Saturday, April 7, 2012

Now What?

I tossed my hospital gown and buried it under the apple tree. I made my scars invisible, grew my hair curly and wild, and gained my energy level back to normal. I’m just like everybody else.  Nobody could ever tell.

Yet I wake up at night and feel the presence of poison-filled plastic tubes, the flickering pale green light, and that god-awful dripping faucet. The images come and greet me whenever I’m afraid of life.  Like clockwork, at 4 AM. Not to mention those special purple cells going through my bloodstream. The ones who got me in this mess in the first place. I hope they’re doing fine and aren’t plotting on pulling out one of their stunts again. A joke that lasted for a year and a half. I’m still laughing.

Monday, March 5, 2012

Halfway to One


This is what a six-month-old looks like. With a headful of hair. Happy Birthday to me.


Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Is It January Yet?

Pants down, bra off. The nurse hands me a hospital gown and I tiptoe into the scan room barefoot.

The room is divided into two parts. The machine and I on one side. The doctor and the nurse on the other. We are separated by a screen that protects them from the very rays that I am about to be exposed to.

I climb onto the machine, lie down, close my eyes and wait for instructions. Hold still, hold your arms up, hold your breath. The camera of the machine starts rolling. It speeds up as though it were about to take flight. I, meanwhile, am thinking positive thoughts. Tumor shrinking thoughts. Normal cell activity thoughts. This time it has got to work out. After everything I've been through. After almost two years of hell.

I'm not ready for my world to fall apart again.

Sunday, November 6, 2011

Time Flies

I stumbled upon this quote today.


"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer." - Rilke


Day +67. Still going strong.

Monday, October 3, 2011

Home Truths












In other words:

"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow will be dying."

Some might say that it's a miserable day outside. It's raining and it's cold. 
But at least I woke up to see it.

Don't delay the happy.


Thursday, September 29, 2011

The Odds

How do you deal with something that can't be dealt with?
How do you move on without remembering but without forgetting?
How do you create a new normal?

I wonder if I'm ever going to feel relaxed again. If there is ever going to be a time when I won't panic over a sudden itch, a fever or an unexpected pain and think that it's back. When will I get peace of mind?

50/50 sucks.