Choices, destinies, improvement, life and death are so close together.

Family and Friends,
Loved ones, Dharma Friends,
Teachers, Brothers and Sisters,

I am home.
I got out of the hospital on Tuesday night, the 31st, this is a tremendous accomplishment. I am have been so thrilled to be able to sleep in my bed with Sara and Tara, take naps on my couch, read when I want to read and do/go where I want to. It almost feels like freedom, but is it. I still get angry, bored, irritable. I still watch TV and don't read enough...I still have to go to clinic...I still worry about my blood counts everyday...am I cancer-free, yes, is my life free of cancer?? It feels as if the acute has become chronic, but the chronic is still acute. This is not the end-game.

Far from it...but closer than I have been in a very long time. ER is on now. A tremendous episode about choice. Who ultimately has a right to choice? Different stages of human growth, both on a cultural and personal level, would say different things...some might say a scripture is the only answer, some say no-one but myself has an input, some say both; and there are likely millions of other answers. I try to use my core beliefs, which spiritually are Buddhist, but infused with science; my family's love; and what my teachers, all of you wish.

This last week has been a very awkward and difficult week on the BMT floor. For one, I got out. But several people that have grown to be major parts of our lives have died or gone on to hospice. Some our age, others older with children. One, we all felt was stable and 'doing well' died in 24 hours. The path or dao is wide and spacious, filled with mystery, questions; paradoxes to be lived in, even concrete turns to dust; I am a mountain, un-moved; I am water flowing; death does not scare, neither does life; choice is frightening; will I choose correctly, can I not if I am being authentic to who I am?
Emptiness is no other than Form; Form is no other than Emptiness.
Many choices to be made, pondered over, answered wrongly/correctly/ sanely/ ignorantly/ attaching to pleasure/ skating away from pain/wanting pride/ running from shame.

My family chooses to love me, I choose to accept their love. Is love enough? No, compassion is necessary. The choice to take all of the love that you have ever felt for oneself, another, from oneself, from others...take that and transform it to help other people...NOT how we, you or I think, is helpful, but what does help? How do we know what helps...Is their feedback? The central problem. Like getting a grade in school...What is the feedback necessary to know what we do helps. 'It made me feel good doing it'...clearly this is not the right answer, this is not compassion. Clearly Buddha did not act live for himself, clearly Jesus did not either.

Please know my family I am comfortable in my path, my dao; I am clear that I have truth in my life and that I attempt to live by that truth. However, this in no way supersedes or subcedes your truth, nor is it wishy-washy...I am clear about our different levels of consciousness, clear of where I am on this path.

Well, enough rambling...I am tired and this is quite long enough.

I love you all,
JJ 'The People's Champion'