I can see in their gentle faces that my experience, 16 years after birth and well check-ups, pains them. Sheldon often talks with me –real in-depth conversation– treating me like an adult– during each visit I have with Dr. Falk. Catching on to my entrepreneurial spirit, he tells me of an investment he’s recently made, in the soon-to-be-opened Northridge Waterslide. He postulates that if I am feeling well enough this summer, perhaps I can work there. Maybe as an Assistant Manager. I love the idea, and he sets me up for a meeting (not an interview, a “meeting,” HIS words) with the Managing Partner, a Mr. Marc Lemkin. Marc and I hit it off immediately. I’m him, 20 years earlier. Or he I, just 20 years, 200 pounds of fat and God-only knows how many kilos of drugs imbibed, later. We talk marketing, production, administration, operations. I have an innate sense of things, he says. “Screw Assistant, you’re a Manager.” His enthusiasm is infectious. He pulls the cap from my head, revealing my near, complete baldness. And he replaces the cap with one that says “Northridge Waterslide.” I wear it proudly.

Marc pays me for nearly everything I do. On the clock or not. But, I earn it. He lets me schedule my own hours – based around chemotherapy and when I am well enough, or not well enough—to work. I more often than not work at the top of the Slide, “regulating” who gets to cut line. Dana Plato, of “Different Strokes” fame, is a frequent guest, and she and I “go out” once or twice, but nothing happens. Jimmy Baio (Scott’s brother) is a regular as well, right as he is appearing on the monster hit series “Soap.” He often hooks me and my friends up for tickets to the tapings. Marc also let me make the schedule for everyone else as well. Part and parcel of which is doing the hiring. This is a blessed occurrence. I hire Jody Shannon, daughter of Del, who had recorded the huge hit “Runaway.” “I was walking in the rain…” I get to make out with her on warm summer nights, under the stars, after closing. Life is good, even when it’s bad…

This is the same summer that I learn I am “Stage 4.” “Terminal.” “GOING TO DIE.” My Dad and Brendie have kept this from me, but Marc takes me aside, and “man-to-man,” tells me what Dr. Lavin has shared with him. He holds me by the shoulders, looks me in the eyes, and said, “Rick. Live.”

Throughout that summer, Marc calls me almost nightly, on those days when I’m not well enough to be at the Slide. Most times, the calls come late at night.  As insecure as he is dynamic, he has a need for approval. He apologizes for whatever transgressions he felt he has committed that day, and then praises me for my work. Even then –and still relatively innocent—I can tell that he is higher than a kite during these calls.

Like so many times in my life, the summer of ’77 is a time of darkness – of a feeling like ink, so dark, so heavy, that you can almost swim in it—interspersed with the brightest of brilliant light and the most beautiful of times.

I heard that Marc died of a drug-induced heart attack in 1990. He was 41 years old. He made it 2 years longer than my Mom. Somehow, I’m gonna outlive ‘em all.

—–

In my Junior Year at Granada, I decide to run for office, my first shot at doing so in High School. First shot, being the unpopular kid and all, ya know? Secretary of Assemblies. Easy win. I get to use the School’s money to put on fun, goofy events. Mimes, musical acts, whatever the case may be, I book acts, handle production, promotion; the whole nine yards. It sets the stage for much of my later life. I

am so weak at this point, that tennis is no longer an option, so I threw myself into producing the best events possible, and the student body digs ‘em. The Tennis Team makes me a “manager.” More a glorified mascot than anything. I appreciate that they let me hang around.

Too sick to barely even move, I’ve not attended school for some time. One day, Ken comes home with a broken hand. A “football injury.” I learn many years later that someone had asked Ken how I’m doing. Bill, a member of our rival Pooh “gang”, is within earshot, and answers for Ken. “Isn’t he dead yet?” Ken punched him in the head. Hence, the “football injury.” I appreciate that too. But not nearly as much as I appreciate –more and more as time goes on– how hard it must have been to share a home with a brother, son, step-son, step-brother—who is withering away and dying before your eyes. And to remain loving and supportive throughout. God bless my family. God bless them all.

Given my “situation,” I really don’t have to conform to the norm. Even when I’m relatively well, I pretty much come and go as I please. I leave school early one afternoon –simply because I want to, and I can– and head toward the newly built Northridge Fashion Center, the pride of the Valley. As I drive into the parking lot, there is a somewhat massive demonstration taking place. A demonstration of ANY sort, in Northridge, in the late 70s? Unheard of. Well, here are three Neo-Nazis, in full-dress World War 2 Storm Trooper regalia, goose-stepping back and forth across the parking lot, while distributing anti-Semitic literature. Right away, I’m seeing red. It’s not like any family members had perished in the Holocaust. Maybe it’s more that I’m upset with what they stand for. Or more likely yet, ‘m just angry, and looking for an outlet. I rush back to school, and gather up a bunch of friends. I think that maybe Gregg was among them, but I can’t say for sure. Regardless, by the time we return to the mall, a real mob has gathered. A mob comprised of overweight, suburban Mothers, themselves seeing red. They stand on the fringes of the parking lot, as the Nazis, with smirks on their faces, march past them. As we join the epithet-hurling Moms, we too decided that hurling is a good idea. We pick up nice, heavy, sharp rocks, and… hurl away. Whap. Catch one right on the skull, and blood streams down his head. The Moms, emboldened, get in on the act. Now, what we have here folks, is a modern day stoning! The Teutonic Turds start to panic, and are actually rescued by rent-a-cop mall security. Rescued from a small group of teenagers and a flock of middle-aged, suburban Mommies. Nazi fucks. Cowards.

I’m at this time a contributing columnist to the Highlander, our school’s weekly newspaper. I write about this episode, and while I don’t have the draft anymore, I clearly remember it as one of the best things I’ve ever written. Rather than being incendiary, I remember it being even-keel. A commentary of why one people would feel so polarized to another; and indicting myself and “my” personal mob for acting in much the same way. Our school editor gave as his reason for not publishing it, is that it was “too controversial.” Conformist nerd. Coward. Boom.

—–

Doctor Skinner, the maestro who performs my second surgery, cuts me along my right side, from my pelvic bone, through my mid-section and all the way up along the right side of my chest. About 24 inches of incision, all in all. In the pre-op consultation, he explains to me, Dad and Brendie that within the male thoracic cavity lays a little-known physiological phenomenon known as “ganglia.” Apparently, these little devils are instrumental to making sperm. Doc Butcher, uh, Skinner, explains that he might have to cut through ALL of them, depending upon what he finds once he’s “in;” and that doing so might kill off ejaculation all together, and the chance of ever having biological children of my own. And all along, here I was worried that being a one-balled wonder might be the thing to affect that. Anyways, his warning never really registers. Nor is it questioned in any way, at all, by anyone. I’m 16, scared and a proverbial deer-in-the-headlights. The last think I’m thinking about is one day making little baby does. Also incredibly lethargic at the same time, I don’t have the energy –the process or presence of mind–to comprehend. Or care. Probably both.