this celluloid dream

was my first favorite non-single by AFI. I remember listening to it whilst parked in the cancer center parking lot before going in for radiation treatment. It helped me get through the last weeks of radiation.

I would hum the song and specific lyrics. In my mind, I pretended that the lovely Davey Havok was singing to me, "bathed in your radiance, I melt," during the time when I was locked in the room alone and being hit with radiation from a laser. The irony of the lyrics and the way I interpreted them at the time always elicited a smile or giggle.

During that time, I rarely smiled because I was exhausted, at least fifty pounds heavier, scarred, almost hairless, and grey-tinged from chemo. I thought that no one would ever find me attractive again.