{"id":3714,"date":"2016-02-06T17:54:35","date_gmt":"2016-02-06T23:54:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/?p=3714"},"modified":"2016-02-06T18:02:53","modified_gmt":"2016-02-07T00:02:53","slug":"the-final-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/2016\/02\/06\/the-final-time\/","title":{"rendered":"The Final Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

I walked into that room with the piped in music and the big gun hanging over the gurney where they put my personal form-fitted cage over my face and clamped me down one last time<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The staff calibrated the big gun from behind the thick walls and a bank-vault door, taking some X-rays first to make sure that I was properly aligned. It rotated into its starting position, adjusting and whining and clicking and blocking out the light from the ceiling as it came briefly to a stop above my face at which point the usual alarm rang while the radiation poured down onto my throat.<\/p>\n

It was wild music Friday, so I tapped my fingers to the beat of some Pandora stream that I never will recognize (although it was a great beat). The gun came to a stop and then started its second pass as the alarm rang out again and another stream of radiation poured down on me. The buzzing stopped.\u00a0And then the gun came a stop again.<\/p>\n

It was the 30th and final time<\/em>. Six weeks come to an end.<\/p>\n

The machine retracted and locked into a safe position. Laney and Tutu and Sarah and Sonya came into the room, cheering for me before I could cheer, because I was still strapped to the gurney with the cage holding me down and a stent in my mouth holding my jaw open. For the final time.<\/p>\n

And by way of celebration<\/em>, they let my local companions and caretakers come into the room, and we posed for a photo with that big gun.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And then we went out into the waiting area, where a brass bell hangs in wait on the wall for everyone’s last day of treatment.<\/p>\n

\u201cPull it three times,\u201d Tutu said.<\/p>\n

I pulled on the rope. Gave it a good yank three times, celebrating that this was indeed my final time<\/em> and I shouldn\u2019t be returning.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the loudest I\u2019ve ever heard!\u201d Tutu said. The staff and I gathered together for a group hug. And we posed for one last picture beside the bell.<\/p>\n

And it was good.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I walked into that room with the piped in music and the big gun hanging over the gurney where they put my personal form-fitted cage over my face and clamped me down one last time. The staff calibrated the big gun from behind the thick walls and a bank-vault door, taking some X-rays first to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3714"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3714"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3714\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3717,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3714\/revisions\/3717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}