Today as I lay on my back surrounded by strange doctors positioning my body I received my daily dose of oldies again.  The medely began with Al Green (don't know what song), after this was that Marvin Gaye song that goes something like "Oh mercy me, things are not they they used to be," or something.  The last song that I heard, while intermittently hearing buzzes from the machine, was a personal favorite of mine, Roberta Flack's "Killing Me Softly."  This is the type song that usually gets me pretty emotional because it reminds me of my younger days with my mother who was single for a short period of my childhood.  This was the time of near after birth to about the age of six.  Nevertheless, good thing those appiontments are not too long and I am able to head out as fast as I entered. 

       Also, I am also glad that these appiontments are so early so when I get out of their it is still morning and I have time to mess around if I feel like doing so.  Today I went to eat at a famous LA restaurant called the Pantry.  It is an old time restaurant that was opened in like the 30s or something and since it is so old has become like a monument.  All around this tiny restaurant in the middle of the city are all types of tall skyscrapers.  However, becuase of its historic value the city has refused to let anyone tear it down for redeveolpment.  Herein, the Pantry's motto is "we never close."  So when I was younger and out partying in Hollywood or downtown, all of us friends knew we could go to this place and eat for a very reasonable price.  On average, a decent breakfast will cost you only four or five dollars not including tip.  Many times while I was working in downtown my cowrkers and I would catch an early Friday morning breakfast there at about five in the morning.  It was funny because the place would be packed with construction workers from other companies and different jobs.  Sometimes you would run into some dude you haven't seen in years.  At the same time being a frequent visitor you would learn to know your own waiter.  Our wiater was Porter, an old playboy type who was fast talking, like an out of the movies New Yorker type.  He was real quick with the service if you were a regular.  Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the bread, which was like the signature of this restaurant, for mostly anything you order breakfast or dinner, your meal would come included with this thick sourdough bread.  That place is the greatest and I was glad that I was able to visit and able to reminense this morning.

       On a side note I wanted to make a clarification on my first entry.  I stated that my father passed in the beginning of the year, which is true, this man was actually my stepfather, who was in my life since I was about eight.  Yet, he fully accepted me as a son, so in turn I fully accepted him as a father.  When he passed this past January it deeply hurt.  

       Yesterday, was the first radiation treatment.  Even though it was not too bad, it did take a long time because they have to position your body and stuff like that.  It is funny they take into this small room and have the radio playing easy listening music like Frank Sinatra and that one oldie "Brown Eyed Girl."  Nevertheless, after I was free to go.  I think I could get used to going to these appointments.  First of all they add a little variety to my life at this present moment.  On a side note, it is funny before all this happened I was working crazy hours, like maybe nothing less than a sixty or seventy hour work weeks.  Even though the money was good to me sometimes all I wanted was a day off.  Well I guess I got my wish.  For right now I got a lot of days off and since the kids (I have two boys, Tiburcio is 7 and Joaquin is 5) are off for the summer many days I am figuring out ways to make the day fun.  Yet, it will be nice when they start schoool in a couple of weeks. 

      The other benefit of going to these appiontments is that I get to hang out in LA for the day if I wish.  My father has this nice apartment in a very bad neighborhood.  It is in what they call East LA, yet it is really near downtown.  For instance if you go onto his back balcony you have the perfect view of the LA skyline.  In this case, his place is like my sanctuary.  Whenever I want I could just go there for a couple minutes or hours and just relax.  Yesterdayu, I went ahead and did that and I will probably do that today.  Nevertheless, right now I have to go, but I will fill in the details of what happened later.

         As stated in the title, this is officially my first blog and I am very excited.  I have been interested in breaking my way into the blog culture for a while, and at the same time have been reading interesting blogs daily.  I believe this could be very therapeutic to my condition in life right now.  About four months ago I was diagnosed with a rare type of cancer (just my luck).  This type of cancer is known as a Sarcoma, which is only one percent of new cancer diagnoses per year.  Again, with the turn of events happening this year another personal tragedy started the year with my father passing away.  Yet, this daily journal that I beckon to set up will not be one of total negative feelings, yet I hope to become more resilient and at the same time instill hope in those running into adversity in thier daily lives.

        Initially after getting diagnosed I was very discouraged, yet today I have a better outlook on living.  Tommorrow I start my radiation and am not looking foward to it completely.  However, at least I will get to drive into the city to recieve my therapy.  Probably, I will stop by my father's house first who lives on the east side of Los Angeles.  Near his place there is a very interesting cafe called, Homegirl Cafe.  It is a non-profit cafe that helps get young women who have been incarcerated back onto track by giving them employment.  I think teaching people a skill is the most important thing an organiztion could do.  In this same manner, politics is the one thing that keeps me going and keeps my mind off of my personal condition.  Another thing that keeps me going is building my creative side, in this way I am really trying to build up the courage to began and finish my novel.  This summer, I took a course in creative children's writing and receive many insightful ideas in how to began and publish a manuscript.  In addtion, I am hoping that this blog will serve as a great way to serve as a warmup for me to write for the day.  Even though I have a condition, I need to maintain this creative side that I was blessed with.  I wish you all a good day.