Thro evening shades I haste away
To close the Labours of my Day
William Blake, The Traveller Hasteth in the Evening (1793)
This post concerns an impending death; my own. My recent diagnosis (Mar 4ᵗʰ) is both complicated, but also typical of a metastatic cancer, if I understand it right, with the cancer identified only weeks ago, and further growths identified since then: I have tumours in the legs, lymph nodes and adrenal glands; a 4.5 cm tumour on the left lung is crowding out the nearby aorta; it has sprouted a smaller (11 mm) tumour on the right lung too; and colonies have set up camp in the cerebellum.
So, did all the talk of William Blake and prophecy, Christ, vision, the Ranters, and Christian communism prepare the traveller at all? Absolutely, yes I said yes It did Yes!
Oof mate. If I were you I'd get another angel driver to help shunt around the corporeal decayed bag of flesh and bones. Self driving ain't an option no more it seems unless you go mechanical next. Interesting proposition about the longevity window still open, surely it's some Hawkins type immobility life support affair like a Dalek, but I've seen some remarkably agile robotic limbs lately so perhaps try getting your brain in a jar live connected to Cybermen of the future. Am leaning towards a global universal consciousness lately. So little we know. Godspeed.
It's funny how things circle back. My next door neighbour Sheila Boakes had that Frank Ifield song, her family had a proper record player, we only had something my dad had cobbled together from a three watt 'Adastra' (great name) valve amp which he bought from a shop in Croydon for three quid and an BSR autochange turntable propped up on four upturned glasses. The final piece in this sonic chain was an 8" speaker hung from bent pieces of wire and suspended in a very large terracotta pipe he lifted from a local building site; it sounded pretty good and I used it to play the Joe Meek 45's that were my main love in 1962. Dad belted out Little Richard, Gustav Holst, Al Bowly and Bert Kaemfert - mum played Peter Paul and Mary, Brahms and Mozart. I' m eternally grateful to my parents for giving me an early grounding in music but It was also always a treat to nip next door because Sheila' s family had masses of 45's and, although the Dansette probably didn't sound as good as our 3 watt sound system, that Frank Ifield song hooked me, and it was the line you quote "when my life is through, and the angels ask me to recall...." that has stayed with me for 65 odd years. Nearly ten years later I bought the Jethro Tull single too, by that time with my Dads help I'd built my own record player.
here is the difficult bit, and I simply don't know what to say and if I did I probably wouldn't know how to say it. Andy please hang on a bit longer, although our lives only crossed very briefly, you have enriched mine one hell of a lot.....
I am very much with you in all this, from Frank Ifield to Jethro Tull (to Bert Kaempfert!) and beyond. I know we will stay in touch. And I shall be here as long as I can.
Hey Andy, I don’t want to go all Alan Partridge and tell you how ‘ruddy, bloody, brave’, you are, but this is extraordinary. It’s an occasionally exasperating but more often inspiring honour to know you, and I’ve gained so much from your thoughts on Blake and, well everything! Selfishly I hope we get to keep you for some time x
Thanks for writing this, Andy. I haven't fully finished it yet. I think I never will as it opens up new horizons I am unfamiliar with. I am praying for you.
I never would have thought that we'd touch base so many years after having been in the same organisational orbit. It's been nice to connect and learn about all your interests
Hello, Andy - thank you for your post and heartfelt thoughts, even amid difficult news. I am a friend of Timothy Morton's, which is how I started reading your words a few months ago. I've spent many years working on hospice and palliative care. If I can be of support for you - just know you have it. The expression of your experience helps us all. Thank you for your words. All the best - Carlyle
Thank you, Carlyle, for your thoughts. I am not sure I’d know how to call on your help, ut I do know I’d love to hear any thoguths you have in future. please stay in touch.
My work was - and still is - as a spiritual counselor and bereavement professional. Although my personal practice is Buddhist, my training and experience is interfaith. If anything I am someone willing to explore these subjects - not just as thoughts but also in the real experience of dying. So if you or your family need to process, vent, trouble shoot the days ahead - then consider me an ally. The person dying and those supporting them walk a sacred space - and also a space with very mundane concerns. If you haven't already - bowel movements will be a frequent topic of discussion!
It just felt that if I can offer you support - given how you have supported others - then it seemed worth offering. At least you have jumped in and are looking deeply at this experience already. Many do not. That will be a great blessing because you set your mind in the ground of curiosity. You can still be nervous and uncertain - but being open is vital. How do you want to step into that unknown place? You become a teacher for all of us.
If you like I can find a way to share contact info and you'll have it as you need it.
thank you for sharing this
Oof mate. If I were you I'd get another angel driver to help shunt around the corporeal decayed bag of flesh and bones. Self driving ain't an option no more it seems unless you go mechanical next. Interesting proposition about the longevity window still open, surely it's some Hawkins type immobility life support affair like a Dalek, but I've seen some remarkably agile robotic limbs lately so perhaps try getting your brain in a jar live connected to Cybermen of the future. Am leaning towards a global universal consciousness lately. So little we know. Godspeed.
It's funny how things circle back. My next door neighbour Sheila Boakes had that Frank Ifield song, her family had a proper record player, we only had something my dad had cobbled together from a three watt 'Adastra' (great name) valve amp which he bought from a shop in Croydon for three quid and an BSR autochange turntable propped up on four upturned glasses. The final piece in this sonic chain was an 8" speaker hung from bent pieces of wire and suspended in a very large terracotta pipe he lifted from a local building site; it sounded pretty good and I used it to play the Joe Meek 45's that were my main love in 1962. Dad belted out Little Richard, Gustav Holst, Al Bowly and Bert Kaemfert - mum played Peter Paul and Mary, Brahms and Mozart. I' m eternally grateful to my parents for giving me an early grounding in music but It was also always a treat to nip next door because Sheila' s family had masses of 45's and, although the Dansette probably didn't sound as good as our 3 watt sound system, that Frank Ifield song hooked me, and it was the line you quote "when my life is through, and the angels ask me to recall...." that has stayed with me for 65 odd years. Nearly ten years later I bought the Jethro Tull single too, by that time with my Dads help I'd built my own record player.
here is the difficult bit, and I simply don't know what to say and if I did I probably wouldn't know how to say it. Andy please hang on a bit longer, although our lives only crossed very briefly, you have enriched mine one hell of a lot.....
