A Personal Plea to George R. R. Martin
Sorry to bother you. I know you get overwhelmed by all the naggers nagging you to finish the last books of A Song of Ice and Fire (i.e., Game of Thrones, etc.).
Allow me a nag, just a small one with a dose of melodrama. You see, I need you to finish the story before I die.
I have Stage IV cancer. Don’t freak out. I’m not dying tomorrow or next week or hell, probably not even next year, but it will eventually get me. It’s thyroid cancer, you see, a version not cured by the usual treatment, and it’s metastasized to my lungs. I’m on a strong med, a pill (sadly there’s no chemo cure), with colorful side effects that makes you always aware of the nearest bathroom. Two years ago, my oncologist predicted I had 2-to-4 years left.
So great, I have an expiration date. No matter, I still work, I still do stuff. Hell, I’m moving my daughter to Philly this coming weekend. That medicine I mentioned, it’s my Wall. But like Winter, it (in this case it being cancer) is coming. In other words, eventually my medical wall will crumble as the cancer cells adapt and the med loses effectiveness. So it’s a race.
I’m no recent convert thanks to the marvelous HBO series. I bought a hardback Game of Thrones in winter 1996, stumbled across it really in a bookstore, and I’ve bought every one since. In fact, I remember reading your (not a) blog what seems now like jillion years ago when you first mentioned a possible HBO adaption. Some of us worried that it would turn out crap and ruin a story we’d come to admire. We said so in the comments. You vowed it was going to be good.
You were right. We were wrong. Man, am I ever glad we were wrong.
Like everyone I wonder how it’s all going to turn out, but for me the journey is more important than the destination. It’s the story I crave, the depth you can only get from the writing. So add my voice to all the naggers out there, wishing you the best, and still desperately waiting to continue the story with you.
All of us are dying. Some of us are just better at it than others.
