Well, here I have landed. After a thirty-year cancer recurrence last May, a bunch of surgeries and follow-ups and dental implants, new teeth, new speech prosthesis (for an example of what I am doing, click here), some triumphs and some blasts of disappointment, I have landed here yet again.

Lots of dentists and doctors over the years said, “nope, no dental implants for you buddy- too much radiation, too risky, might bust the jawbone and ruin your life forever” so I gave up on that. One day the BLD (Brilliant Lady Doctor/Dentist at MD Anderson Cancer Center Houston) said, “oh, yeah I can” and she proceeded to do so and now I have implants and new, functioning teeth and a smile.

Lots of doctors over the years said “I wouldn’t operate on that neck flap area, too risky, might not heal. Sorry you look funny, but that’s just life.” One day the BCD (Brilliant Chinese Plastic Surgeon Doctor at MD Anderson) said “hey, let me do your new flap and I will fix that old ugly stuff too” and he did. He said I had plenty of good blood supply to the area, healing no problem. I’m fully healed, I look much more normal, and I can go to the grocery store without small children running screaming into their mother’s arms pointing open-mouthed and speechless at the monster-man carrying the pigs’ feet.

First thing the BLD surgeon said to me on my first day there was, “Hey, how long has it been, we should get you talking”. Not “sorry, this is going to be long and hard and may not work” or “not sure what to do about this” or “half your head and jaw are about to disappear”, but “hey, you should be talking”. And now, I am. It took her three tries, the first two failures, third time the charm, and today I am talking. After thirty years of silence, writing pads, frustration, sadness, you name it- I am talking. Not pretty yet, kind of gurgly and burpy, but saying words and cussing my brother on the phone. He said I sounded just like "the old me, drunk". She didn’t give up, shook off the advice from one doctor not to bother, kept on trying, and never stopped smiling with me.

I still can’t eat solid food because I can’t open my mouth wide enough to get any in there, or chew it once it is. But, the BLSpeechTherapist is getting me a device to exercise my mouth, stretch the scar tissue in there, and one of these days I am going to inhale a bratwurst, a tamale, and an entire roast chicken, and then I am going to commence to eat some by-God food like a real Texas man.

I am not saying bad things about those doctors who wouldn’t or couldn’t fix me. They were giving what was the best advice they had to give. I guess I am saying that if you want to get something done and you have cancer, you should go where they are going to fix it, and usually can, and if they can’t that day or that year they probably will have invented a way to do it by the next.

Speaking of soup, this is a basic idea that I have been doing variations on this week:

Winter Vegetable Soup

1 Russet Potato

1 Carrot

1 Sweet Potato

1 Celery Stalk, ends put into the stock pot

1 Yellow Onion or a couple of leeks, peeled, washed, chopped, green parts into the stock pot

Chicken Broth that you made from scratch from said stock pot

Dried wild Thyme gathered in the Minervois in your Secret Spot

Bay Leaf from your tree out back

Parsley from your potted plant that never freezes

Winter Squash, roasted and scooped out. (Place in a 350 oven for whatever it takes to cook the flesh.)

2 or 5 pieces of good bacon or dry-cured pork or whatever you feel like along that line

Couple of tablespoons of good butter or some heavy cream to tas

te

Bread

Gratitude

Good wine from Domaine Sainte Leocadie down the road

Good mess around music going in the background

Peel the potatoes, cut into chunks. Chop celery, onion, add all vegetables and herbs to heavy pan, cover with cold clean water, simmer until done, about half an hour. Add three pinches of coarse sea salt, a couple of grinds of pepper. Use an immersion blender or food processor or blender to puree the vegetables. Remove the bay leaf unless it is too late, in which case it didn’t matter anyway. Add the butter and stir, or add some cream and stir until the color is inviting. Serve it forth with bread and gratitude.

You can use any combination of potatoes, squash, celery or

no, pork or no, thyme or oregano or sage, butter or no. Just feel it, baby, feel it. Good for the soul.

Peace and Love,

Joe Gracey December 2009

Soup, Soup, Beautiful Soup!

Being on a liquid diet for six months has been a test of my patience, as has much of my life over the past three decades. I'm halfway through now and I cannot turn back so the only way out is to churn forward toward the distant shores of paradise, a plate of real food.

However, I can make and eat soup. Pureed soup only, which limits things rather sadly. Here is one that I really liked, though, and you could even do a cold version with mint like we had at the restaurant Fish in Paris at our home base in St. Germain.

Split Pea Soup

1 cup dried split peas

4 cups boiling water or broth

1 yellow onion, peeled and chopped

1 large garlic clove, minced

1 stalk celery

1 T. dried thyme leaf

1 bay leaf

1 handful fresh Italian parsley, chopped

1/2 lb cooked or dried ham, chopped

Freshly ground pepper, sea salt

Ground parsley for garnish, reserved

Heavy Cream, for garnish, reserved

Put the peas into boiling water or broth, turn the heat off, and let rest for one hour. Add the remaining ingredients and simmer until peas are soft, about two hours. At this point I pureed the soup and served it in bowls garnished with a sprinkling of parsley and a nice little ribbon of cream floating on top.

Random Thoughts about Health Care

We just played at the Edmonton Folk Festival up in Alberta, Canada. Great festival,smoothly run and one we wish we could play every week forever.

I made it a point to ask the Canadians how they felt about their health

photo Alan Budd

care and the answer was uniformly positive, even effusive, with tales about how people had been spared bankruptcy and death by it. Not one negative word. The Canadians thought we were rubes to be so afraid of what they have.

It has been the same experience as we have traveled and worked in the UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Holland, Scandinavia. Not one horror story. Sure, you may have to wait six months for non-emergency surgery if it involves a very specialized type of care, but you can also get really good quick treatment in the most out-of-the-way locations as well.

This swill that the right wingers are peddling about this subject is irritating when it is merely ignorant and makes me mad as hell when it is cynical and calculated, as in the case of Ms. Palin, that most despicable of humans, or William Kristol, whose ego long ago eclipsed his sense of decency. Or in the case of John Mackey, whose wealth and power have turned him into a selfish, nasty little man. I won't go back to Whole Foods, John, and thanks so much for your sense of mercy and kindness to us little guys down here at your feet.

I am literally living proof of the necessity for humane, affordable health care. I have been dealing with cancer now for thirty years and I won't go into the financial details now, but let me be clear: if it were not for the fact that I have access to health care, I would be bankrupt (or rather, my family would) and dead. I am uninsurable; I have pre-existing conditions. Apparently the Republican Party is ready to cast me and all the others like me onto the ice of greed and let us float away into the darkness. If John Mackey thinks that be eating food from his grocery store would keep me from any of these problems, then he is a fool.

I am tired of shallow thinking, lack of understanding, and loud nonsense about Hitler and Socialism. Americans had better lift this country up out of this petty little mire we are in, and fast, or we won't have enough left to cry over one of these days.

Kimmie Rhodes and Joe at the Edmonton Folk Festival

photo Alan Budd