DECEASED SOUL VISITS MAGNOLIA

Many  years  ago,  in  1978,  before  I  married  or  lived  in  Magnolia,  I  had  a  minor  stroke  and  a  Near  Death  Experience  in  which  I  was  told  that  I  had  "too  much  to  do"  before  I  would  be  allowed  to  die.  Although  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  my  wife  Rise`'s  subsequent  interpretation  --  that  what  I  had  to  do  was  IMPROVE  MYSELF,  MORALLY  --  was  the  correct  one,  some  other  things  did  occur  which  could  qualify  as  things  left  to  do.

One  was  my  effort  to  evangelize  to  a  client  I'll  call  Joe  Doakes.  When  I  was  appointed  by  the  Court  to  represent  him,  I  knew  immediately,  from  my  experience  with  other  clients,  what  I  was  looking  at  --  a  male  who  had  been  sexually  abused  by  his  father  when  he  was  young.  When  I  told  his  paramour  this,  she  roared  with  laughter  and  said  I  was  wrong.  Years  later,  she  called  me  and  told  me  that  Joe's  brother  had  shocked  her  by  confirming  that  I  was  right.

I  ended  up  representing  Joe  in  about  10  cases.  We  did  pretty  well  in  those  cases.  Joe,  however,  was  one  who  did  not  know  to  not  bite  the  hand  that  fed  him.  On  one  occasion,  on  returning  from  court,  I  found  him  inside  my  home,  removing  my  favorite  china  closet  from  the  living  room  after  falsely  convincing  my  son  that  he  had  bought  it  from  me!  

On  another  occasion  he  stopped  by  my  house  to  borrow  $50  from  me.  A  heroin  abuser,  he  was  obviously  in  withdrawal.  I  said,  "No,  Joe.  I'm  not  going  to  subsidize  your  habit.  However,  take  advantage  of  your  withdrawal.  Instead  of  feeding  the  habit,  let's  get  you  into  a  program  now  --  today."  He  said,  "Pete,  that's  a  good  looking  station  wagon  you  have  there,"  implying  that  if  I  didn't  pay  him,  he'd  steal  it.  "Joe,"  I  answered,  "Don't  do  that  to  me.  That's  so  low."

As  soon  as  he left,  I  drove  to  our  local  car  parts  store  and  bought  The  Club,  that  heavy  hardened  steel  bar  for  steering  wheels.  That  night  I  had  to  represent  someone  in  night  court  in  a  neighboring  town,  and  did  not  return  home  until  1:30  a.m.  I  sat  in   the  family  room  and  stripped  down  to  my  knickers  to  prepare  for  bed  while  I  watched  late  night  TV.  At  around  1:45  a.m.  a  car  with  its  headlights  on  pulled-up  outside  my  house,  and  I  heard  several  male  voices  arguing.  I  looked  out  the  window,  and  saw  about  5  men  standing  around  the  station  wagon,  pointing  at  The  Club on  the  steering  wheel.  I  jumped  up  and  clad  only  in  my  jockey  shorts  threw  open  the  door  and  jumped  off  the  front  stoop  and  started  screaming  like  a  lunatic.  The  thugs,  more  aware  of  the  dynamics  of  the  situation  than  I  --  if  I  caused  their  arrest,  they  would have  someone  do   something  like  burn  down  my  house,  right?  --  just  ignored  me.  Then  I  heard  Joe  Doakes  in  a  car  stopped  on  Warwick  Road,  in  front  of  our  house,  screaming,  "Steal  it!  Steal  the  f-----g  car!,"  obviously  unaware  of  the  problem  of  The  Club  on  the  steering  wheel.  The  thugs  decided  that  The  Club  made  the  car  too  hard  to  steal,  got  into  their  car  and  drove  away.  Then  Joe  Doakes  drove  away.

