ToMhIlL

Thanks for the rep.

I know! I want new clapboards!! Not new paint!!!

Thanks, Hilly. Threads like this can put me in "pontificate mode" pretty quickly. I've gotta watch myself sometimes. :) Cheers, Chris

Thanks, Hilly. Threads like this can put me in "pontificate mode" pretty quickly. I've gotta watch myself sometimes. :) Cheers, Chris

Hi Tom,

I'm sorry to be writing with troubling news, but I'm glad I can bring you into the picture on this issue. This is only going to you and Evan, although feel free to tell people whom you think should know. I just didn't want to put this up on the board.

After a persistent sore throat during the late winter and early spring – for which at least four potential diagnoses in Athens were suggested, none of which proved to be correct – I was finally diagnosed with a laryngeal mass on the left vocal cord on July 8th after I had returned from six weeks of research and teaching in Cologne and Paris. I was subsequently biopsied at Mass Eye & Ear Infirmary (part of Mass General Hospital in Boston) on July 17th and the biopsy revealed a squamous cell cancer of the larynx.

My surgeon stated that it has not metastasized and thus believes it is quite treatable. I am meeting with a consulting team on July 30th here in Massachusetts and, within two weeks, will begin a six-week regimen of radiation, perhaps augmented with chemotherapy. Given the location of the tumor – and the nature of my profession – surgery is not recommended as the first option.

If all goes well during the six weeks of treatment, I will be evaluated after two weeks of rest, and may be able to resume my regular research plans for the remainder of the semester. My surgeon even asked me what I would be teaching in the Spring.

Thankfully, I don't have teaching obligations this fall since I am planning to do a one month visiting research fellowship at Johns Hopkins University’s American Institute for Contemporary German Studies:

http://www.aicgs.org/index.aspx

originally scheduled for the month of September but this is rearrangable later in the semester once my treatment is complete.

I have also been invited back to the Max Planck Institute in Cologne where I was during May and early June

http://www.mpi-fg-koeln.mpg.de/index_en.asp

for two weeks in October, but this will now be put off until sometime in the Spring after our semester finishes.

So, this is why you havent' seen me in the Fort this year. I'm feeling relatively comfortable at the moment (before treatment) but I can't yell, which sort of defeats the purpose of the Fort. :)

The best way to reach me is via email or my mobile phone (978) 621-
6106 since I'll be at my Boston area home – with Katherine looking after me – until I finish treatment and then (ideally) doing my month’s research in DC before returning to Athens later in the fall.

I will, of course, be happy to accept “old technology” traditional greeting cards at:

58 High St.
Newburyport, MA 01950

But only if they are funny. :)

Cheers,
Chris

Good idea.