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July 12, 2005
The Special One
Today I finished the book Tylor (the one-legged maniac) and I have been working on for the last six months. (No title as yet.)
After discovering that I was an author Tylor decided we needed to create a book together to help people live life to the full. Tylor is truly inspiring. So I agreed to write the book with him. After all, who should know the value of life more than a child, suffering from cancer, who makes every day (which might be his last) the best day of his life?
Based on our telephone conversations, phone messages, notes and insights, we hope this book inspires people to enjoy each and every day as if it were their last.
Later today I heard some heartbreaking news from Tylor’s dad Dean. Tylor went in for chemotherapy and a scan today and three more tumors were found in the front of his brain. Dean says the inoperable tumors are the size of his fist. Tylor has been booked into the hospital and will soon be moving to the hospice room. I will be chatting to Tylor in a few minutes and I will hear more tomorrow after the family has spoken to their doctor.
Presented in Tylor's honor the following excerpts from the book show what an amazing human being he is and how blessed I am to know him.
****
“Hey Tylor what’s happening?”
“Not much.”
“How’s the Chemo?”
“Oh it’s great. I’m just loving it!”
“Really?”
“Of course not. Chemo sucks!”
“Uh…sorry, dude.”
That’s okay. Hey, Trevor, you’re an author, right?”
“Yup.”
“I want to write a book with you.”
“What kind of book?”
“A book to help people who are having a hard time.”
“Oh yeah.”
“Yeah. But we’d better hurry.”
“Why?”
“Duh. I have cancer. I’m terminal.”
“Uh...well…if you put it that way. When do you want to start?”
“Now!”
“Okay. I guess we’re writing a book then...”
****
“Hi Trevor.”
“Hey there Tylor. I’m sorry to hear you are back in the hospital.”
“It’s okay.”
“So how’s the treatment going?”
“I actually haven’t thought about it.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I more interested in having fun.”
“You mean what trouble you can stir up, right?”
“Yeah. I got busted today for roller-blading down the hallway to the elevator.”
“No.”
“Yeah. The nurse yelled at me.”
“What did she say?”
“She said, ‘You can’t be doing that Tylor.’” And I said why not? She said, ‘Because you only have one leg.’”
“So what did you say?”
“I said, ‘Lady I have got two legs, but only one of them is visible.’”
****
“I’m just sitting here thinking about what I’m going to eat when I wake up.”
“But Tylor you’re just about to have brain surgery and you’re thinking about food?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you anxious about the surgery?”
“Nah. Worryin’ about whether I should be worried or not just makes me worry.”
“Errr. Okay.”
****
“Hey Tylor, what’s happening?”
“Nothin’ much. Just sitting here in the hospital. I’m getting a blood transfusion right now.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Nah. It’s just like changing the oil in your car.”
****
“How do you manage to move around with one leg? I mean your mom told me that one day you hid your roller-blade in you back pack and once you were out of sight of the house you roller-bladed on the road.”
“I just do it.”
“Don’t you feel off balance?”
“No. In my mind I have two legs.”
“They call that visualization. It can be a very powerful tool while fighting your cancer.”
“Yeah. I picture the little chemo like a munching monster in my blood eating the little tumors.”
“Like Pac Man.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s amazing. How do you visualize your future?”
“I always picture myself being well when I think of the future. I never see myself curled up in a little ball all sick and sorry for myself.”
“That’s a real positive way of dealing with things Tylor.”
“There one thing that I don’t want to visi…visu… that visual thing.”
“Visualize.”
“Yeah.”
“What don’t you want to visualize?”
“Your shirt with the pink and red flowers. The one you wore for the movie premiere. That shirt scares me.”
“But it’s a designer shirt.”
“I don’t think that designer went to school for design.”
****
“Today is a great day.”
“How come, Tylor?”
“Because I want it to be.”
*****
“Trevor, with this book, we could be on TV right? Like on the Today Show.”
“It’s a possibility.”
“Hmmm. Well, I hope you don’t change if I make you famous.”
****
Tylor is one of the most compassionate human beings I have ever met. He is all about the welfare of others. When his little brother was about to have a hernia operation, Tylor who has had over 41 surgeries cried and said he wished it were him having the surgery not his little brother.
