Cancer

This is clearly one person's experience although Hoagland is urging America to "get" cancer. He writes about a specific phlebotomist w/ a specific pink radio playing gospel music. Clearly, America can't get cancer. So what is he doing? It seems that getting sick has made him confront the humanity in all of his fellow sufferers no matter how different they might seem to him--either based on ethnicity or just the way they dress. Perhaps all of these people are too ill to create conflict. Or maybe since everyone has to depend on others here--often people who look very differently than themselves--they start to see their shared humanity. The truth is that even in a city as diverse as NYC, people often live in segregated neighborhoods, that they work w/ people who look a lot like them. This gets even worse the farther away from urban centers we move. Maybe people who get sick w/ cancer are having to confront difference for the first time in their lives.