A  few  years  later,   Joe  called  me  from  a  hospice  in  Burlington  County  and  said  that   he  was  dying  of  brain  cancer.  He  had  always  insisted,  to  his  paramour,  that  he  was  "Catholic"  whenever  she  tried  to  entice  him  into  her  Protestant  assembly.  So,  I  asked  Joe  if  he  wanted  me  to  arrange  for  a  priest  to  give  him  Last  Rites.  "Sure!"  he  said,

"In  addition  to  an  anointing,  it  involves  a  final  confession  and  receipt  of  the  Eucharist,"   I  explained.   "Don't  worry  --  the  priest'll  help  you  through  the  confession.  But  I  have  to  warn  you  about  something,  Joe.  The  confession  is  no  good,  and  what  the  priest  does  has  no  effect,  unless  you  tell  him  your  worst  sins,  the ones  you're  really  ashamed  of.  You  know  what  I'm  talking about.  Otherwise,  you're  giving  evil  a  place  to  hide  in  you.  I'll  send  you  a  priest  who  is  a  friend,  and  you  let  him  know  how  you'll  need  help  with  your  confession.  Okay?"

"It  sounds  great,  Pete,"  he  responded.

I  sent  Fr.  Jerome  Romanowski,  who  is  dead,  now.  He  later  told  me,  "Obviously,  Pete,  the  Seal  of  Confession  prohibits  me  from  revealing  any  details,   but  I  can  tell  you  that  Joe's  confession  was  the  most  amazing  confession  of  my  career."  I  thought,  "Good!  Joe  swallowed  his  pride  and  did  the  difficult  thing  in  making  his  confession!"

And  Joe  died  shortly  thereafter.

The  other  incident  in  which  I  think  I  had  spiritual  impact  was  a  case  involving  a  deathbed  will.  My  typist,  whom  I  can  not  identify  because  her  name  is  so  distinctive,  referred  to  me  her  sister-in-law  Linda,  who  lay  dying  of  cancer  in  Garden  State  Hospital.  After  the  will  signing,  I  asked  her  my  client  if  she  was  Catholic,  and  did  she  want a priest for  "Last  Rites."

"I'm  not  Catholic,"  she  said,  "but  I'll  talk  to  you."

I  explained  that  "Last  Rites,"  in  addition  to  an  anointing,  involved  a  combination  of  a  final  confession  and  apology  to  God,  followed  by  receipt  of  the  Eucharist.

"Can  you  help  me  with  the  final  apology  to  God  for  my  sins?"  she  asked.

"Absolutely,"  I  said.  And  I  had  her  pray  privately  for  help  from  the  Holy  Spirit  to  be  mindful  of  her  sins,  and  sorry  for  them,  and  I  had  her  repeat  the  words  of  the  Catholic  Act  of  Contrition  after  me  --  an  invalid  substitute  for  the  Sacrament  of  Reconciliation  if  a  priest  is  available, if  one  is  Catholic,  but  a  good  alternative,  surely,  for  those  outside  the  Catholic  fold.

After  the  Act  of  Contrition,  I  left  Linda  alone.  Her  sister-in-law,  my  typist,  passed  me  going  up  to   Linda's  bedroom  as  I  was  leaving  the  hospital.

The  next  morning,  as  my  family  sat  at  the  breakfast  table  chomping  on  our  cereal,  my  middle  son  Reid,  who  was  about  5  at  the  time,  excitedly  said,  "Mom,  Dad,  did  you  see  the  bright  light  outside  our  windows!?  My  shade  was  up,  so  that   it  lit  up  my  entire  room!  I  looked  at  the  clock  beside  my  bed  after  it  went  away.  It  was  about  1:15  a.m."

When  I  went  upstairs  to  check,   I  saw  that  only  Reid's  window  shade  had  been  up  that  night.

A  little  later  that  morning,  my  typist  called  and  said,  "Pete,  I  was  with  Linda  when  she died  last  night.  She  was  in  great  distress  trying  to  stay  alive.  I  whispered  into  her  ear,  'Linda,  let  go.  God  is  waiting  for  you.'  And  she  did.  She  died  in  front  of  me."

"What  time?"  I  asked.

"1:15  a.m."

So,  here's  the  question:  Did  Linda  stop  by  the  house,  on  her  way  up,  to  say  "Thank  you?"

I  think  so.

HE NEVER PROMISED US A ROSE GARDEN

The  Church  has  been  a  special  challenge  to  us  all,  especially  me.   The  priest  sex  cases  are  a  terrible  stumbling  block  for  millions.  And  I  struggled  to  find  a  parish  which  would  sponsor  --  give  us  a  meeting  room  for  --  un-programmed  Bible  study.   If  no  priest  or  deacon  is  avaible  to  mentor  the  Bible  study  in  a  hands-on  way,  all  the  Church  will  tolerate  anymore  is  watching  television  --  watching  Bible  study  experts  giving  recorded  speeches.

