a radio was on.

Tracy Brown passed on from the material world today at 1:44 p.m.  She was surrounded by loved ones, including all of her children.   One of Tracy’s favorite pictures said, “Somewhere just out of sight, the unicorns are gathering.”  I (Kyle) bet Tracy is now gathering with them.  She could not have been more loved.

For anyone who might want a message read to Tracy, please feel free to leave a message in the comments.  We will be sure to read anything left in the comments to Tracy. 

It’s Kyle writing.  Tracy had a series of seizures on Saturday.  She was rushed to Massachusetts General Hospital.  Scans suggested that Tracy has leptomeningal disease, which means the cancer is in her cerebral spinal fluid.  She also has lesions in her frontal lobe, temporal lobe, and cerebellum.  The leptomeningal disease is the real issue, though.  The steps that could be taken to contain the cancer did not present quality of life for Tracy, and she continues to have seizures.  The decision was made to move her to hospice today.  Rest assured Tracy is being kept comfortable and surrounded by so much love. 

And so the winter passed and the writing ceased. I spent time in my body, which seems to me to be slowly failing as I try one medicine after another. I got kicked out of a clinical trial when the cancer progressed right away. I tried another clinical trial medicine that dragged my blood pressure into the basement. I had back surgery again. I got a port. I dug deep into my body and it was not a place of light. Some of you may have noticed I stopped consistently responding to texts--a flurry one day and then the silence of a snowfall the next.  I got a little cynical, which was not attractive. "Oohh, a clinical trial," people would exclaim excitedly. As if a clinical trial was good news. And I thought of all the mice who took the medicine before I got the nod. These are phase one trials. Of course, the people running the trial have reason to believe there is some efficacy to the drugs, but phase one also means the real goal of the study is to identify a dosage that is not toxic...

A thread of sadnesses, a crowd of sorrows, a clutch of fears. An ambush of tigers. A sloth of bears. A murder of crows. A range of mountains. A forest of trees. A flight of stairs. And why not a clutch of fears?  I went to see my surgeon yesterday. I think of him as mine now, because that's how my team refers to him. As in, we need to run these scans past your surgeon. When I met with him, he was much warmer to me than he was in the spring. Maybe he is starting to think of me as his patient.  He specializes in orthopedic oncology and is startlingly frank about my cancer (I think of the cancer in my body as mine, too). "That leg is full of cancer," he says, as an aside. I know that already, so it doesn't strike new fear into my heart, but it does feel a little like a soft drumbeat in my mind, where I keep my clutch of fears when they haven't wandered into my heart.  You might remember I had surgery on my left leg last winter. I had a plate put into the left leg in ...

And another summer's week at the Cape. All the children are here: Cameron, Kaitlyn, Zachary, Avery, Zoe, Asher, Elijah. And Dave, Kaitlyn's husband. And my niece Katie, and her girlfriend from Texas, Rachel. Tomorrow Kanika arrives, Cameron's wife.  Everyone was scattered through the first floor, making lemon zucchini cake, playing a complicated board game called Everdell, resting on the white furniture (why??) shimmying to Avery's playlist. And Zoe said, "Are they all yours?" in a sarcastic, Massachusetts accent.  Years ago, when the kids were Asher and Elijah's age, this is how we were greeted once at Honeydew Donuts. "Are they all yours?" Yes, I said then, shelling out eight dollars for four donuts and an iced coffee.  Yes, I say now, although they have multiplied, have various mothers and fathers, coupled and uncoupled with sundry partners, and yes, although they aren't strictly all mine, they are mine to be with, mine to love.  I'll ...

The New Yorker introduced me to the concept of interoception last week. It's simply our ability to feel what's happening inside our bodies. A "portmanteau of interior and reception." A consciousness about our own body's inner processes. A breakthrough to the surface: the body is exhausted--we think: I'm so weary, I need sleep. An unconscious knowing: our brain detects high glucose levels in our liver and releases hormones triggering metabolic changes. A response on the part of our bodies and minds to what will happen next, a forecasting of the future. This last idea confuses me: is this kind of interoception unconscious or conscious or somehow both? The article spoke of cancer, but not in the way I needed. A study suggests tumors consume huge amounts of energy and interoception might offer a way to alert us to cancer earlier. Totally unconsciously, so measured by what? Changes in blood measurements? I don't know--the research is in its infancy.  What I...

