Appreciate the kind words y'all.
To be fair, I am not in here often. I prefer my time spent overseas. But usually when I pop in people are down to hang. Or maybe because I pick up the tab?
Luckily, I belong to a great community of mariners, and I have received daily phone calls from other mariners off-ship. I get regular check-ins from my European homies. And though this forum is near-dead, I do truly enjoy you guys. So though alone, I have enough connections to keep me from feeling like some social loser.
So as to what's next. Mostly just saying fuck it and plowing ahead. I feel like I have nothing to really hold me back anymore. I did, for way too long, cling to some pretty sentimental ideas about life--the gang is dead...the deep loyalty I had for a number of individuals is gone forever, the sentimentality for my old home town has died with it.
I'm going to take a good vacation this summer--I'm thinking Colombia, then head back to my ship for a solid four months. If everything lines up and the cancer doesn't come back, I hope to basically immediately roll from there into a volunteering position for four months working for a charitable organization that provides medical care to children in the developing world. I have a skillset, a license and a blue American passport, may as well put all those to good use and actually make a difference.
That last part is a ways off, but I usually schedule my life "by-the-year" to some extent. If everything works out, and I get that opportunity (which all signs point to yes, no reason I will not be able to), I will let you all know, because I will need sponsors. And then you all too can take part in me being sprinkled in angel dust.
And I'm definitely dyeing my hair platinum blonde again once it returns.
The whole experience has left me more-or-less bitter. Cancer has made me realize that most Americans are miserable and selfish people. I have been in my "hometown" for chemotherapy, and I received what amounts to basically zero support from anyone outside my immediate family. Of the dozens and dozens of so-called old friends, no one has really reached out much. It has been extremely isolating.
To be fair, I am not in here often. I prefer my time spent overseas. But usually when I pop in people are down to hang. Or maybe because I pick up the tab?
Luckily, I belong to a great community of mariners, and I have received daily phone calls from other mariners off-ship. I get regular check-ins from my European homies. And though this forum is near-dead, I do truly enjoy you guys. So though alone, I have enough connections to keep me from feeling like some social loser.
So as to what's next. Mostly just saying fuck it and plowing ahead. I feel like I have nothing to really hold me back anymore. I did, for way too long, cling to some pretty sentimental ideas about life--the gang is dead...the deep loyalty I had for a number of individuals is gone forever, the sentimentality for my old home town has died with it.
I'm going to take a good vacation this summer--I'm thinking Colombia, then head back to my ship for a solid four months. If everything lines up and the cancer doesn't come back, I hope to basically immediately roll from there into a volunteering position for four months working for a charitable organization that provides medical care to children in the developing world. I have a skillset, a license and a blue American passport, may as well put all those to good use and actually make a difference.
That last part is a ways off, but I usually schedule my life "by-the-year" to some extent. If everything works out, and I get that opportunity (which all signs point to yes, no reason I will not be able to), I will let you all know, because I will need sponsors. And then you all too can take part in me being sprinkled in angel dust.
And I'm definitely dyeing my hair platinum blonde again once it returns.
