Welcome to The Francis Files, the post-Japan journal of my life in America.

Y’all might be wondering who in the hell is Francis.

Francis is the collective name I have given my current ordeal. It sounds so much nicer than disease, illness, tumors, bane of my existence, or terminator of my social life. It is well known that a name can have a powerful influence on one’s perception, eliciting fear, ambivalence, or jocularity at its mere mention, regardless of what the actual thing is. Consider the really hot guy in my Intro to Poli Sci class my freshman year of college: This guy was a total beefcake, a guy who made my heart race like Seabiscuit and my knees knock like a Jehovah’s Witness. When I finally built up the nerve to initiate a reconnaissance mission and ask his friend about him, his friend said, "Who, Dudley?" After that, Dudley didn’t seem like such a beefcake anymore.

And that, folks, is my intention with Francis. Dudley didn’t seem so big and scary and daunting after I learned his name. Actually, he became the butt of a lot of jokes. Consider this situation: Let’s say I am hacking up a lung because I can’t swallow very well, and you ask me what’s wrong. If I say, "It’s the huge mass of life-threatening cells growing wildly around my windpipe, occasionally cutting off my air supply and sentencing me to a diet of pudding a baby food," you might feel a little uncomfortable and want to leave. But if you ask me what’s wrong, and I say, "Oh, it’s just Francis!" we would probably have a good laugh and maybe have some cocktails. It’s a win-win situation.

So I hope you enjoy The Francis Files. They may be a little sad at times, but hopefully Francis will soon be a thing of the past. Just like Dudley.