revisiting the past is overrated

(1) I have just finished reading Billy Liar, which was hilarious to read when I was a teenager. But it has really dated, and this time I didn't enjoy it.

(2) The first rock band I ever saw was Deep Purple, at the Edinburgh Odeon. I was so impressed, I went out and bought a pair of black leather flared jeans, just Like Ian Gillan's. On TV last night I watched an old Deep Purple concert from about the same period. What a load of aimless noodling, posing and screaming!

(3) I once blogged about the time I had cancer, when I was a lot younger. A few months ago I heard that an old friend, with whom I lost contact many years ago, had breast cancer, and I made email contact. Since then, we have been renewing and deepening our friendship on-line, and I have tried to cheer her and distract her from her horrible treatment. Perhaps I was a little cocky in allowing myself to be portrayed as the success story, the guy who beat the big C. There are almost no cancer success stories, only works in progress.

In a post earlier this month, I said "I wouldn't mind dropping dead right now, life surely can't get any better than this." If only.

Last week I saw the doctor for a flu jab, and I mentioned a couple of strange sensations I have been feeling on my face for the past few months. She sent me to see a specialist the next day. I said to the guy "it's not really bothering me" but he said it was bothering him, he thinks it's something pressing on a nerve. "The kind of cancer you have likes to regrow in the nerves." So next Friday I'm going for a brain scan to see what, if anything, is going on in there.

Back in the mists of time, on the day when I got my first cancer, a good friend who was also a skilled counsellor said "name 5 positive things about having cancer." A little shocked, I went along with the idea, and started listing some of the advantages. I stopped at about 13, but I could probably have gone on.

That friend, like all my friends actually, now lives 10,000 miles away, but I've been trying on my own to think what might be some of the benefits if my brain scan goes badly. So far, I've got 3 items on my list: I can quit worrying about having no real pension entitlement when I retire; it's a great excuse to have a big clear-out of the junk in my house; and the anxiety is a free laxative. What a fortunate creature I am?

Obviously, if the scan goes well, I'll take my dear partner somewhere very ritzy for a celebration. I'll probably get blitzed for a week and start a whole new blog full of ground-breaking rude bits.