My Ganglion Cyst

I have a cyst just like this on my wrist! I have personified him, turned him into a close friend.

My friend has been riding the inside bend of my right wrist for nearly a year now. He doesn't hurt me unless I slam him against the hard surface of a table or wall. He is the size of a cherry, with the same gelatinous texture, which allows me to shift him slightly to the right or left by pressing against him with a finger.

When he first appeared (seemingly overnight) I worried a little he might be an early sign of something horrible. People around me must have thought so too, because upon noticing him, they always took two steps backward. And if they happened to see me again in the future, they never failed to give me a wide, wide berth.

Shortly after my friend appeared, I went to Kaiser, where a young woman physician sat me down and explained what my friend was, exactly. "A ganglion cyst," she said, poking at it with a small stick. Then the physician opened a drawer and brought out a bottle of iodine, a handful of gauze, and an enormous needle. While I clenched my teeth and glared at the white examination room wall, she used the needle to suck my friend's insides out of me.

But within a week my friend sprouted up again. Evidently, he wasn't ready to be bullied away.

For the past year I've left him alone, let him hang on happily, comfortably.

But this morning I once again telephoned Kaiser, this time scheduling an August date in which my little friend could be surgically removed.

After setting the phone receiver in its cradle, I sat down on the sofa and gently massaged my friend. Then I gave him the news.

He had just two weeks left to live.

Of course, all morning my friend has been filled with melancholy. So in an effort to brighten him up, I took a pen from the coffee mug sitting next to the computer on my desk and drew a happy, happy face on my friend's soft, plump surface.

On the outside, my little friend appears to be the happiest little ganglion cyst in the world.

But of course anybody can see its just a mask.