Christian – Page 2 – Kate Kohler

My Wig!

Caring And Comfort (Savvy Wigs) sent me my wig in May after a little delay. One of the main wig makers just had a little delay, I mean, a baby! I’m excited for her and still waiting for those pictures… I’m so grateful to Caring and Comfort, Christian and my Mom for helping me obtain this wig. It’s made from my hair and made to look exactly like I used to look…

I do feel ambivalent about wearing it. I love it AND it makes me cry.

It’s all very interesting to have it arrive when the hair on my head was starting to grow back in earnest. Of course, now, it’s falling out again from this second batch of chemo rounds. When I got diagnosed and cut off all my hair, I felt empowered and I didn’t really mourn much about the loss of my hair for that first part of chemotherapy. Cutting it off was a way I could take control of this out-of-control situation. But now, having my wig, and having my hair fall out a second time… I am mourning, more than I expected.

Here’s my journal entry from the day I received my wig (edited for language):

I got my wig. My hair. My hair all tied up in knots on lace that fits over my bald head. It’s emotionally very strange to suddenly have my hair back, but it’s not actually attached to my head. It does look uncannily like me. Or at least how I used to look. I’m not sure I look like that anymore. Which is maybe why it’s emotional. Why my hair got to be this symbol of something bigger, some letting go. Some mourning of a past self that will never exist again, cancer free and ignorant of the possibility of cancer. I am forever changed. It seems like a cliche, but it’s also a truth. I will never be the same again, cancer changed me. Physically, some of which I will recover from and the visible scars will be few. Emotionally, most of which will follow me until I’m gone. I want to travel and see my family more, I want to do the things I’ve dreamed of and never acted on. I want to do more of the same things I’m doing anyway, because I do love music, writing music, teaching music, performing music. My hair. My identity. My look. My sexuality. My quirk. My recognizable trait. My hair.

Picture of Kate looking uncannily like her old pre-cancer self with long wavy hair. Yes, this is my wig!

I am grateful and I am healing and I am hopeful…

The Ovarian Bull

Christian, Creative Process, Musings, News / Kate Kohler

Hey y’all, Christian here with some more comic relief! 😊

First off, thank you so much to everyone who has helped support us during this time of need, it has really meant a lot to us both. 🙏 Who needs a functional healthcare system with family and friends like these.

When I was a child, unburdened by the world and its things, my parents decided that it was about time we had “the talk”… you know, that cultural right of passage that so often ends in an awkward conversation between a parent and their child about the birds, bees, and the cigarette trees. And my parents being into these self-help workshops that were so popular in the 80s, what better way to teach your child about how intimacy works then to send him to a sex-ed class consisting of a bunch of strangers, which in retrospect wasn’t the worst pairing with the overall “we must never discuss this again” vibes surrounding the event.

So one night my Dad dropped me off at the local church where the class was being held, within a minute or so of being seated, they already have they diagram of the female reproductive system up on the overhead projector, and the teacher is proclaiming, “it kind of looks like a bull with the horns” (points to the ovarian tubes) and that is where the memory completely dead ends and my life-long association with bulls and woman’s reproductive parts begins.

That is all to say that, please forgive me for my somewhat juvenile first-take of this situation, but when we found out about Kate’s ovarian cancer my initial reaction was to imagine this giant bull with blue skin, staring down murderously, violently exhaling smoke from its nostrils, a cancer monster looking like it was ready to charge. And of course, you know me (maybe), never have I missed an opportunity to use technology and AI to manifest the strange musings of my mind….

Picture Description: Kate uses her magic staff to fend off a very large blue bull

Of particular note, I love how the AI generated boots that matched the blanket she had around her shoulders. The way Dall-E (an AI art generator) works is that you erase part of the picture and it kind of just fills in the blanks with whatever you type into the prompt, then it tries to best match it with the original image, this is pretty much like magic to me… and also quite fashionable. Between the Chat GPT and the generative art stuff going on right now, it feels again like we live in a time of magic. You just have to know the right incantation (or prompt) and out comes a bit of wonder, which is really a much appreciated distraction on the path of Kate’s Quest.

Take care of yourself and loved ones,

Christian

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