A heart attack, and then a cancer diagnosis made me realise; it's the journey, not the arrival that matters.

Below is an excerpt from my memoir about me, my dad, my cancer and the COVID times we live in. I wrote much of it during the first two years of lockdown. I

It's a good book. I am not sure if it will ever find a publisher. Both- my dad's agents requested a copy of the manuscript but never- bothered to respond after reading it.

They should be held harmless because agents in the book trade or even the booze trade which I once belonged to are a particular bunch. The hustle to sell can be exhausting and make one forget common courtesies because it is an unforgiving business. Setbacks, up and down health issues, and money complaints aside, I persevere because it is the only thing I know how to do.

After all, it took me from 2010 to 2013 before my efforts paid off and my father was discovered. It will be a long struggle for me to get this book, my dad's Green and Pleasant Land and another book I am working on published. It will happen, just not when it would be advantageous to me.

Cheers,

John

Chapter Eighteen:

Dear Dad:

During my journey across the Badlands of cancer; depression was my most faithful companion. I grieved intensely over the death of my old physical self. My surgery radically changed my ability to do what everyone does without thought - excrete their bodily wastes and get on with their day. I began to physically detest myself. My resolve to survive wobbled. I was in pain, desperately alone, and saw no future for myself. For a long time after my surgery, my existence was as tenuous as the last glowing embers of a cigarette end about to be snuffed out by a passing shoe on the pavement.

I lacked optimism or motivation. I was not able to concentrate to read, and my journal entries were a detailed list of my many daily bowel movements. I contemplated suicide on a daily occurrence but only resolved to do it if I reached utter despair.

However, with my suicide plans, I was always concerned about how and where I should do it because I wanted to disappear, not create a commotion. After much thought, I concluded that should I wish to die, the best method, although painful, was to contract COVID-19.

My only fear was like Valkyrie Mitford, after she discharged a pistol to her head in 1939 when Britain declared war against Hitler, I’d botch my suicide and struggle for years with Long COVID.

To distract myself from my despondency- I did Tai Chi. But the rhythm of the motions reminded me too much of you when you did it to keep agile. So, I gave up on it as the routine depressed me. Instead, I did what I always do when my mind and emotions are overwrought. I walked it off.

My emotional upset was a PTSD variant. The trauma of cancer forced isolation, and the loneliness of living without you was overwhelming. It created a panic in me that was like being trapped in a car that plunged into a river and quickly filled with water. I was in emotional free fall, along with most of the world, from COVID-19. The threads of society frayed dangerously to snapping through the spring, summer, and autumn of 2020 because Donald Trump and right-wing authoritarians around the globe continued to deny the seriousness of COVID-19.

Capitalism drove millions of people to work in non-essential front-line occupations that were not properly protected against covid, while only collecting substandard wages. Their lives were put on the line by the 1% as if it were the battle of Stalingrad rather than just a means to preserve or enlarge the wealth of billionaires and the entitled.

 There was no new political formulation to stop people’s plunge towards poverty. During the worst of Covid, a million food parcels were handed out to needy people in Britain, while the nation’s billionaires made £41 billion in profits. There were stop-gap methods- furlough in the UK, a stimulus cheque in the USA and CERB in Canada. But these were intended as temporary measures that most realised would be paid for through austerity once the pandemic was over because Neoliberalism always guarantees there is never a free lunch for the 99%, only the 1%.

I foresaw my future, and it was bleak. Like Mum on her deathbed, I cried out, “I am afraid.” However, unlike Mum, I don’t fear the dark unknown of death. I feared ending up in a decaying rooming house. That is the way your dad met his end. I didn’t have the strength to either fight or flee. I was like Mum’s dad, who died at the age of fifty-one and perished in the carnage of Berlin’s last days as Soviet Troops stormed the city at the end of World War Two. He was simply too old to fight and too young to hide. So, he either fell in a futile battle on the streets of Neu Koln or was hung by a gang of rabid Nazis on a lamppost after being accused of desertion in the face of the enemy.

It’s not hard for me to imagine becoming unhoused, because even in my small town, our public parks are strewn with the detritus of the homeless as they set up tents as if they were ancient homesteaders laying claim to their farmland. During this past winter, homelessness was so extreme in Belleville that the dilapidated Hyundai that I once drove you to your medical appointments became a sanctuary from the bitterly cold nights for a homeless person. It is more infuriating when you remember not five hundred meters from our apartment’s parking lot, stands Albert College, a private school that charges tuition that is more than the average wage of an ordinary Canadian.

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From the moment I convinced you to create the biographical project known as Harry's Last Stand, I knew I was duty and honour-bound to ensure that this endeavour wouldn't embarrass you. You trusted me so much. I was always afraid of a voice in my head that said, “I’d fuck this up,” would come true. I knew I had a tremendous responsibility to you, but also to Mum and Peter, when I guided you to get your history down on paper. You never lost enthusiasm for the work, because I convinced you that this was the best thing, we could do with our time together. You weren’t downhearted even when your first two self-published works had modest sales of a few hundred copies. You said, “It will happen because it must happen.”

So, we continued with the writing and building of your social media platform…

Thanks for reading and supporting my Substack. Your support keeps me housed and also allows me to preserve the legacy of Harry Leslie Smith. A yearly subscriptions will cover much of next month’s rent. Your subscriptions are so important to my personal survival because like so many others who struggle to keep afloat, my survival is a precarious daily undertaking. The fight to keep going was made worse- thanks to getting cancer along with lung disease and other co- morbidities which makes life more difficult to combat in these cost of living crisis times. So if you can join with a paid subscription which is just 3.50 a month or a yearly subscription or a gift subscription. I promise the content is good, relevant and thoughtful. But if you can’t it all good too because I appreciate we are in the same boat. Take Care, John