MomsCancer.com

When Brian Fies mother was diagnosed with cancer, he decided to make a comic strip about it. Why? Because cancer is hilarious...Oh, no, wait. That wasn't it. I think it was more his understanding that art, no matter the medium, can address, illuminate and transcend every experience a human being can have. It's a lack of heart and devotion that limit one's ability to express a subject, not the chosen medium.

Brian's comic "Mom's Cancer" won the Will Eisner Award at this past month's Comic-Con 2005 for "Best Digital (Internet) Comic". Unfortunately, the comic is no longer available online at www.momscancer.com, because the series is due to be published in early 2006. But Brian's sister, Elisabeth Fies, a screenwriter living in Los Angeles, continues to post in her blog, "Kid Sister In Hollywood", daily updates on her life in L.A. and her mother's progress, and Mom Fies story can also be followed at www.momsrecovery.com.

I have an aunt in Orlando, Florida currently in the mid-rounds of a "Rumble In The Jungle" with cancer and its treatment after-effects, so I find Brian Fies fine work particularly affecting.

By the way, the "Rumble In The Jungle", for those who don't know, was Muhammed Ali's 1974 comeback fight in Kinshasa, Zaire against George Foreman, in which, contrary to all expectations, Ali kicked the presumptuous usurper's butt.