Radiation Radio

How '70s and '80s Hits Brought Me Peace During The Worst Month of My Life

I’m laying on my back, my torso is sticking out of the small MRI machine. My lower half is inside, currently covered by a miniature towel that seems useless at this point, as the radiation techs have already gotten a full, in-real-life view of all of me, as well as a high definition X-ray before the actual treatment starts in order to make sure my bladder is adequately full, something they assured me is important for this whole procedure.

My hands are wrapped around a little foam circle, making it easy to keep my arms up at chest level and away from the radiation they’re currently beaming into my pelvis—four spots marked by tiny tattooed dots on my legs and lower abdomen that I can show you but you’d never find otherwise.

I’m staring up at the sky. Not a real sky, mind you. I’m in the basement of a hospital since, after all, the area is filled with rooms where they blast harmful radiation. This sky is a picture laid over the fluorescent light. It’s a clear blue sky with just enough clouds, with a few branches leaning into view, giving off the appearance of spending a lazy summer day under a tree. There’s even a blue light in the ceiling to make things feel a little more peaceful.

The speaker inside the MRI machine, which is controlled by the techs just on the other side of the very thick wall, is playing “Dust In the Wind.”

In this moment, receiving hopefully life-saving, or at the very least life-prolonging, cancer treatment, it’d be natural to hear “Dust In the Wind” and start to think about your own mortality. How this disease has taken countless lives, and even though your prognosis has been good and the treatment has proven to work, you’re not immune to becoming another statistic, another casualty of a disease spoken about in hushed tones and “god forbids.”

Instead, I’m chuckling, or at least trying to do so minimally so as to not misalign my tattoos from the beam, because right after “Dust In the Wind” fades out, its complete polar opposite comes on. I’m dressed like Winnie the Pooh, being filled with radiation harmful enough to warrant a warning sign outside in the hallway that the beam is on, and that no one should come inside the 6-inch thick door. But here I am, getting a Chernobyl Raw Dog to the sweet tunes of “Don’t Stop Believin’.” It’s almost like the Pandora algorithm overcorrected for its mistake.

“Shit, we accidentally played the song about fading into the ethereal nothingness while this kid was getting cancer treatment. Quick, do something!”

Days later, I’d lay there and chuckle again as Kenny Loggins’ “Danger Zone” played.

---

I was on the radiation table every day for 32 days. Well, 32 business days. I had the weekends off. Every morning, I took the bus across the Schuylkill to Penn, rode the crowded elevator to the basement, said hi to the friendly front desk staff who quickly remembered me by my face (and long hair at the time), and I waited with my little vibrating disk like you get at a shitty chain restaurant to tell you your table is ready. When it buzzed, I’d go don my surgical gown and sip water while I waited for my table to be called, at which point I’d trudge back to the radiation room, clutching the back of the loosely tied gown so as to not moon all of the medical staff just trying to get through their own work days. (I was more attentive to this than some patients.)

The process of radiation isn’t wholly unpleasant in the moment, honestly. It’s pretty easy, in fact. You just lay there for about 6 minutes while they do an X-ray to ensure that your bladder is “comfortably full” (read: at the point where you kind of have to pee) and then eventual treatment happens. You don’t actually feel anything.

For me, however, there was a slight hitch in the process that made it less fun than it already was. Because of the location of my treatment, and the fact that at 29 I’m still a viable specimen of a man, they wanted to protect my privates from unnecessary harm. What that meant is that every morning, as I lay there in my surgical gown, clutching my little foam circle to keep my arms out of the way, two radiation techs would lift up my gown and the towel ostensibly used to create a sense of privacy, and place what is called a “clamshell” around my genitals.

Picture, if you will, a soda can. Now, imagine that soda can cut in half long ways. Now, imagine both of those pieces of soda can are about 8 lbs. each and made of solid concrete to prevent too much radiation from penetrating them. Now, imagine the Hurt Locker act of carefully putting those two pieces together around the most sensitive area known to man.

Some days were more successful than others.

To be fair here: I cannot overstate how professional and thoughtful the Penn radiology techs were throughout this process. They made it as comfortable as humanly possible to be manhandled into a lead chokey day in and day out.

But it was an uncomfortable process no matter how wonderful the staff was to me. And, because of that, I relied on the music as a means of temporary escape.

After I noticed on my first day that they played Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy,” and thought about how I was not, in fact, going crazy, I started paying attention every day to what songs played while I received treatment. I kept an ongoing log first in my head, and then on Spotify, eventually culminating in a playlist I called “Radiation Radio.” It’s not bad, honestly. You could play it at a cookout and probably get a few compliments, none of your guests any the wiser that it was crafted by a man currently going through cancer treatment hell.

It’s full of synthed out ‘80s classics and ‘70s car rock. (Except for two occasions where Matchbox Twenty sneaked in there—a not unwelcome intrusion in my opinion.)