Respecting  the  priest  sex  cases,   Father  Judge  High  School  --  my  high  school  --  in  the  early  1970s  was  one  of  the  first  cases  to  hit  the  headlines  with  news  of  cases  involving  sexual  abuses  in  our  era.  The  football  coach,  Mr.  Degnan,    and  a  priest  named  Fr.  Robert  Hermley  were  arrested  for  sharing   male  students  between  themselves.  I  at  first  had  trouble  believing  Philadelphia  Bulletin  and  Inquirer  descriptions  of  case  after  case  in  the  Phildelphia  area,  but  I  finally  became  a  "believer,"  when  it  dawned  on  me  that  no  one  is  going  to  falsely  volunteer  that  he  dropped  his  pants  and  bent  over  for  a  priest,  in  the  hope  of  winning  money  in  a  lawsuit.  Such  a  life-changing  admission  just  isn't  worth  it.

I've  tried  to  talk  to  priests  about  the  whole  phenomenon,  but  there  seems  to  be  a  general  policy  of  silence  on  the  subject  in  place,  consistent  with  diocesan  offices'  dishonest  denials  and  settlement  payments  in  return  for  silence  --  an  overall  policy  of  endless  stonewalling  with  explosive,  highly  destructive  results.

Damage  to  the  Church  from  the  phenomenon  seems  massive.   I  have  been  looked-at  like  I  am  crazy  when  I  tell  people,  "I  am  Catholic."

During  this  time,  I  fell  in  love  with  the  Bible  and  with  Bible  study.  I  ran  Bible  study  for  about  15  years  at  St.  Gregory's  Church  in  Magnolia.  The  pastor  tried  to  derail  our  group  a  few  times,  but  failed.  (There  were  about  30  of  us  in  the  group,  too  many  to  disrupt  easily.)  Finally,  he  simply  banned  us  from  the  church  premises  just  before  a  new  pastor  took  over,  as  though  sorely  embarrassed  at  our  utterly  orthodox  program.  (The  pastor  used  to  sit  in  on  the  sessions,  waiting  for  doctrinal  errors  to  crop  up.  Once,  when  I  said  that  Mary  "died"  before  her  assumption,  he  thought  he  had  me  and  he  stood  and  accused  me  of  "heresy"  in  public,  to  the  Bible  study  group.    I  privately  read  to  the  pastor  the  verses  from  the  assumption  encyclical  verifying  that  Pope  Pius  XII  affirmatively  taught  that  Mary  "died," using  that  word  in  the  official  Vatican  translation,   and  he  privately  acknowledged  his  error.)  For  several  years  I  searched  for  a  parish  interested  in  Bible  study,  without  success.   Lying  was  the  chief  tool  used  to  put  me  off  while  I  paid  my  parish  envelope --  "Pete,  I'll  meet  with  you  next  week ..."  "Pete,  I  have  to  break  my  appointment ..."  One  pastor  broke  his  appointment  about  18  times.

So,  why  do  I  call  myself  "Catholic"?

Well,  first,  Christ  foreshadowed  a  few  times  that  the  Church  would  generate  evil.  He  said  to  Peter,  5  minutes  after  appointing  him  head  of  the  Church  ("You  are  Peter  and  upon  this  rock etc."),  "GET  BEHIND  ME,  YOU  SATAN!"  When  Peter  tried  to  walk  on  water  he  succeeded  for  a  few  seconds  and  then  sank  in.  Sinking  into  water  is  a  typological  symbol  of  being  sinful.  (Remember  the  story  of demonically  possessed  pigs  drowning  themselves.)  And  then  Peter  denies  Christ  3  times  shortly  AFTER  a  clear  warning  to  him  that  he  would.

Also,  in  2  Thessalonians  2  Paul  warns  of  "the  apostasy"  to  precede  the  end  of  time.  Since  Paul  was  surrounded  by  "apostasies"  at  the  time,  Bible  commentators  assume  that  Paul  is  referring  to  something  enormous.  In  our  current  day  and  age,  vocations  have  plummeted.   Millions  whose  faith  has  been  made  cold  by  the  media  generally  and  the  sex  cases  in  particular  are  leaving  the  Church  annually.  Catholic  schools  --  the  Church's  biggest  evangelizing  tool  --  and  churches  are  shutting  down  everywhere.   I  believe  that  we  are  experiencing  "the  apostasy"  --  what  our  Fundamentalist  brethren  refer  to  as  "the  great  falling  away"  --  right  now,  as  I  write  this.