Posted by trevor at July 12, 2005 07:17 PM
Comments
"I will have loved my life with passion, embraced it with fervor, cherished every single moment of it. I will have contemplated with wonder at the sky and its running clouds, my brethren the humans, my sisters the flowers and stars. I will have feasted unceasingly on the treasure of life in all its forms. I will not have dwelled in mediocre ambitions, vain hatred and useless complaints."
~ Robert Muller, Most Of All, They Taught Me Happiness
Trevor, this is an amazingly inspiring entry!
Based upon reading your lovely words, Tylor is an impeccable manifestation of compassion, immense vitality, and an artisan of living the best life imaginable!
He appears to be a kindred spirit to Dame Edith Sitwell, who said,
“I am not eccentric. I am just more alive than most people. I am an electric eel in a pond of goldfish.”
Every day, we are presented with a gift of 1,440 minutes. Either we can waste those precious minutes looking at our watches, lamenting our misfortunes, worrying over trivial matters, or we can turn ourselves into electric eels.
Tylor appears to be living his life as an electric eel instead of as a goldfish.
May each of us begin to model our lives after Tylor and begin to "feast unceasingly on the treasure of life in all its forms."
Posted by: Kim at July 12, 2005 11:58 PM
Sounds like Tylor is really making the best of every day. I can just picture him on his roller-blade.
Posted by: wynlen at July 13, 2005 06:44 AM
Tylor truly is an inspiring young fellow. We should all look to him for guidance in how to live our lives more fully.
Love, Violette
Posted by: violette at July 13, 2005 09:20 AM
Write fast. We need his book to fill our sails on days when the water is flat.
Posted by: Kathleen at July 13, 2005 10:06 AM
Tylor if you read this I just have to say:
You have got to be the coolest kid ever!
And Trevor, that shirt really does sound scary!
Posted by: Anna at July 13, 2005 10:14 AM
{{{tylor}}}
hugs for tylor
r.
Posted by: renee at July 13, 2005 11:54 PM
Personally, I liked the shirt!
Posted by: Lynette at July 14, 2005 12:04 AM
Well, I am already inspired simply from reading this blog entry. I can't wait for the book!
Posted by: nina at July 14, 2005 07:08 AM
just simply ...
gosh.
This said it all:
“Today is a great day.”
“How come, Tylor?”
“Because I want it to be.”
Congratulations on creating and completing a book you both dreamed into being and a special Thank you to Tylor for setting such a wonderful example on living - in spite of .
and thank you for this story for it encourages my own imagination.
I imagine this book as a Pocket Tylor.
A tiny-little BIG book full of quotes and conversations from every day encounters by a perfectly normal and remarkable young man and those he is surrounded by.
I imagine Tylor's nurses and doctors, family and friends - young and old alike - at the hospital and elsewhere carrying around this little book in their hospital overcoats, patient robes or back pockets - forever reminded and encouraged because of this young man and even more importantly passing this little book of quotes and/or stories along so that others are inspired and empowered -- perhaps blank pages are at the end of this book filled, personally by the owner, with snatches of other's conversations adding even more richness. Each person that reads this book will take something unique and perhaps even life changing away with them.
Has it been done before? Yes, we have probably all seen this type of little book before. However, we have not seen one by Tylor -- 'this' is remarkable in and of itself. His happiness and humor, his joy for living, the way he thrives in spite of and his compassion for others is one of the greatest Gifts that he has to offer us.
and oh gosh ... this is true of each of us, isn't it.
Over our lifetime, my three boys, my little girl and I will meet many 'Tylors'. I look forward to all of us, learning from and living the examples set by the 'Tylors' of this world - both the young and old 'Tylors' alike. There are many of them. Am I embracing my life with as much passion as they embrace their life? And despite others expectations for me ... Am I skating on one leg or two?
I thank you for sharing and creating such richness with another, Trevor, for it inspires and empowers.
Love,
Shannon
PS.
I look forward to seeing the both of you on the Today show.
Posted by: Shannon at July 14, 2005 08:53 AM
This is incredibly touching and beautiful and funny. I have to post a link to this (and you) on my blog. It is a wonderful thing you and Tylor are doing.
Posted by: Running2Ks at July 14, 2005 09:53 AM
Nice intnetions. I'll be curiously waiting for the book to be published soon. Let see what you folks have come up with.
Posted by: Kane at January 28, 2006 06:42 AM