 I grew up in Ohio, and the ocean we went to for vacations was the Atlantic Ocean, and the shore was in South Carolina.  We would drive ten hours in the car to get there and we would stay in a house known to us from 3 or 4 lines of print--maybe less, because what was there to say--in a thick rental brochure which would arrive in the cold, bleak spring of Ohio. Houses to rent were just listed, entry after entry in super small print--with no photos--just the information (three bedrooms, full bath, outdoor shower) and the quality for which you paid more: how many blocks back from the beach.  My father would pick a house and we would take this long 16 hour drive to get there, crowded in the back seat, the three of us kids, looking for license plates, playing word games, trying to keep our fussiness quiet back there. We would pick up the key from a rental agency and drive to the house, and there it was. Usually musty, with metal bunk beds and thin mattresses.  I didn't ca...

Last Friday evening, I went to a potluck dinner at Asher's new school, bearing foil tins of bean burritos and brownies, cupcakes with thick white frosting and golden sprinkles.  The school sits in an office park in Winchester and the playground is a makeshift, gorgeous set of structures and wild tire swings and rocky hiding places built in the trees at the edge of the parking lot.  There were clotheslines and miniature laundry clips you could hang homemade art from--with the markers on the wooden table, I drew a photo of a sparkling eye.  To be loved is to be seen, I wrote, because I was watching Asher run happily through the trees, now at the basketball court, greeting the school director with what looked like real pleasure, the night darkening as musicians played saxophone and the most diverse and cerebral group of people circulated with plates of pizza and Korean barbecue.  Even after just a month or so, Asher is himself at school, and he is at home at school....

The little boys and Sebby and I are staying in a tiny, perfectly renovated house on the far west end of Commercial Street in Provincetown. Sebby has been in a sustained anxiety attack since we got here--I now see how quiet his life in Carlisle is.  At home, we often go for walks and never see another person, another dog.  Here the streets are absolutely jammed with people, sometimes quite drunk, and the dogs--oh, the multitudes.  Asher said he thinks this is a good community because they like gay people and dogs are allowed everywhere.  Which is probably a perfectly great way to assess a town.  But Sebby is absolutely overwhelmed and I don't think I would bring him next time, if there is a next time.  He does love swimming at the town beach, but I cannot tell you just how bad he smells after that--kind of like a dead seagull.  And since he is glue to me in our tiny house, I must then force him into the shower, where I bathe him with the boys' all-in-on...

The little boys and Sebby and I are staying in a tiny, perfectly renovated house on the far west end of Commercial Street in Provincetown. Sebby has been in a sustained anxiety attack since we got here--I now see how quiet his life in Carlisle is.  At home, we often go for walks and never see another person, another dog.  Here the streets are absolutely jammed with people, sometimes quite drunk, and the dogs--oh, the multitudes.  Asher said he thinks this is a good community because they like gay people and dogs are allowed everywhere.  Which is probably a perfectly great way to assess a town.  But Sebby is absolutely overwhelmed and I don't think I would bring him next time, if there is a next time.  He does love swimming at the town beach, but I cannot tell you just how bad he smells after that--kind of like a dead seagull.  And since he is glue to me in our tiny house, I must then force him into the shower, where I bathe him with the boys' all-in-on...

Hello friends.  It's been a moment.  I opened up computer today to turn back to writing and discovered this unpublished blog I wrote in April.  I'm going to sent it out and work on a new one--I'm in Provincetown with the twins and Sebby, and its our last day, so I'm certain to be interrupted by the need to get to Herring Cove at high tide, but I'm hoping to begin writing again and anew.  Psalm 91:10 is translated variously. There shall no evil befall you. Nor will any plague come nigh thy dwelling. There shall no evil befall thee.  Neither shall any plague come nigh thy tent. Harm, of course, does come to all of our tents.  Sometimes, the harm comes from without, sometimes from within.  The Bible knows this: it is full of harms, of infertility and adultery, of war and disease, of hunger and of jealousy, of vengeance and of sacrifice. Kate Bowler taught me about the prosperity gospel: "its bold central claim that God will give you your heart's desires: ...

Hello friends.  It's been a moment.  I opened up computer today to turn back to writing and discovered this unpublished blog I wrote in April.  I'm going to sent it out and work on a new one--I'm in Provincetown with the twins and Sebby, and its our last day, so I'm certain to be interrupted by the need to get to Herring Cove at high tide, but I'm hoping to begin writing again and anew.  Psalm 91:10 is translated variously. There shall no evil befall you. Nor will any plague come nigh thy dwelling. There shall no evil befall thee.  Neither shall any plague come nigh thy tent. Harm, of course, does come to all of our tents.  Sometimes, the harm comes from without, sometimes from within.  The Bible knows this: it is full of harms, of infertility and adultery, of war and disease, of hunger and of jealousy, of vengeance and of sacrifice. Kate Bowler taught me about the prosperity gospel: "its bold central claim that God will give you your heart's desires: ...