Rocco Versaci's Blog, page 2

I #AmWriting; therefore, I #AmReading

“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There's no way around these two things that I'm aware of, no shortcut.”
                                                                           --Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft



This is a...

Patience Is a Virtue or Something

            I can’t remember the exact story I was telling Shannon way back when, but I do remember that the events I was relating required me to pause and announce what I see as one of my central virtues.            “Look,” I began, “I’m a patient gu—”            “No you’re not,” Shannon said, and proceeded to laugh.     &nb...

My Hero, Teddy N.

A few months ago, Shannon and I were watching an episode of The Mindy Project (shut up—it’s good!), and there was a scene where one of the characters was sitting in his boyhood room at his mom’s house. Just over his left shoulder, in the background, I saw a green blob.            “Oh my God,” I said, scrambling for the remote. “Is that what I think it is?”            “Wuzzat?” Shannon...

Putting the Comics into Comic-Con

            Unless you’re one of the 130,000 or so people who annually attend it, San Diego’s Comic-Con has probably been packaged to you in the media (assuming that you’re even interested in such things) as a four-day bacchanal of superhero movies, television shows, and cosplayers.            And to some extent, it is. I’ve been going to Comic-Con for the last eighteen years (a number dwarfed by many Co...

Do You Have the Time?

            “Jesus Christ, why are we so early?!!”            I can’t remember where Shannon and I were going during this particular outburst, but it hardly matters. What I am sure of is that we were in my car, because at some point in all of the trips we take in my car, I hear some version of the above.            “It’s my clock,” I say. “Remember?”...

Some Good News

I’ve been on a brief hiatus. Last fall I took over as department chair, and I’ve been busy figuring out my new duties, at least one of which is to figure out how to sleep during meetings without calling attention to myself (hint—it’s easy; that’s what everyone is doing).
Anyway, I’ll be back with more posts soon, but I wanted to get something quick out to share the good news—my book, That Hidden Road, just won the San Diego Book Award in the “Unpublished Memoir” category. I was selected as a f...

A Year in the Life

I just wrapped up the fall semester, and it occurred to me that it was very different from my previous two semesters of teaching.

Mainly because I felt like me.

One year and two months ago, I was diagnosed with testicular cancer. I had surgery in October of 2013 and then began twelve weeks of chemotherapy that stretched from November, 2013, through January, 2014. In March of 2014 I had another surgery--this one pretty major--and a complication developed that didn't resolve itself until late May...

Judging Books by Their Covers

So it’s been a rough two-and-a-half months (roughly the time since my last post). The post-surgery complication I’d been dealing with—chylous ascites, or fluid collection in the abdomen—didn’t resolve as quickly as either my doctors or I had hoped. During this time, I’ve been on a strict no-fat diet and been pretty uncomfortable (massive fluid collection will do that). To be honest, right now I don’t feel like reliving this time, except to say these few things:
I’ll never again take for grante...

My Hospital Adventures, Part 2

If you haven’t read Part 1, you’ll want to begin HERE.

I came home from the hospital on the afternoon of Friday the 21st, feeling mighty proud of myself to be up and about only four days removed from major surgery. Of course it was difficult to move around easily—I wasn’t yet able to put on my socks and shoes—but my surgeon, Dr. K, and his team of residents warned me that it would take some time.
Meanwhile, I was still waiting for my plumbing to get fully functional. Part of the problem was the...

My Hospital Adventures, Part I

A lot has happened since I last checked in. At the time of my last post, on March 8th, my surgery was still nine days away and the real dread hadn’t yet set in. But when it came, it came gradually and then rapidly, kind of like this:



The hours just before surgery were the worst.
The procedure, even in its abbreviated form—RPLND—sounds awful. All those letters. The full name is worse, of course. Retroperitoneal Lymph Node Dissection. “High risk,” according to my surgeon and everything I had been...