As Read at Dr. Kamran Hassidim’s Memorial
San Diego, CA January 27, 2011

Hello, my name is David Wright and I am one of Doctor Hassidim’s patients. I first met him 18 years ago practically to the day, today. I had just been diagnosed with cancer and I was told I had to go meet my Oncologist. I’m pretty sure that I had never heard the word before, and I know I had no idea what an Oncologist was or what they did, but I went, because you do. I met him over at his old office on Moraga Ave. The one with the beautiful view. He sat behind his desk, a very unassuming man, who shook my hand, and seemed to have the unenviable task of telling me all the possible things that could go wrong, with my upcoming months of chemotherapy. What a way to meet somebody! Doctor Hassidim met a lot of somebodies that way. It’s unfortunately a very long list of side effects, and I think Doctor Hassidim went on for about a half hour or so, but within the first minute of Doctor Hassidim talking with me I had 3 very distinct thoughts.

One - “This is the smartest man I have ever met.”

Two - “Gee, he really does seem to know what he’s talking about.”

Three - “I’m in the right place!” and I was.

When Laurel called me a month ago with the news, I immediately had a vision of Doctor Hassidim. It was more of a conglomerate memory, really, but Doctor Hassidim was on his rounds, in his lab coat, and he stepped into my hospital room as he had done so many times to check on me. In my vision he did it just the way he did it every time in real life for those many months. He looked up to find my eyes and said, “How are ve doing?” And even with Laurel still on the phone with me, it made me smile, and it comforted me.

When you do what Doctor Hassidim did for a living, and you do it the way he did it, you don’t just touch thousands of lives, but you hold those lives in your hands and maybe even cradle them in your arms. At least that’s the way I felt. In Doctor Hassidim’s care, you were very well cared for.

Doctor Hassidim first brought me to Sharp. He told me he could treat me at any of the hospitals in San Diego, but he thought I should go to Sharp Memorial Hospital. When I asked him, “Well, why Sharp?” He got kind of conspiratorial and said, “I think you’ll like the nurses the best.” He was right.

I wrote a play about my cancer experience. It’s called With Flying Colors. Doctor Hassidim is in it through out, but I’m going to do just one short piece from it. This is called Portrait.


PORTRAIT

If I were to paint a picture of my life right now, I would paint myself seated high on a stallion charging boldly forward into whatever comes next. And on that stallion I would carry large banners above my head. On those banners would be the following names: Chatsworth, Del Carmen, Henderson, Ritchken, Bekkar, Holdy, Smith, Gibbons, Barone and, of course, the largest banner - Hassidim. These are the names of doctors. My Doctors. My incredible Doctors. It would make a good picture, but if I stopped there it wouldn’t be finished.
I would need to paint in still more banners - thousands upon thousands more. Only these wouldn’t have any names. I don’t know the names of all those that vomited their way through chemos that didn’t work. All those that endured radiation without the results they’d hoped for. All those that suffered surgeries that couldn’t stem the tide. I don’t know their names, but I know their courage. And in my portrait they ride with me, too. The way I see it, that courage became wisdom. That wisdom found my Doctors’ hands. And those hands gave me back my life. I will never have a greater gift. No one could ever have a greater gift. I can’t repay it-I can only live. And living for me now, is being high on my stallion, charging forward, with flying colors.

I used to love to try to make Doctor Hassidim laugh. He had a great laugh. He had a great sense of humor. You didn’t always see it because his was a serious business, but it was there. I was about midway on my stay in the hospital and my hair was long gone, so, one of my more thoughtful friends brought me in a rainbow wig. I thought this might do it, so I told the nurses to tell Doctor Hassidim that I was really excited as my hair had started to come back in. I then donned the rainbow wig and waited for him. When he came into my room I didn’t even wait for him to announce himself with “How are ve doing.” I started right in with, “My hair’s back, Doctor Hassidim, what do you think?” He looked at me and said, “Looks pretty good.” Unflappable when he wanted to be.

