A note from your editor

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If there is one thing that I have learned in my existence so far, it's that life brings no end of surprises, some of which are pleasant, others of which are distinctly less so. At the bottom end of that scale is where I would place a cancer diagnosis. But, I am sad to inform LWN readers, that is exactly what life brought me at the end of February.

The good news is that my condition, while serious, still has a good probability of being curable. Things were caught at a stage where, with a bit of luck, the disease can be evicted from my body and, eventually, this whole episode will fade into a bad memory.

The bad news is that getting there is not going to be a great deal of fun. Cancer treatment turns the body into a battleground, and, regardless of who wins, battlegrounds always suffer. My treatment has been underway for a couple of weeks now, and will continue, in various phases, through the end of the year. I am doing OK so far, but I expect that there will be periods where I will not be in a condition to figure out and explain the details of a complex kernel patch or community political situation.

It is very much my intent to continue to inflict my insights, opinions, and bad humor on LWN readers over the course of this treatment regime. But there will certainly be times when I'll have to cut back or drop out entirely. The rest of the LWN crew will continue to work to make LWN the best Linux and free software resource on the net, and they will certainly do a fine job of it. But please cut them a break if an occasional edition comes out a bit thinner than usual; they will have a lot on their plates.

Needless to say, my presence at conferences will be somewhat reduced for a while as well.

Happily, it is possible to gain access to top-quality medical care in the United States if one pays attention and is well insured. My previous experiences with the medical system have had the effect of causing both of those conditions to be met in this case. In the absence of ugly surprises (always a possibility in the system here, alas), the stress of dealing with this situation should not be accompanied by undue financial stress.

If there is a lesson in this situation (beyond paying attention to your insurance if you live in a part of the world where that is necessary), it is that we all need to pay attention to the health of our bodies and to keep up on our biological maintenance. As a community we are getting older, and any "biological debt" that we allow to accumulate will indeed catch up with us eventually. Step away from the keyboard and get outdoors, eat your vegetables, keep up with your health screenings, etc.

Should anybody wish to help, a good starting place would be to not ask for details on my condition or treatment plans; I do not intend to discuss such things in public spaces. For those of you who have ever thought about writing up some interesting work for LWN, this year might be a good time to put together an article — but please look at our author guide and talk to us before getting into the actual writing. We would also still like to hire another editor someday, especially if we can find somebody who can write about kernel topics. But, for the most part, the best help I can get is quiet support and understanding.

Many thanks are due to the (few) people in the community who already knew about this and have offered their support. More thanks to every LWN subscriber; it's you who, among many other things, allow us to pay the company's insurance bill every month. I am pleased and proud to be a member of this community — and I plan to continue that way for a long time yet.