Nonetheless,   Christ's  purpose,  in  giving  us  an  imperfect  Church,  and  in  predicting  its  sins  and  through  Paul  its  eclipse,  was  to  prepare  us  for  the  future,  not  to  de-commission  the  Church.  It  has  to  do  with  the  nature  of  the  sacraments.  The  sacraments  can  operate  despite  the  imperfections  of  the  Church,  even  in  the  process  of  collapse,  despite  our  era's  ignorant,  mean-spirited  priests.  The  sacraments  are  a  generous  gift,  by  God,  of  shortcuts  to  salvation,  administered  by  His  officially  commissioned  organization,  the  Church  --  as  easy  as  it  can  get.  I  have  no  interest  in  leaving  the  "salvation  machine"  established  by  Christ.

I NEEDED A GYNECOLOGIST FOR MY EAR

Years  ago,  the  virulent  disease  MRSA  entered  our  house.  I  was  last  in  the  family  to  get  it.  It  nearly  killed  me.  The  powerful  antibiotics  given  to  me  at  the  hospital  to  save  my  life  killed  every  germ  in  my  body.  When  that  happens,  it  opens  the  floodgates  for  mold  infections  --  unaffected  by  antibiotics.  Suddenly,  I  had  a  wicked  ear  infection.

Dr.  Todd  Schachter,  DO,  our  family  doctor,  referred  me  to  an  ear,  nose  and  throat  specialist  in  Voorhees,  New  Jersey.  The  latter  doctor's  treatment  dragged  on  and  on  and  on,  for  week  after  week.  I'd  come  in   for  my  appointment,  shell-out  my  deductible,  bend  my  head  sideways  for  carefully-administered  eardrops,  and  go  home  with  cotton  in  my  ears  and  a  prescription  for  ear  drops  at  home.

When  this  went  on  for  3  months,  I  became  suspicious.  Was  the  ears,  nose  and  throat  specialist  just  running  up  the  tab?  I  had  listened  carefully  when  he  said  that  I  had  a  Candida  albicans  infection  in  my  ear  --  a  common  yeast  infection.  I  checked  the  label  on  my  ear  drops  --  the  concentration  of  anti-yeast  medication  was  1%  of  that  if  my  wife's  vaginal  medication.  I  thought,  "WHAAAAAAT?"

So,  I  put  a  single  dab  of  vaginal  yeast  medication  of  a  cotton  swab,  spread  the  medication  in  my  ear  canal,  and  slept  on  it.

The  next  day,  my  Candida  infection  was  cured.

One  day  after  that,  I  had  my  appointment  with  the  ear,  nose  and  throat  specialist.  "Huh!"  he  said  as  he  examined  me,  "Your  infection's  all  gone!  How?"  As  though  he  knew  that  it  shouldn't  have  been.

When  I  told  Dr.  Schachter  the  story,  he  burst  out  laughing  and  said,   "I  should  have  referred  you  to  a  gynecologist."

NATURE STILL AROUND US

Years  ago,   an  angry  judge  anxious  to  not  let  a  case  in  his  courtroom  go  unresolved  put  the  case  last  on  the  night's  calendar,  and  forced  a  full  trial  of  the  matter.  At  4:00  a.m.,  the  case  concluded.   I  represented  Defendant.  I  don't  remember  if  my  side  prevailed.

As  I  tiredly  drove  through  the  warm  spring  darkness  up  Evesham  Avenue  and  turned  into  Camden  Avenue  toward  home  after  the  trial,  I  saw  the  distinct  outline  of  a  quail  in  the  middle  of  the  street  in  front  of  me,  and  I  heard   a  bird  sound  I  hadn't  heard  in  40  years ... "There's  Bob  White;  There's  Bob  White ..."  The  bobwhite  quail  call.