Years later on one of my follow up visits, I said to him. You know, Doctor Hassidim, you saved my life. He got a funny look on his face and said. “David, David, Doctors treat. Only God heals.” Such was his humility. Such was his grace.

When I hung up the phone with Laurel that day a month or so, ago. I had another vision of Doctor Hassidim. This one wasn’t a memory, but really a true vision this time. Doctor Hassidim was at the gates of heaven, in his lab coat. And as he stepped through the gates and looked around at everyone, he had no thoughts of himself, no worries about what had happened to him, where he was going, or what was coming next. He just looked at God and everyone and said, “How are ve doing?

I can tell you this. Heaven is now very well cared for, and on behalf of all those of us who are still here in this world because of him. I want to close by saying,

“We Love you. Thank you Doctor Hassidim.”

Moon

The moon is incredible. I am navigating Malibu Canyon Rd at 3:30am on a Thursday morning. My call time for the commercial is 5am, and I hate being late. It’s so dark, except for the glorious moon. I have never traveled this road before, so I am careful. The only vehicles I meet are two power company trucks lumbering at me, and then by me. Their lights are bright, bright, and then they are gone.

The moon is just this side of full. It pics up the dashes of paint on the road, and seems, to my eye, to play out some sort of constant Morse code, as I zip by. I wonder what dash, dash, dash, dash, dash, dash, dash, dash, means in Morse code. Suddenly, there is a man. I think it’s a man. It is, and he is on the far side of the road...running. Jogging, to be precise. At 3:45am? He wears nothing reflective or bright colored. I almost didn’t see him. I wonder how the power trucks saw him. I wonder if he does this everyday. I wonder if he is famous. This is the back side of Malibu. I wonder if he notices the incredible moon.

And, then I am over the mountain. I can’t really make out the ocean, but I can sense the open vastness ahead. It has a different air than the lurking mountain behind. I am winding downward, now, past the mansions and Pepperdine. Finally, I turn right on PCH, the Pacific Coast Highway to be precise, also known as Highway 1. Now the moon is straight ahead of me as I glide up the coast.

This beach, “Leo Carrillo State Park Beach,” to be precise, is supposed to be 14 miles ahead. At around mile 7, I see a Starbucks. I start to slow, to pull in to it, but then I realize that I am even too early for Starbucks. There are a couple cars parked in it’s parking lot. Their running lights are on. They must have their heaters on, too, to keep warm. I can make out the exhaust from their tail pipes curling up. Starbucks itself is lightless, a black hulk of a tiny building, waiting in the moonlight. I whiz by.

I see the sign for the beach, but I am nearly an hour early for my call time. I don’t need to be there, yet, so I go past the exit. There are some distant lights out on the water that have caught my attention. They aren’t nearly bright enough to compete with my friend the moon, but I can make them out. A couple of cars fly at me and then by me. Their lights are bright, bright, and then they are gone. Probably film crew slightly late for their even earlier call time than mine. Still those lights out on the water are getting closer as I get further north, and eventually I get up even with them. The lights belong to boats, of course.

I pull onto the land side of PCH, and stop the engine. Looking across the highway out to the sea, I role down my window. I count eight boats. Each boat has a single spotlight tethered high that shines back down on itself. Eight lights bobbing in black. The light from the boats is moving? Fluttering? And, then I can see that these are fishing boats, their spot lights reflecting off of the hundreds of frenzied gulls that fill the air. Such a dazzle to my eye! But, in the inky vast open darkness of the sea, they are small pinpoints of dazzle. I know there must be a horrendous sound as the gulls scream for fish, but none comes to me across the waves. It is quiet...but oh, so, frantic.

Soon, I will be with the commercial, the director, the cranky costume lady, and the other actors that will make me laugh. The beach will be bright. The sea will be bright, and the fishing boats in the background of the shots will have to be photo shopped out of the scene. But, for now, right now, I am on the edge of a continent, staring out of the darkness at the dazzling, fluttering, frantic, quiet lights, and I am the only one here.

Well, me and my friend the incredible moon, to be precise.

