Friday, July 25, 2014: I arrived in Knoxville for my appointment at Provision Center for Proton Therapy late Thursday night with Parker. I have a 10.30 appointment to have some scans done and insert some gold markers. My street value despite the cancer has never been higher. It is a beautiful morning. I feel like I should be driving to Neyland Stadium instead of to a medical facility. Blue skies and low humidity on a comfortable East Tennessee morning…it feels good to be home.

I am greeted by Kristin at the desk. Kristin graduated from Samford here in Birmingham and was a nanny for my new neighbors while she was finishing her undergrad. Small world huh? She recognized my address when we met on my first visit. Kinda cool. After we finished I sat down and waited for a couple of minutes before I was summoned to the back.

This facility is beautiful. Provision opened earlier this year in January. The reception/waiting area has huge windows with natural light covering the space. I joked with Frazier about how it feels like a television show. The whole cast is attractive. ER, Law & Order, Grey’s Anatomy…pick one.

I am back with my girl Brittany. I met Brittany on my last visit along with Dr. Fagundes. As I said before, My weapon of choice is humor. When I met them last time I was tossing in quips and “ha-ha’s”. Nothing major but just trying to gauge their “humor density”. They had their deflectors on. As they were doing their “thing”, I would lob one here and slide one in there….They wouldn’t budge. They would wait for my grin to fade and my eye brows to drop and plow right through their tasks. They were so serious…I guess they should be. They must have thought I was nuts…(save it)…It was almost like I was being “punked”. They were masterful at staying in character…It was comical how much they didn’t laugh. I thought to myself, “They’re good…real good”. They will not break me.

Back to “now”. Brittany takes me back. We draw blood to do a third PSA test. Needles don’t bother me, blood doesn’t bother me…no sense of humor bothers me. I set out to break them. But not before I am introduced to a new character. Shannon is just starting her freshman year at UT and she wants to be a nurse. She is maybe four years older than my oldest. (Edit: she is one year older than Devin) She iscute and bubbly and talks. I think her main job is to assist Brittany and distract the patients with conversation to calm them down. She was great. It was now that I thought I was on a television series set. The handsome Brazilian Doctor, the attractive but serious Clinical Nurse Brittany and the cute and smiling, up and comer, Shannon.

I “broke” Brittany pretty quick. She was leaving for vacation the next day and was in a good mood and was pretty easy to get a smile and a giggle. We move to a second room where Brittany and I are alone and chatting. I see her reach into the dreaded “box of blues”. These blues, like the soulful songs of sadness do not offer me personally a lot of hope. They are latex gloves. Nothing really good is about to happen when the door latches shut and the glove snaps around the wrist of a person in a white coat….nothing. My mind is racing. I think, “There is no way she is about to check my prostate….there would need to be another nurse or doctor in here because of the “gender conflict”. Then I joke to myself, “Dear Penthouse, I never thought I would be writing you….”, I asked her, “Is this about to get personal?”. She turns around and says, “Yes, drop your shorts and underwear and have a seat and lean back”. Luckily it’s about sixty-five degrees in there so I quickly oblige. As I situate myself she explains that she is going to apply a Lidocain lotion to my perineum to numb the area before they place the markers. “Thank you Lord”, I think to myself. I am so relieved that I announce to Brittany, “You know this takes our friendship to level 2 don’t you?”. We have a laugh. I explain to her that the odds of a girl rubbing lotion on my “taint” after I got married were not even on the board….another laugh. Brittany and I are good. After we blow out the candles and dump the last sips of wine she hands me a piece of saran wrap. As she leaves she explains that I am to place this clingy plastic on my taint so I don’t get my underwear and shorts greasy. It is a total FAIL. How can so many smart people come up with such a miserably bad idea or plan? I can’t get the stuff to stick to a round glass bowl. How in the world am I going to get this to stick to cotton or greasy skin? It was like walking around with a greasy piece of plastic in my pants. But I do it and head down to get my MRI.

Tom is waiting on me and he gets me comfortable on the table. Tom is a great guy. We are fast friends. He gets me set up in my gown made for an eleven year old girl and explains to me what’s about to happen. I knew this part was coming I just didn’t know when. Now I know when. Tom has the unpleasant task of inserting a balloon into my backside and pumping sixty milliliters of air into the balloon. This after I chug 16.9 fluid ounces of bottled water to fill my bladder. The full bladder and ass-balloon (Dear Penthouse, I never thought…it’s okay to laugh) push my prostate up so they can get a better picture for the MRI. I’m 6’4′ tall weighing in at a svelte 234 pounds. I am wearing a child’s gown laying in a big microwave oven with a balloon in my hind quarters and a bladder full of overpriced water. Certainly my day can only get better. I thank Tom for his gentleness and blow out the candles and dump out the last sip of wine. I’m going back up the hill to where I started. My head is spinning. I’ve had more action this morning than Lindsey Lohan on Saturday night in Amsterdam.

I’m back in the main facility and I have some time to text Frazier. We had some laughs on the exchange. If you see him, he will show you.

Here I sit. Thankful the worse is….wait, they still have to place the markers and I have a PET scan coming. By the way, I know how they place the markers…they place a balloon into my bung hole and  fill my bladder again…great!

