Chemoddity Fetishism: 1) The state wherein social relations are transformed into apparently objective relationships between medical treatments and metastasis; 2) An illusion arising from the central role that privatized medicine plays in the convalescing social process; 3) an irrational idolization or visceral veneration...of chemotherapy treatments. (Sentence Usage: The remedial nature of medical treatments is complicated by the abstraction of chemoddities, or chemoddity fetishism.)
Before falling asleep last night, I was waxing enthusiasm over the final infusion only a few days away. In my conversation with Daniela, I anticipated an eagerness for closure, but instead was confounded by her comments. Her words tempered my eagerness. "After this last treatment, I'm going to have a crisis of faith," she disclosed. "...faith in what?" I pried. Her response amazed me: "Faith in chemotherapy... right now, I know that there is something working to stop cancer. After chemotherapy...what happens? We just wait." Her comments revealed a re-imagined chemotherapy. Her concerns transformed the treatment of toxic infusions into more abstract constructions, chemotherapy as...protector, insurance, safeguard, oasis, haven, refuge, sanctuary and shelter. (Pale shelter, literally.)
Instead of an escape from chemotherapy, she wanted to escape into it. Avant-garde images began to drip from my imagination...the plastic bag of curative toxins syphoning her upwards through the translucent tubing, a corrupted version of the genie in a bottle...self-exiled into the toxic elixir...the comforts of amniotic fluid replaced by the praetorian potions of Taxotere and Cytoxan...a disturbing notion of insulating toxicity.
Daniela's anxiety about the future had crafted a reality part magical realism, part medical realism...an idealized remission nurtured by the intersection of infinity and chemotherapy. Some philosophers and social scientists have qualified reality as a social construction. Daniela had re-qualified it as a septic construction. As I meditated, I did not question her comments...the incarcerated characterization of herself within this constructed reality. I looked at her and smiled. I kissed her goodnight and asked myself a simple question.... How do I plan her escape?
1 comment:
Cara Daniela, noi cristiani in questi giorni ci prepariamo per festeggiare la Pasqua. Si sente nell'aria un lontano rintocco di campane e sono certa, certissima, che quelle campane sono quelle della nostra amata Cattedrale di Noto. Suonano a festa per tutti noi e suonano a festa per te perchè stai lottando con una tenacia incredibile contro questo maledetto cancro e prego Dio ogni giorno affinchè ti aiuti a vincere. Ti abbraccio forte forte, sempre più forte e ti vogliamo tutti molto bene. Guarisci presto ! Abbiamo bisogno di te. Tutti !
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