Caretaker Carlos - 8/29/09

I caught up with Carlos as he was hurrying through the parking garage just like I had a thousand times before. The building was doing it again, and it reminded me to ask him. The pipes were making this intermittent, high-pitched, wail of a sound that had been going on day and night for about a week. You could hear it all the way from my third floor apartment to the first floor parking garage. It would last for about 30-40 seconds and then it would trail off. “Hey, Carlos, do you hear that?” I asked him. “That’s an awful noise, what is that?” He smiled his usual impish grin and said, “That? Oh yeah, we put a monkey in the wall!” Once again Carlos had made me laugh, and had also told me, in his wonderful way, that he would get to it and have it fixed on Monday when he got back after the weekend. Carlos always got to it, and Carlos always got it fixed! But, Monday never came. Monday was instead the day that we all heard the worst news anyone of us could have imagined. Carlos had died in a deep-sea diving accident over the weekend and he wouldn’t be coming back. That was it. That was the news. To say the residents of this big old lumbering apartment building on Screenland Drive were stunned would be an understatement. We all knew him and loved him! He was our Carlos! The one who could fix anything! The one who had cleaned our carpets, changed our light bulbs, stopped our leaks, polished our hallways, got us new garbage disposals, hung our blinds, installed our lamps, supervised the gardeners, hosed our garage, lit and unlit our pilot lights, directed the painters, climbed up on the roof and reset our air conditioners… You name it, Carlos did it, and always, always with a joke and a laugh. He knew every inch of this building with its 100+ units, and I think that even the building, itself, loved Carlos.

Carlos was my friend. Now, I am happily blessed with many, many friends, but Carlos was my everyday friend. When I moved into this giant ship of a building 6 years ago Carlos was one of the first people I met, and when someone works where you live you tend to see them all the time. So, I got to really know Carlos. I got to know his family, starting with his beautiful wife Ayde, and then his 3 kids that he was so proud of, Hayde, Carlito, and Sandra. Finally, the love of his life these last couple of years, his two year old grand daughter Tenicia. But, there were things that I didn’t know about Carlos, like his love of deep-sea diving. How did I miss that? I knew that he had studied like crazy and had earned his American Citizenship a couple of years back, but I didn’t know that he was 44, or that he had started work here as the caretaker of this building the first day the place opened 20 years ago. I did know that he loved to hunt and fish, and I had met his Mother and his sister Maria, but I had never been to his house…

Carlos, my everyday friend, I miss you so dearly already. We all do. I realized the other night lying awake in my bed listening to the unfixed wail in the wall again and again, that Carlos had been wrong about that. There wasn’t a monkey in the wall, but rather this big old lumbering apartment building had somehow known that it was going to lose its precious caretaker, the only one it had ever known, and the building itself, had simply started to cry.