Back  around  the  early  1960s,  each  Summer,  I  and  my  brothers  and  sisters  would  sometimes  spend  about  two  weeks  on  the  farm  of  our  grandparents  in  Evesboro,  now  part  of  Evesham  Township.  The  farm  was  about  7  acres  on  what  was  then  called  Hog  Pond  Road,   now  North  Elmwood  Road  between   Church  Road  and  Medford-Evesboro  Road.  I  used  to  enjoy  getting  up  in  the  wee  hours  of  the  morning  at  the  farm,   opening  the  bedroom  window,  and  listening  to  the  sounds  of  the  rural  dawn.  At  a  particular  point  I  told  my  grandmother  that  I  liked  to  hear  the  lonely  whistle  of  a  bird  I  heard  every  morning  at  the  same  time  --  three  tones,  "peep,  peep,  PEEP!  Peep,  peep,  PEEP!"

"Oh,"  Grandmom  said,   "That's  the  bobwhite.  It's  a  quail  that  lives  around  here.   It's  called  a  'bobwhite'  because  when  it  peeps,  it  sounds  like  its  saying,  'There's  Bob  White!  There's  Bob  White!'"

Grandmom's  explanation  stuck  with  me.   And  so  I  was  all   the  more  amazed  to  hear  the  bobwhite's  dawn  call  to  me  that  morning  in  much-more-urban   Magnolia.

I  let  the  bobwhite  cross  the  street  in  front  of  my  car,  and  went  home.

RIGHT CLICK AND ENJOY THE MUSIC WHILE READING

Use  headphones  if  possible.   Click  on  link:  Faure'`s  Pavane.  Right  click  "Loop"  for  perpetual  looping  while  reading  my  blog  items ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpgyTl8yqbw

CANCER, THEN A GREEN BURIAL ?

Many  reading  this  blog  will  have  already  heard  that  suddenly  I  have  to  face  the  great  modern  dragon,   cancer.  I'm  a  lifetime  non-smoker,    though   as  a  kid  I  was  always  in  the  presence  of  my  chain-smoking  mother's  cigarette  smoke,  and  to  a  much  lesser  extent,   my  wife's  cigarette  smoke  --  she's  very  careful  to  avoid  smoking  in  my  presence.  And  while  the  cancer  which  I  contracted,   metastasizing  adenocarcinoma,  is  indeed cigarette  smoker's  cancer,  it  is  probable  that  its  origin  in  my  case  is  something  totally  other  than  cigarette  smoke  --  radon  gas  rising  out  of  the  soil  in  Magnolia.

Our  homes  in  Magnolia,  like  much  of  the  rest  of  Camden  County,   are  situated  upon  thick  layers  of  Pleistocene  marl  and  sand,   laid-down  by  ancient  inundations  over  an  enormous  piece  of  rock  called  the  Reading  Prong.

One  can  actually  see  outcroppings  of  the  Reading  Prong  jutting  above  the  surface  by  looking  left  while  traveling  north  on  Route  95  just  after  passing  over  the  Delaware  River  on  Scudders  Falls  Bridge  into  Ewing  Township.

The  problem  with  that  enormous  slab  of  metamorphic  rock  is  that  it  is  suffused  with  huge  amounts  of  highly  radioactive  isotopes  of  Uranium,   which  constantly  release  a  halo  of  deadly,  cancer-causing  Radon  gas.  Underground,  north-to-south,  the  Radon  gas  halo  permeates  and  saturates  the  gigatons  of  thick,  wet  sands  and  marls  resting  upon  it,   so  that   the  sands  and  marls  of  Magnolia  and  other  towns  in  Camden  County   have  zero  shielding  effect.   They  may  as  well  not  be  there,  as  far  as  protection  from  radiation  is  concerned.

And  so,  many  will  recollect  that  beginning  in the  late  1970s   and  early  1980s,   real  estate  transactions  began  to  warn  buyers  to  beware  of  Radon  gas.

Warnings  which  I  did  not  take  seriously  enough  --  no,   I  never  installed  the  little  fan  to  constantly  change  the  air  in  our  basement.

In  any  event,  probably  sometimes  in  2015,   something  in  my  body's  62  year  old  immune  system  gave  up  the  fight  for  survival,   and  a  single  Radon  gas  isotope  sticking  to  a  single  particle  of  dust  was  inhaled  by  me.  It  rushed  down  into  the  left  lobe  of  my  lung  and  sat  there  and  --  boom  --  it  spontaneously  split  into  either  Thorium  or  Lead,  slamming  a  neutron  into  a  nearby  cell  in  my  lung,   altering  the  DNA  in  it  in  a  way  that  mutated  it  into  a  single,  energetic  little  bastard  which  we  refer  to  as  a  metastasizing  adenocarcinoma   cancer  cell.

