Heaven Only Knows

Maybe some day melanoma will become a chronic and manageable disease that we can all live with, instead of a killer of one person every hour in the United States. Or at least be a cancer whose progression can be slowed to the point it takes only leathered geezers like me, rather than so many young people who weren’t even born when the songs I fracture here were first recorded. Heaven only knows when, if ever, that day will come.

But meanwhile, everyone at The Hotel Melanoma can do something to help turn the tide against this beast. Share your story. Show your scars, if you can do so without risking an indecent exposure charge. Participate in a fundraising event and pester everyone you know to sponsor you. If you’re braver than me, get a black ribbon tattoo. Annoy your friends and family by spreading melanoma awareness on Facebook and Twitter. Or gently educate and scold the recidivist tanners among them. Just please do something.

I’ll leave you with another ode to melanoma, to the tune of Emmylou Harris’ “Heaven Only Knows”…



Wrecking lives, that’s your game
I feel your heart turn cold as rain
And know that you'll be gone some day
I hear the tan stores close
You say you got to go sell brown
I guess there's someone else you’ll hound
So why you're still hanging ‘round
Heaven only knows

Heaven only knows just why having you should make me cry
Make me feel like I could die
That's the way it goes
Heaven only ever sees
How sun's made a fool of me
I guess that's how it's meant to be but
Heaven only knows

I've heard it said that talk is cheap
But still our words they cut so deep
Lay me crying in my sleep
And the pain just grows
I don't know whose life is long
But all my tans are dead and gone
So why you keep me hanging on
Heaven only knows

Heaven only knows just why having you should make me cry
Make me feel like I could die
That's the way it goes
Heaven only ever sees
How sun’s made a fool of me
I guess that's how it's meant to be but
Heaven only knows

I'm going to yearn and blog away
There's something left for me to say
It could just change things on one day
Though, I suppose
The stuff I rave’s not always true
Well, I don't know what else to do
And how I'll ever get over you
Heaven only knows

Heaven only knows just why having you should make me cry
Make me feel like I could die
That's the way it goes
Heaven only ever sees
How sun’s made a fool of me
I guess that's how it's meant to be but
Heaven only knows