California October - 10/28/08

October has always been my favorite month. I grew up in upstate New York, which is a great October place. Cool, crisp days, and the bone chilling, blustery nights that followed, marked the best of months for me as a kid. You just couldn't beat the smell of burning leaves and the visual feast of an upstate New York rolling hill covered with a carpet of trees seemingly on fire with Fall color. Yep, October.
We would get our pumpkins in mid October, and the whole family would carve them together. My Dad's were always the best. He developed a technique to give Jack-O-Lanterns a set of EARS which couldn't be beat! We would set them all up in the front window on a tv tray with a candle in each of the six, where the whole neighborhood could see them. They didn't always make it all the way to Halloween, and you really did have to throw away a pumpkin when it started to go bad, as it got pretty smelly. Or, at least you had to move it outside to the front porch where someone most likely, eventually, smashed it. Still, there was that first night or two where everyone out there in the dark could see our pumpkins all lit up spooky and glorious in the front window, and the back of my neck would secretly tingle with pride.
Another thing I loved about October was apple cider. It wasn't the hot stuff that I now, sometimes, drink at Starbucks. This was cold, fresh, apple cider that you got from the farmer direct. I remember this one place up on top of Boughton Hill where we would stand in line to get our cider. The apple orchard and the barn were right beside us as we waited. There was no mystery as to where the cider came from! Today, I glance at the bottles of apple JUICE that they label "Apple Cider" in my local super market, but it's nowhere near the same. For one thing you can see through it! The good stuff, the real apple cider of my youth, was never filtered to any degree, and rarely had a label of any kind. It was just strong flavored and cold. I don't think I ever drank anything colder than October apple cider. The fact that it ALWAYS gave me a wicked stomach ache never seemed to matter...
I grew up and went away to College and eventually made it out to California, but I would always try to get back to Batavia, New York to see Grandma Watkins in October for our annual foliage tour. That's what she called it. "Should we go see the foliage?" she would inquire with a twinkle in her eye. I think she knew it was my favorite part of the visit. That and the brisket she always roasted for me. Gram was on oxygen for several of those later years of the foliage tour, so I would lug the canister out to the Le Baron. She would hook up and breathe as deeply as she could and we would be off! I remember very distinctly the little puff sounds that the machine made. Gram also needed the air conditioning on the whole time to breathe better. This made the inside of the Le Baron as cold as a freezer and I would watch my knuckles on the steering wheel slowly turn Ontario Lake blue!! There were times when I thought I might need a hit off Grams O2 just to get my heart started again, but I made it through. Our quest in those days was not just for the view of pretty Fall trees. We usually went up past Attica to Merle's Farm to get some syrup. This is another wonderful by product of October in upstate New York, some of the best maple syrup in the world. Gram and I would wind our way down the country roads of her and my youth. She would tell me stories the whole way. She would talk about Grandpa, and Marion Whitelsey, and sometimes even Old Man Merle. "That's who started the farm." she would say. And it would go on like that. The beautiful cold, crisp day, and the sound of Grams voice mixed with the little oxygen puffs...
At this moment, three days before Halloween, there is a very confused maple tree outside my window here in Burbank. It's sort of half turned to yellow, but still has all of it's leaves. I think it's confused by the three weeks of 90 degree days we have endured this California October. My neighbors have put up this really cool pumpkin display with a giant spider web, but the whole thing is made of plastic. It's fire season in California and the terrible burning brush fires that happen all to frequently, smell nothing like the burning leaves of Western New York. I haven't carved a pumpkin this year. I did find out recently that you can now order Merle Farm Syrup on the internet, but I don't see the point. I miss Grandma. I miss the foliage tour. I guess I'll go over to Starbucks, order a Venti Caramel Apple Cider and see if I can get a cup with ice... Yep, California October.

15 Years - 6/10/08

I am really supposed to count from the point of diagnosis, which would be February 1993. That is the official way to delineate a cancer survivor. You count from the day you find out that you have cancer. Kathy, the leader of my cancer support group at St. Jude says, "If you live through the day you find out, then you are a cancer survivor." And she is right, of course. For some reason, I have never done it that way. I have always counted from the day of my biggest surgery, June 15, 1993. By June of that year, I had been in the hospital for a very long time, and then a day or two before my big surgery they let me out for an afternoon. Looking back, I think this might have been in case the surgery had gone bad and I didn't make it through. Let Dave have a nice final experience outside the hospital. This never occurred to me at the time but it seems kind of obvious in retrospect. My Mom and Dad helped me to the rental car and we headed over to Balboa Park. This was my request. I had lived for the better part of 5 months in my various hospital rooms and I wanted some outside time. I think maybe Balboa Park came to mind, because that was the place that had originally brought me to San Diego. The Old Globe Theater is located within the park grounds, and acting there had been my introduction to America's Finest City, as it is called. Also, the Park is right in the middle of San Diego and it wouldn't be all that far a drive for us. (in case I got sick and needed to head back)Once we reached the park, I asked Mom and Dad to take me to the "Tree of Life" as I called it then. (and still do) It's a huge Magnolia tree that sits in the park not far from the San Diego Junior Theater. It's actually located directly in front of a little fast food place we dubbed the "Gag Shack" back when I was acting at The Old Globe. When I say this tree is huge, I mean huge! Children have always loved to climb all over it, and it could, in those days, accommodate 5 to 25 of them at a time! I say, in those days, because they have since built a fence around the tree to protect it, and no one climbs on it anymore, although it does seem to be a favorite subject of drawing classes.
Personally, I had always just liked being in this tree's presence. Back when I was healthy, I would take a book and read in its shade with my back up against its sprawling trunk. Or I would sit a little way across the park and just watch the wind in it's branches. It was a comforting place. A tranquil, happy place, and even if it was only in my subconscious at the time, it was where I wanted to spend maybe my last afternoon. And so I did. My Dad was off parking the car, and getting us something to drink from the gag shack. Mom and I found a park bench with a good vantage point on the tree. She talked to me quietly while I tried to focus on what she was saying. My Dad eventually joined us, and the three of us just sat there watching the children play on the broad shoulders of that old tree.