Suddenly,  the  Devil,  himself,  was  on  the  loose  in  my  body,  and  my  life  began  to  be  in  mortal  danger.

In  January  and  February,  2016,  an  unhappy  coincidence  occurred.  My  wife  Rise`  got  the  flu,   and  she  began to  cough.    I  began  to  cough  at  the  same  time,  and  our  coughs  sounded  the  same.   The  doctor  said  that  she  had  the  flu.  Rather  than  go  to  the  doctor  myself,   I  assumed,  "I've  got  the  flu,  too."   Rise`'s  cough  stopped.   My  cough  continued  --  and  changed.

I  had  made  myself  the  #2  champion  stair  stepper  on  the  Stair  Masters  at  LA  Fitness  in  Somerdale,  second  only  to  an  amazing  black  girl  there  named  Marcella  whom  Rise`  calls  one  of  my  "gym  wives."  My  weight  was  down  to  220  pounds  from  260.    In  March,   2016,  something  changed.    My  breathing  on  the  Stair  Masters  was  fine,  except  when  I  stopped.

Though  my  flu  coughing  had  stopped,  every  time  I  ended  my  Stair  Master  sets,  I  had  coughing  fits,  of  at  least  one-half  hour.  Here,  I  should  have  gone  to  the  doctor.

But  then  a  bad  coincidence  distorted  my  understanding  of  my  problem.   In  an  ill-advised  attempt  to  lower  my  systolic  blood  pressure  --  I  argued  to  the  doctor  that  he  should  leave  my  systolic  alone,  that  my  systolic  was  the  product  of  a  simple  feedback  loop  in  my  physiology  because  my body,  probably  my  brain,  demands  a  high  systolic,  perhaps  to  push  my  blood  through  decades  of  residual  damage  in  my  brain  from  years  of  transient  ischemic  attacks,  beginning  in  1978  or  perhaps  earlier  --  the  doctor,  over  my  objection,    changed  me  from  Norvasc  to  Benazepril.

I  can  feel  higher  blood  pressure  in  my  forearm  skin,  if  I  have  it.   I  immediately  felt  my  blood  pressure  skyrocket  upwards  in  response  to  my  Benazepril  doses.  My  new  blood  pressure  medicine  was  paradoxically  increasing,  not  decreasing,  my  blood  pressure,  for  some  reason.  I also  began  coughing  around  the  clock.

I  reported  the  same  to  my  doctor  one   morning.  He  told  me  that  I  was  "crazy."  I  said,   "Okay.  'Litmus  test:'  I'll  lay  off  my  dosage  till  I  come  in  for  an  exam  tomorrow.  Your  staff  can  do  before-and-after  BP  checks.  The  effect  is  nearly  immediate.  My  BP  will  skyrocket.  And,   they  will  see  me  start  coughing,  coughing,  coughing."   The  doctor  took  my  dare.   He  watched  my  systolic  skyrocket  after  taking  Benazepril,  as  I  began  coughing,  coughing,  coughing  --  really  deep,  scary-sounding  coughing.  Shocked,  he  took  me  off  Benazepril   and  put  me  back  on  Norvasc.

It  was  then  --  in  March  of  2016  --  that  I  discovered,  finally,  that  my  cough  came  from  neither  the  flu  nor  medication.  It got  particularly  fierce,  and  it  just  kept  happening,  for  no  apparent  reason.

And  then  the  cough  mutated  again.  As  I  reported  above,  at  L.A.  Fitness  in  Somerdale,   where  I  was  #2  champion  on  the  Stairmasters  after  my  "gym  wife,"  that  amazing  African  American  lady,  I  began  to  cough  with  genuine  ferocity  for  about  one-half  hour  after  one-to-two  hours  on  the  Stairmaster.  Staff  at  L.A.  Fitness  clearly  began  to  think  "tuberculosis,"  and  implied  that  I  might  want  to  get  a  diagnosis  before  continuing.  I.e.,  "Leave  us,  if  you  don't  have  a  doctor's  note  diagnosing  you."  Since  I  had  recently  awakened  in  bed  at  home  without  my  usual  cough  drop  between  my  cheek  and  jaw,  the  thought  occurred  to  me  that  I  had  inhaled  a  cough  drop.  Finally,  when  the  cough  just  wouldn't  go  away,  I  went  to  Dr.  Schachter,  our  GP  in  Somerdale.  He  arranged  for  carefully  done  x-rays  and  a  full  physical,  called  me  in,  and  said,  "Pete,  with  you  I  know  that  I  need  to  be  direct.  There's  no  doubt  about  it.  You  have  lung  cancer.  And  it's  not  just  lung  cancer.  It  has  already  metastasized."