I am very much with you in all this, from Frank Ifield to Jethro Tull (to Bert Kaempfert!) and beyond. I know we will stay in touch. And I shall be here as long as I can.
Hey Andy, I don’t want to go all Alan Partridge and tell you how ‘ruddy, bloody, brave’, you are, but this is extraordinary. It’s an occasionally exasperating but more often inspiring honour to know you, and I’ve gained so much from your thoughts on Blake and, well everything! Selfishly I hope we get to keep you for some time x
thank you for your kindness, Jon.
Thanks for writing this, Andy. I haven't fully finished it yet. I think I never will as it opens up new horizons I am unfamiliar with. I am praying for you.
Thank you, Mark. Our recent acquaintance has meant a lot to me, and I love the work you do. And your taste in reggae ;-)
I never would have thought that we'd touch base so many years after having been in the same organisational orbit. It's been nice to connect and learn about all your interests
Hello, Andy - thank you for your post and heartfelt thoughts, even amid difficult news. I am a friend of Timothy Morton's, which is how I started reading your words a few months ago. I've spent many years working on hospice and palliative care. If I can be of support for you - just know you have it. The expression of your experience helps us all. Thank you for your words. All the best - Carlyle
Thank you, Carlyle, for your thoughts. I am not sure I’d know how to call on your help, ut I do know I’d love to hear any thoguths you have in future. please stay in touch.
My work was - and still is - as a spiritual counselor and bereavement professional. Although my personal practice is Buddhist, my training and experience is interfaith. If anything I am someone willing to explore these subjects - not just as thoughts but also in the real experience of dying. So if you or your family need to process, vent, trouble shoot the days ahead - then consider me an ally. The person dying and those supporting them walk a sacred space - and also a space with very mundane concerns. If you haven't already - bowel movements will be a frequent topic of discussion!
It just felt that if I can offer you support - given how you have supported others - then it seemed worth offering. At least you have jumped in and are looking deeply at this experience already. Many do not. That will be a great blessing because you set your mind in the ground of curiosity. You can still be nervous and uncertain - but being open is vital. How do you want to step into that unknown place? You become a teacher for all of us.
If you like I can find a way to share contact info and you'll have it as you need it.
If that helps at all! Best - Carlyle
Sending kind thoughts Andy.
I received this response to my post from a friend, Peter Baxter, of the AMM Allstars, and have his permission to share it here:
Thanks For Sharing
Britannia Hospital vibes amid industrial action and NHS decline
Felt in a bloodied gown, plastic chairs, car alarms, shop doors, and
A4 notices printed out and stuck on walls.
I tuned in to NASA this morning to hear and see from
Artemis's journey to the dark side of the moon,
And caught a conversation about dumping spaceship sewage.
Ground control laughed about the time it took
Discussing the logistics of flushing the toilet in space.
It reminded me of reading Andy's Substack on my journey back from Beijing yesterday,
The PET scanner images, Ben pointing out typos (there are more than a couple),
BUT it's unimportant. I saw them as similar to the spaceshitter and Andy's feeling as he
was watching myself internally start to dissolve into the universe beyond and within my skin,
lumbering up to turn from meat into light.
The typos aren't errors -- they're the sound of it,
Epiphanal grunts of pain and affinity of
The body's own noise as it breaks the text.
If you walk around the ruins of the London Wall,
You'll struggle to read the heritage information
Because the letters have moved around the boards.
The ruins outlive the interpretation
Just as the typos illustrate
The atrpohy of the blog roll and body.
ACH! This is No Fun
From ersatz domesticity,
Depravity of family -
The kind my mother
Broke the cycle of.
BUT Andy here is beautiful
From literature, libraries -
To have them REGARDLESS (Edith) -
To cab scene lorry drives,
Like I had with my granddad.
An angel near Hoxton -
I hope to meet an angel should my
Journey take a turn this way.
And was it all worth it wank
Comedy car alarms to the
Circle of willies… blindness!
As a teenage self-educator of culture’s egoic obsession
and cultural aspects of dying
I read accounts: Before I Say Goodbye: Recollections and Observations
from One Woman's Final Year by Ruth Picardie,
I think John Diamond did one, and others, Denial of Death (Becker), I don't recall liking.
Ethnographies of weeping Greeks, Ghanaian coffins, Tibetan vultures...
Not that I see this blog roll in that tradition, but as I seem to be experiencing again
19 out of my head / 21 getting on for dead (The Adverts) feelings,
I will subscribe, I will subscribe, hey! hey!
The possible fracturing of the femur at the most painful area of my leg
The slow and incremental battle of the body against the body,
Was difficult to read, but I was reminded of the Bone Flute project in Cape Town.
A flute from a replica of femur was made and played to direct critical attention to the
“fusion between the human body, new technologies and the experience of being human”
And I wondered whether it was in bad taste to do something similar to a replica of Andy's femur...
You get one number, and one number only, and thank you ANDY
for not being a lazy bastard in sharing your “‘Born to Go’, ready for grace”
writing of remarkable coincidences, tyranny of the senses,
mapping the “flips” and flops of our puny everyday life
in the new layout of the dead end.
Life, love and unity, versus
Liars, loathers and utility bills.
BaXter