I am summoned to another room…new gown…same situation…kinda. Now I am in the most prone position of the day. I am in stirrups, my swabbed taint is “supposedly numb”. At least I can’t feel the frigid air against my delicate skin. The same skin that has never had human eyes on it since I was born. For the second time today I have been instructed to hold up my scrotum. I have three of the main characters in the room with me now, Doc Fagundes, Brittany and Shannon. Doctor Fagundes is giving me play by play…Thanks Doc. Spare me the candles and wine and give me some rot-gut whiskey…STAT! So they rub Lidocain on “no man’s land” so it doesn’t “hurt” when they inject me with Lidocain. The injection of Lidocain is supposed to save me the pain of feeling him place seven or eight gold markers into my prostate. This idea was probably authored by the same person who came up with the whole “cling-wrap in the boxers” plan. FAIL #2…Although my #2 area was predisposed at the time.

After the Lidocain gets rolling I become a little light headed. I still have to break the good Doctor’s exterior facade. I’m going at him quick and heavy. I switch my wit-weapon to kill. After a couple of wise cracks I see his shell start to crack. I add, “If I’d known so many folks were gonna be in my bidness today I would have cleaned that up for ya’ll.” In his provocative Brazilian accent, he remarks something to the effect of positive attitude and good sense of humor and blah blah…. I said, “Oh you wait, you’ll have a freakin’ portrait of me above the fireplace by the time I’m finished here.” I think snot came out of his nose. He let out a snort that let me know we were all gonna get along just fine. I was victorious. Well, as victorious as you can be to have three people in the room with your knees above your head and an ultra sound probe in your butt. Maybe that was a push. I learned watching the World Cup this year that a tie can be a win. Since I’m playing Brazil today I get the “W”.

After all this physical, emotional and chemical trauma they have to take my blood pressure. They hook me up to the BP machine and make sure I’m okay. Brittany checked it twice. She checked it when I first arrived and she is checking it again…then again. All of this is being documented into her laptop. She leaves and comes back and brings in yet another attractive lady in a white coat, Lindsey. They check it again. Everyone is serious now. They ditch the machine and do it like Dr. Quinn. It’s better now. I’m still a little light headed and they are drilling me with questions. “How do you feel?”. I say, “As good as I can considering the circumstances…I’m a little light headed”. They leave. It’s Shannon and I. We talk about how she got to Knoxville from Minnesota….in comes another attractive lady. She introduces herself as Dr. Tamara Vern-Gross…I slur, “Tomorrow?” she nods and says, “like yesterday”..I think she just made fun of me but I am not sure.. She is “all serious” too…or is she? (I still don’t..it is spelled TAMARA but pronounced like any good southerner would say, “TOMORROW”). Now my pulse is racing because I have the cast from General Hospital standing in the doorway staring at me. Dr. Quinn’s method prevails. They go get a second BP machine and try it. Normal. Then they comment about how that’s the second one that has failed and it too needs to be re-calibrated. Then, we are all back to happy….That probably could have gone differently…Oh well.

Next up. Zach and Sheri for a PET scan. After this we are all done. I will spare you the suspense. A bottle of water and balloon filled with saline and twenty minutes in the scanner. Zach has a reputation of being the best balloon man in the business and he didn’t disappoint. My bladder is full and I need to,”…go make water…” like Hoke Colburn. We are way ahead of schedule. I’m on the home stretch. Three bottles of water, two balloons and one ultra sound probe will soon be behind me. The day can only get better.

I relieve myself, discard the gown and get dressed. I shake hands and hand out hugs and I am happy to be leaving. We decide that August, 11th will be my first day in Knoxville to begin treatment. I feel great. I have a gig at the Peninsula Club tonight with Frazier for their summer social. So many familiar faces and best friends are there.  I wasn’t originally supposed to play the gig. Mike booked a solo gig and I was supposed to be at the Camp SAM fundraiser. The week before I told Mike I couldn’t do it due to the event. We had a blast.

Friday, August 8, 2014: Other than that how is it going? Pretty well. I’m not sick. I am physically very well. Me and my cancer are doing just fine. Sometimes I’m a little “pissy”. I have two houses five miles apart. The treatment date changing to August, 11th instead of August 4th allows me to move Devin down to Auburn this weekend. I turned 47 August 6th and played golf (or something resembling golf) with my business partner for my birthday. I watched the “Bagger Shootout” after that train wreck. My golf group, The Sand Baggers’ have an annual golf event that eliminates two players for 18 holes until there is a winner. It is fun to watch those guys grind it out. I went upstairs and had dinner with my family. I received phone calls and text messages and emails and FB messages and posts until this morning with a couple still trickling in. Thanks to you.

Parker has been running around the neighborhood with Parks, Josh, Jill, Tyler, Anderson and Harrison all week. This is why I moved. Nerf battles, spending the night with friends, Kids running through the house and yard screaming…it was the sweetest sound.

Dylan changed dance studios. It was a hard decision but one I think she is looking forward to. A new challenge with some of her good friends.

Devin has been preparing for her move to “The Plains”. A whole new life awaits her. I’m sad and excited all at once.

Michelle is holding all of this together. All of it! She has the worst job around for the time being. There is no auto pilot for the Surber’s right now. Nothing can be “mailed in”. No days to be taken off right now. Parker and Dylan start school the day I start therapy in Knoxville. Devin goes to college right now and my sweet “Miss Michelle” is holding it together right now.

Tuesday, my buddy Taylor asked Michelle how she was doing. Michelle said, ” I don’t know? My husband has cancer and is leaving, My daughter starts college this weekend, Dylan and Parker start school Monday, I have two houses and I need to get one of them on the market…..I don’t know. How am I doing?

Michelle, You’re doing great! I love you Miss Michelle!