Schachter  is  a  good  doctor.  I  knew  that  he  was  right.  I  said,  "Ah,  f - - k."  And  then,   "Poor  Tiny.  Poor  Tiny.  Poor  Tiny.  Poor  Tiny.  Poor  Tiny."  "Tiny"  is  my  nickname  for  my  wife  Rise`.

I  went  home  and  told  Rise`.   

Since  then,  I  have  gone  through  full-skull  radiation  for  the  growing  brain  tumors.  On  10  occasions,  my  head  was  bolted  to  a  table  in  a  radiation  machine  in  a  plastic  mask  

and  inundated  in  radiation  highly  destructive  to  brain  tissue,  and  hopefully  more  destructive  to  brain  tumors.  The  radiation  treatments  were  extremely  difficult  to  endure.   Though  my  head  was  bolted  in  place  for  my  protection  --  so  that the  radiation  struck  targeted  areas  only  --  I  could  tell  that  the  powerful  flesh-eating  radiation  was  also  eating  my  plastic  mask.  Every  time  the  machine  turned  on,  I  could  smell  some  kind  of  ionic  gas  streaming  off  the  mask  into  my  nose  and  mouth.  Yeeech!

And  now  I  have  begun  Chemo  for  all  cancer  below  the  neck  --  carcinomas  in  the  left  lung,   right  adrenal  gland,  liver,  and  all  through  my  bones.  The  bone  cancer  is  the  worst  so  far.   On  three  occasions,  cancerous  bone  tissue  in  my  upper  left  quadrant  spontaneously  snapped  during  absolutely  necessary  coughing  --  I  simply  absolutely,  positively  have  to  clear  the  bloody,  cancerous  discharge  which  slowly  gathers  at  the  top  of  my  left  lung  and  trachea,  with  coughing.  The  first  break  was  the  worst.  It  completely  disabled  the  coughing  function  --  each  cough  generated  absolutely  astonishing  pain  --  and  the  stuff  gathering  in  the  lower  quadrant  of  my  left  lung  clogged  things  up  and  gave  me  "walking  pneumonia."   The  medical  assistant  who  first  saw  the  bloody  discharge  of  cancerous  lung  tissue  in  a  test  in  a  doctor's  office  freaked-out  in  response.  I  angrily  said,  "Calm  down !   It's  why  I'm  here !  It's  why  people  come  to  doctors !  What  --  do  you  only  want  to  test  healthy  people ?!   Just  bag  the gauze  with  the  bloody  tissue  on  it,  note  the  discharge  in  your  notes,  and  continue  the  test!"

The  other  breaks  in  the  same  area  generated  almost  the  same  pain,  although  I  developed  a  technique  of  coughing  very  difficult  "gentle  coughs"  voluntarily  all  day  long  to  clear  the  cancerous  crap  out  of  my  lung  at  keep  it  from  gathering.  This  gives  me  some  sleep  at  night.

However,  the  lung  cancer  and  bone  cancer  breaks  generated  a  second  less  obvious  problem ...

We  are  pre-wired  --  well,  at  least  I  am  pre-wired  --  to  flip  over  in  my  bed  at  night  in  my  sleep  about  10  times,  left to  right,  right  to  left  --  for  comfort.

Suffocation  from  the  lung  cancer  makes  it  impossible  to  sleep  on  my  right  side  or  back.  Crappy,  cancerous  lung  tissue  in  my  left  lobe  touches  other  lung  tissue,  when  I  lay  right  or  on  my  back,  in  my  sleep,   and  I  get  less  O2,   and  I'm  up  in  a  flash.  (One  pulsox  check  caught  the  plummeting  O2  in  action,  so  far.)

Also,   the  breaks  in  my  upper  right  quadrant  of  my  back  are  comfortable  only  when  I  sleep in  my  left  side.

