I'd like to take this opportunity to thank everyone -- all 2,000 of you -- for donating the plasma that went into formulating the IVIG treatments I received last week at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center over in Dartmouth.
I don't know any of you personally, but I'll tell you this: please know that the minute quantities of immunoglobulin each of you contributed to create the concoction they dripped into my vein has done Wonders in boosting my body's abilities to fight infections and diseases.
You may also be pleased to know the IVIG has greatly ameliorated the arthritis which has infested my neck and right shoulder for the past 10 years.
Doctors Liz and Trevor suggested I might experience some sniffles and / or flu-like symptoms as a result of IVIG. But I'm here to tell you there are no such side effects -- none.
Liz mentioned I might not even need a flu shot this winter, thanks to the IVIG and you.
To make IVIG requires about 2,000 blood and plasma donors to yield 1,000 CCs of serum. From what I can make out of it, the pharmaceutical lab spins the specimens inside a centrifuge to separate the immunoglobin from the other blood components.
When it's transferred into a glass bottle -- one which bears an uncanny resemblance to an upside-down Absolut Vodka bottle -- IVIG looks like Michelob Ultralite floating around in there. It even has a beer-like head.
In this state, the lab freezes the IVIG solid until a wimp-metaphysician such as I needs it.
It takes about ten hours over two session days for the nurses to drain IVIG into the vein. The health pros like to do it slowly because a human body can generate several pretty funky reactions if -- and only if -- the serum's collective A-B-O blood factors don't match those of the recipient's.
The probability of an adverse reaction is in the realm of one-tenth of one percent -- but no one wants to take any chances by speeding up the process. As The Boss once sang, that's OK by me.
(Nerd Alert: IVIG was developed in the mid-1950s to treat wounded and returning Korean War vets. They apparently caught several strange strains of East Asian immune system-compromising "bugs" while fighting on the Peninsula, strains that were heretofore unknown to North American medicine. IVIG then went on to be used as a front-line treatment, with dramatic efficacy, during the HIV/AIDS Epidemic. From there, it's now employed for treating all types of immune-compromising illnesses and blood disorders. Liz and Trevor talked me into getting IVIG to boost my blood counts which were crashed during chemotherapy for Non-Hotchkins Lymphoma. End of Nerd Alert.)
Anyway ..
And so it came to pass that, right about the Eighth Hour of treatment, I realized that IVIG was a much different form of chemo than all the others I've received.
First and foremost, IVIG wasn't Kicking My Ass like the others -- no bouts of Nausea, no overwhelming Fatigue, no dense Chemical Fogs.
Second, if I had owned a mule team and a plow, I felt as though I could have gone out to the North Forty and tackled some serious farm work.
Third-- and this is the best part -- for the first time in three years, my mind began wandering to some rather distant, pleasant thoughts about the succulent tastes of Benthic Organisms.
It happened to be around dinner-time. I had, after all, to drive back home from Hanover to Rochester, and there just happened to be a Clam Shack along the way.
How Tozier's Clam Emporium got itself off the ground, within the heart of the Green Mountains just west of Bethel, VT, 200 miles from the nearest New England Coast, might be fertile grist for one of my future metaphysicial literary quests.
For the moment, I'll just say this: Tozier's Clam Emporium far exceeded my expectations.
I pulled into the gravel driveway, starving, about an hour after the nurses patched me up. The place didn't appear to be all that busy -- I attributed this to the fact that a downpour recently worked its way through the Bethel area: Ergo, the locals were drying off and had yet to decide on their own dinner plans.
So a wonderfully chippy high-schooler greeted me at the slide window and took my order: a pint of Whole-Belly Clams, a half-pint of Fried Oysters, and a medium-size order of Onion Rings. And, oh yes, I'd like a large Coke with that, please.
She handed me a blue Poker Chip with the number "37" etched onto it.
"I'll call you when your order is ready, sir."
"I don't think the chip is really necessary, Miss. I appear to be the only one here," I said.
I guess she had to follow Procedures and it was my responsibility to Play The Game. Anyway, I settled up: this feast set me back $15.
It took less than ten minutes for my new friend to call "Number 37 is ready!"
So I returned to the sliding window.
There they were! Clams and oysters and onion rings. Deep-fried, hot, crumb golden, crispy. Steaming in their Chinese-style take-out containers.
"Would you like some tarter sauce?," she asked.
I answered: "Give me four, if you don't mind."
For the next 25 minutes, I thought I had died and gone to Heaven.
Every bite of clam and oyster revealed a paradox of fresh, oceanic, sweet saltiness which dissolved, as if by magic, in my mouth to tickle my taste buds and to make me One with the Sea.
I employed bites of the succulent onion rings to adjust the flavor receptors within my palate. Some folks pay a C-Note for a bottle of Red to accomplish the same cleansing effect when they dine on Pheasant Under Glass, or Beef Wellington.
I prefer the Onion Ring method, but that's just me...
Plus there was absolutely no need for tarter sauce here. The condiment just would have gotten in the way to ruin the whole effect.
POSTSCRIPT: Was it the IVIG that made me so perky? Or was it the clams and / or the oysters? Or was it a combination of all three?
I shall discuss this matter with Liz and Trevor when I see them later this week...
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