It was all right there at that moment. Old, steady timeless life with happy laughing young life draped all over it. The tree and the children. The children and the tree. And, of course, the two people that had given me life. And, of course, me. It was all right there, and it was all good.

June 15, 2008 makes 15 years since that big surgery. 15 years that I have counted myself cancer free and a cancer survivor. 15 years with so many all good moments that I can't even count them. I am extremely healthy, now, and there is a pretty good prospect for 15 more years for me, and then 15 more, and maybe even 15 more.

I sincerely hope those years happen for me, but it doesn't really matter, because I learned something that day 15 years ago. That day with my Mom and Dad, and the impending surgery, and the rental car, and the the gag shack and the park bench, and the laughing children and the tree of life. I learned that it is all right here for us, all the time, and it's all good.

Here's to 15 years!

David Grant Wright

It pays to have friends... 4/21/08

It's almost time to open the house. (let the audience in) Kathy, Maria, Katie, Glen and I have just about finished the preparations for this With Flying Colors performance and the only thing we really have left to do is the lighting. It's not going well. Tonight's performance is in a brand new theater. So new in fact, that no one else has ever performed in it. We are the first to realize that they have put their ambient lights in the spotlight slots and their spot lights in the ambient slots. (not that the spotlights actually face the stage, but this is another issue) The house seats are lit beautifully. In fact, the only really dark spot in the entire room is, indeed, the stage where I am about to sit and read my play aloud for the next hour and fifteen minutes.

I have my bedstand snake neck lamp from home in my hands and Kathy has her and Wes's desktop snake neck lamp from their house in her hands. Katie is sitting patiently in my performance chair while we try to light her. Katie is 12 so this truly takes patience on her part. We are trying to keep the lamps low so that they don't get in the audiences sight lines. but because of this angle, Katie is looking like she should be in a Vincent Price movie. Which is not exactly the effect I am looking for in this piece. The lamps also make giant shadows on the back wall which I fear might become more interesting than my performance if we can't find an angle whereby they disappear. Did I mention that it's not going well?

Mike shows up. "You guys have got some really bad shadows going on the wall back there," he says. "Thanks." Kathy and I say in unison as our snake neck lamps continue to orbit around the now nearly blinded Katie. "I've got my light kit in the car, let me go get it..." says Mike.

Kathy says, "Mike, we don't have time, we are letting in the audience in 5 minutes!" "This will only take two minutes." he responds. "OK," Kathy says putting down her lamp. "You've got two minutes." And she meant it.

Mike is out to his car, back with the lights and the light stands, and the stage is perfectly lit at the 1 minute 58 second mark. Mike says, "Told ya, two minutes." Maria finishes taping off the back rows and we open the house.

Kathy gave me a great introduction. We had a very nice turn out and I think the show went well. It's always hard for me to gage when I'm doing With Flying Colors, but they were nice and responsive, laughed in nearly all the appropriate places and clapped at the end. What more could I ask!!?

I realized when it was all over that the evening could have been a bit of a disaster. Say, for instance, my friend with the light kit hadn't shown up right when we needed him. When I was younger I would get very upset and worried about moments like that, but living this life of mine has taught me that most stuff works out for me in the end. I think that's how I survived cancer, how I remain an actor, how I have a web site and how I stay happy. Friends. I seriously count on my friends, and I have a friend for everything...