So,   I'm  stranded.  I  had  been  sleeping  on  a  hard  floor  in  the  family  room  at  night  to  escape  as  much  as  possible the  increase  in  the  suffocation  sensation  when I  lay  on  a  mattress,  but  bone  breaks  made  it  too  difficult  for  me  to  climb  to  my  feet  from  the  floor  unassisted  to  get  up  in  the  middle  of  the  night,  as  the  urges  to  flip  sides  (or  to  pee)  awakened  me.  So,  I  had  to  return  to  my  proper  place,  in  bed  next  to  the  most  wonderful  woman  in  the  world,  my  wife,  "Tiny-ness."  But  that  meant  foisting  my cancer  problems  on  her,  too  --  helping  me  in-and-out  of  bed  in  the  middle  of  the  night,  coughing  jerkily  next  to  her,  and  so  on  and  so  on.

Yech!

At  any  rate,  this  is  the  kind  of  thing  which  drives  sane  people  to  "putting things  in  order."

Among  other  things,  Rise`  and  I  have  done  something  fascinating  in  connection  with  preparing  for  our  --  and  especially  my  --    death  and  burial.

A  few  years  ago,  one  of  Rise`'s  beloved  nephews,  a  smoker,  died,  of  lung  cancer.  His  family  happened-into  and  chose  for  burial  a  cemetery  in  Cape  May  County,  New  Jersey  called  Steelmantown  Cemetery  where  green  burials  are  permitted.  A  green  burial  dispenses  with  all  but  basic  biodegradable  (non-formaldeyde)  embalming,  with  casket  and   concrete  sarcophagus,  and  transports  the  body  in  a  shroud  to  the  point  of  burial  by  wooden  cart.  We  --  well,  at  least  I  did  --  went  a  little  bit  afraid  that  the  burial would  comprise  "something  funky."

I  was  dead  wrong  (an  approriate  pun !). Instead,  I  found  the  burial,   divested  of  modern   accoutrements   of  human  burial,  to  be  HOLY,  to  be  MORE  BIBLICAL !

So,  BE  BALLSY !   Pre-purchase  cemetery  lots  for  yourselves  and  your  families  at  Steelmantown  Cemetery,  at

http://www.steelmantowncemetery.com/

A SIN WHICH I SHOULD CONFESS ???

I  just  discussed  the  following  moral  question  with  my  family.   They  laughed  and  said  that  I  acted  properly.  This  is  a  good  place  to  seek  public  comment.

I  have  always  been  a  library-goer.  One  night  years  ago  --  maybe  30  years  ago  --   I  was  kay-ing  my  vehicle  out  of  my  place  in  the  lot  at  the  library  when  there  was  an  unexpected  "CRUNCH"  in  back.  I  jumped-out  and  walked  back  and  saw  that  I  had  backed-into  the already  ripped-up  fender  on  the  already  essentially  demolished  car  body  of  the  vehicle  behind  me.  No  exaggeration  at  all,  I  promise,  the  vehicle  really  did  look  like  a  survivor  of  a  dozen  demolition  derbies.  No  part  of  the  body  was  undented.  It  was  the  kind  of  car  where  a  cop  called  to  the  scene  by  me,  if  I  were  scrupulously  honest,  would  think  that  I  was  crazy  for  reporting  it,  risking  entanglement  with  a  nut-case  vehicle  owner  trying  to  finance  total  body  reconstruction  with  a  fraudulent  massive  claim.

Soooooooooo,  I  looked  around  carefully.  I  saw  no  security  cameras,  and  I  was  in  the  darkest  part  of  the  lot.   I  climbed  into  my  driver's  seat  and  drove  home.

Technically,  I  violated  the  New  Jersey  Hit  &  Run  Laws  by  leaving  the  scene  of  a  very  minor  accident  in  which  I  re-damaged  a  severely  damaged  fender  of  an  empty,  already-badly-damaged  car,  already  not  much  better  than  this  close  facsimile ...

I  never  got  caught.  Did  I  sin?  As  a  Catholic,  should  I  have  confessed  it?   As  a  lawyer  at  the  time,  should  I  have  been  disbarred?

We  all  know  what  the  internet  is  like ... every  anonymous  nut-case  comes  crawling  out  from  under  his  or  her  rock  in  response  to  something  like  this  and  screams,  "DISGUSTING !!!"   Are  you  one  of  the  nutcases ?   Am  I  disgusting ? How  will  God  respond  to  this ?