As the weeks of treatment continued, my body took more of a hit. The effects were delayed and cumulative, meaning that each week was worse than the last. Unlike chemo infusions, where I had to endure a few days of sickness and then feel back to 100% in time to get back on the intravenous horse (not heroin), radiation made me feel worse with just about each new day. Toward the end, I was dragging myself into the radiation oncology area of the hospital. At the beginning, I insisted on wearing “real clothes” to prove to myself that I was still a functioning member of society despite all of this. You used to have to dress up to go to baseball games or fly on an airplane, god damn it!

As the weeks wound down, though, I was sweatpants personified. My stomach was constantly in knots. My skin was dry and uncomfortable. I was putting on my happiest face for the friendly front desk staff and wonderful techs. But I felt like shit, man. I really did.

Keeping track of those songs became a mission, a reason for going back every day aside from the fact that the radiation would shrink my tumor enough to make eventual surgery more doable. No matter how shitty I felt on the day, no matter how much I wanted to go home and get back in bed, I’d whip out my phone while I changed out of my surgical gown and add the two or three songs from that session to my ongoing playlist before I forgot. I had started this project, I had to finish it.

It also provided a useful distraction while I laid there staring up at that fake sky, careful not to move a muscle below the belt out of fear of the concrete slab shifting. It was my own game of “name that song.” I’d challenge myself to see how quickly I could recognize an intro riff, a synth line, a drum beat. I could, for a few moments, sort of exist somewhere other than where I was – currently being zapped by what otherwise would be a form of evil genius torture. 

I could think about how “American Pie” is the longest song ever written. I thought about how we all get hyped up for the drum part of in “In the Air Tonight,” but how it’s the only exciting part of an otherwise dreadfully boring song. I thought about the cafeteria scene in Animal House when they played Sam Cooke’s “(What A) Wonderful World.”

“I’m a zit. Get it?”

And before I knew it, the table would jerk to the side just slightly enough to indicate that I was finished, and I’d glide out from under the MRI tube. The techs would come back in to greet me, once again carefully removing the clamshell with (usually) expert precision. (Some techs were better at this than others. One time one of the male techs, after being complimented by a female colleague on his execution of this particular task, winked at me and said “It takes one to know one.” That’s true, now get this damn thing off of me.)

They’d ask what I was going to do this weekend, and I’d say something along the lines of “Oh, probably just take it easy,” a way to say without saying that I felt awful and only have about two good hours in me a day before I’m back to laying on the couch or running to the bathroom.

I had told the one tech that I enjoyed cooking, and he’d ask if I made anything good lately. “Nah, nothing too special,” I’d say, which meant “Bro, I haven’t been able to stand for more than 20 minutes and my appetite is nonexistent. I haven’t cooked in weeks.”

Cancer treatment sucks, dog. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. If they do, they’re a chemo salesperson.

I feel a lot better now. I’m just about two weeks out from my last day of this particular treatment, and I’m already able to do a ton of the things I wasn’t able to do previously. I’ll walk to the grocery store. I’ll ride my bike to the pharmacy. I’ll have a beer with my friends while we watch soccer. I’ll clean out the litter box. I’ll lift some weights. I’ll cook dinner. Hell, I’ll even eat dinner! All of it!

Michele asked me, when I told her about the playlist, if those songs would open some wounds the same way other things have been permanently etched in my brain as “bad sick things.” Certain foods I forced down my throat when I was sick during my first rounds of chemo that I haven’t been able to even think of eating. The video games I played through nauseated eyes that I don’t even want to look at now. Would “Don’t Stop” by Fleetwood Mac trigger some Pavlovian episode where I’d start puking? No, I don’t think it will. I hope not, because this is also basically the soundtrack to your local Target. I can’t be throwing up in Target all the time. That’d be uncouth.

I think I’ll be ok hearing these songs because this playlist was a way to transcend the shittiness of it all. It was a way to break through and see the objective wackiness of what was happening to me in the moment. And in those moments where I’d think about how weird it was that I was receiving radiation treatment to the tune of Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “Relax,” I felt better because it’s funny as hell.

Some of this shit is really weird. A lot of it is really weird. And recognizing that weirdness and silliness made it easier every day to get out of bed. I had a mission beyond “survive.” I had a stupid playlist to make. Music has always had a part in my life, whether I was listening to it, writing about it or playing it with my friends. So, it’s only natural that I’d find some way to incorporate it into All This. And it made me genuinely happy every day when I otherwise wasn’t finding a ton to be happy about.

And now maybe you’ll listen to it while you cook dinner. While you ride your bike. While you mow the lawn. Hopefully, no one reading this will ever have to receive radiation treatment. But, if you do, maybe you’ll get a nice chuckle out of a cheesy ‘80s song providing the soundtrack, and it’ll give you a few minutes of silly peace.

---

Today’s Snakes and Sparklers musical guest is Caracara.

---

Did you enjoy this? Now that I’m feeling better, I’m hoping to become more active with this again. Don’t worry. It won’t all be about cancer treatment. Some of it will be because, well, how often does a noteworthy event like this fall into a writer’s lap? But a lot of it won’t be, too! So, with that in mind, maybe consider subscribing or telling some friends about this newsletter?