<h1>F**k cancer and the cell it rode in on </h1>

About a year and half ago I made my annual visit to the optometrist. At the end of the examination she announced that I had a very small freckle on my right eyeball that I shouldn't worry but she would refer me to an opthamologist "just to make sure".

Just to make sure of what! Cataracts? Macular degeneration? Surely not the big "C" - Cancer!!!

I am way too healthy for cancer!

Flash ahead three months and I see an eye surgeon at a hospital that specializes in eye problems. That doesn't lessen my fear. I have all the eye tests, except for the important one - ultra sound. The operator has gone home for the day and the surgeon cannot find an important piece to the machine.

"Sorry" he says. "You will have to come back but in the meantime, don't worry, the freckle is very small but I will know when we get an ultra sound done to see if that sucker has grown any."

I was dismissed only to return a few weeks later when the ultra sound established a base for the size of the growth."Let's see," he said."Today is March, make an appointment to see me in November".

I forgot to do so until January of this year when I returned. In the meantime, I scoured the internet for answers and discovered eye cancer is relatively rare and what I had was probably a choroidal nevus. This didn't sound good until I learned that a choroidal nevus is a fancy word for "a freckle in the eye" and it is totally benign unless it grows. Then we would have a problem.

So there I sat, nervously answering the resident's questions and having a bright light shone through contact lenses place against my eye. The ultra sound had been done a few minutes earlier and he had the photos spread out on the desk. He was writing furiously and drawing intricate pictures on his chart. Meticulously shading in the spot of the freckle on a graphic of the eye. I sat there wondering how I would react if given the dreaded conclusion that the big "C" had taken up residence.

The resident mumbled something to the effect that he thought all was OK but he would get the specialist to check. I could hear them in the hallway and my soul was beginning to drown in self pity. I must have cancer. It was taking them too long. They sat down and the specialist wrote on the chart and turned to me and said,"OK then, it hasn't grown in the past year. Make an appointment for a year from now."

I was home free and gladly paid the $5.50 fee for parking in the the hospital parkade for less than an hour. Yes, home free, unless of course that thing grows over the next year. I don't think it will. After all, when I was young, I had a bad case of ephelides ( fancy name for "freckles") freckles all over my body, so why not on the eye?

Of course this is just a choroidal neves. I am fairly sure about that.

None of this has anything to do with PD except as an allegory. We have Parkinson's but we don't have Alzheimer's.

“Among the blind, the squinter rules"