It’s been a week since my mastectomy, and I feel like a I’m on some sort of medically prescribed house arrest. Technically, I can leave my house, but my physical restrictions make general mobilization difficult. I’m able to walk and move about, but doing so is discouraged. I’m supposed to keep my right arm as stationary as possible, I can move my arm at the elbow, but my shoulder needs to stay put. For the time being, I identify as a T-Rex with this little gimp arm of mine. Fucking RAWR! I am to remain as sedentary as possible to allow my body to heal. Too much physical activity triggers the immune system to produce excess fluid to my surgical sight, which is bad news…even with the presence of surgical drains. Speaking of surgical drains: what a royal pain in the ass! They are gross and cumbersome. Thankfully, I only have 1 drain to contend with (because I only had 1 boob cut off). The ball that collects the fluid hangs from a lanyard around my neck, and when I sit down, it rests between my legs like a plastic scrotum. So, of course I give it a nick name: Love Sack. Thankfully, Brian is a wonderful caretaker and helps me drain my Love Sack, keeping a record of the fluid volume on a logbook provided by the hospital. Being the mature adult I am, scrotum jokes are commonplace anytime Brian is handling my drain.
Sleeping is a challenge, as I’m required to sleep on my back in an upright position. If I had a recliner (think Lazy Boy), this would be easy…but, I do not own a recliner, nor do I have room in my house to bring one in. So, I purchased a set of bed wedges off of Amazon, which work fairly well to prop me up.
The pain is more tolerable than I expected. It’s painful, don’t get me wrong…but, not to the point of requiring the prescription pain killers they gave me. Over-the-counter ibuprofen and acetaminophen does the trick just fine. Admittedly, I seem to have a high tolerance for pain, which I’m sure helps. I’ve always been the type to power through misery. For example: in all of the years I’ve been dealing with Crohn’s Disease, it had never hindered my way of life. Crohn’s can be kicking my ass, but you’d never know it unless I were to tell you. I still show up, I still go to work, I still attend family events, I still ride my motorcycle. Power though…that’s the name of the game.
One of the greatest challenges I face at this time is the mental aspect of remaining inactive. I like to be on the go. I like to stay busy, whether it be working, riding motorcycle, or emerging myself in creative projects. This sedentary business is not my speed. If I don’t find something to occupy my time, I will lose my fucking mind! So, my mind cranks on things I can do within my restrictions. I soon remember that my son Ethan & his girlfriend Kat gave me a Lego set for Christmas, a floral bouquet from Lego’s Botanical collection. It remained unopened, so I decided this was the perfect opportunity to build it…I have plenty of time on my hands, after all. Putting that thing together brought me back to my childhood, as well as Ethan’s childhood. I quickly realized that I could assemble Lego sets without extending my arm past the elbow, and a T-Rex arm friendly past-time was born! It sparked a bit of an obsession, causing me to go down internet rabbit holes looking for the coolest sets! I put a few sets together, a couple more from the Botanical collection, and a really cool Viking Village that Brian bought for me. I could foresee this new Lego obsession becoming an expensive hobby, especially considering how fast I was powering through them, and the amount of time I had to fill. I needed something else, something of a larger scale, something that would eat up some time. Then it hits me: I am a Portrait Artist, I should incorporate Legos with portraiture! I did some Googling and discovered that Lego Mosaics are a thing. I found websites that specialize in creating custom Lego Mosaic sets based upon customer supplied photos. It’s a very cool concept, exactly what I had in mind. The issues: these websites don’t provide large scale options, and their pricing is bonkers. My vision was large & in-charge, a statement art installation. So, I did some brainstorming and plotted out my idea: A 40”h x 30”w tile mosaic portrait of my son, Ethan. This would be a creation inspired by my greatest creation! I decided on monochromatic greyscale color scheme for simplicity and to keep costs down. Being a Graphic Artist by trade, I used some Photoshop magic to create a tile map. I took a photo of Ethan, scaled it accordingly, adjusted the pixel size to match the size of the Lego tiles, and posterized to 5 levels to match the gradient scale of the tiles I was using. I used this same tile map to calculate how many tiles I would need to complete the project. The whole piece consisting of 12 flat 10”x10” base plates and 10,800 flat 1×1 tiles. Once the mosaic was complete, I mounted each individual backer plate to a 42”x 32” hardwood panel, which I painted black. I also constructed a bracer system to the back of the hardwood panel to prevent bowing and to reinforce the panel for the overall weight of the finished piece. Once the mounting was complete, I installed LED lighting to the back of the hardwood panel to create backlighting, illuminating the stand-off space between the hardwood panel and the wall. Admittedly, the mounting process caused me to deviate from my T-Rex restrictions…BUT, by the time I got to that point, I was on the tail end of my medical leave, so I was already well on the mend. All in all, the project turned out to SUPER COOL! I like to quip that it’s my greatest “cancerpiece” (play on masterpiece)…because it’s the one thing I managed to create while battling cancer. It’s currently on my wall, and will stay there until I die. It’s a personal reminder that I can still do cool shit, even when my body is trying to kill me.