Category: life

Mark and I just returned from the oncologist with the reminder that we’re in this for the long haul, no matter what. The remission that we thought we had in March was, more likely, the large nodule hiding behind a rib on the x-ray. The nodule was visible this time, but still smaller than it had been before. So, still probably good news (assuming the nodule was hiding, not that it disappeared and returned), just not the over-the-top good news we had before.

And this leaves me thinking again about how to define myself. Before our supposed “remission” I was a “survivor living with cancer” or even someone who could make jokes about the nodules in my lungs. Then, when remission came (erroneously), I didn’t quite know how to define myself until I became comfortable with the word remission and then bandied that one about at will.

But what dawned on me when I was getting used the “remission” moniker is the same thing that comes to me today. That I simply can’t rely on a tag like that to explain who I am or what I am in the world. Just as “wife” or “mother” or “guidance counselor” cannot fully explain me. Really the only label that transcends all of this and is ultimately the only truth is the title: Child of God.

And Child of God is really all that I am, all I need to be, and all that is ultimately real when nodules hide behind ribs on the chest x-ray, when I have to expain to Zoe that I do have cancer after all, and when I it takes copious energy to keep my head living only in the day. Child of God.

Child of God.

Child of God who happens to have a tiny cancerous lump in her lung.

Child of God who has a spindly blond girl making art at the dining room table.

Child of God whose husband rides this roller coaster with courage and grace.

Child of God who intends to swim at the park this afternoon.

Child of God. Child of God. Child of God.

This moniker, my friends, can’t hide behind a rib. And won’t change in three months, three years, three decades, three…you get the picture.

That’s my mantra for today. Child of God. Child of God.

And that’s enough.

Every 5 year old is a food critic, I’m sure. Zoe is no exception. Add to her young and picky pallete her mother’s sugar-free vegan diet, and a few zingers are sure to come. My favorites:

“Too hot. No flavor.” (OK, this was actually about some eggs that Mark made)

“Tastes like dust.” At which point I looked at Mark expectantly. He gave me a faint regretful nod and looked back at his plate.

So, when this comic ran in the paper a few weeks ago, I laughed out loud. Were they sitting at our dinner table?! (The kid character is actually named Zoe too.)

Mark and I have often remarked on the amazing comfort we take in conversations we have with the people in our lives who have gone through the same things we have. When we’ve hit a tough patch, the first people we seek out are those who have been over the same tough patch and weathered it. Often, we have found these interactions to be tangible evidence of God’s grace in our lives.

Mark and I revel in this. We get antsy for it. And we’re so relieved when it comes our way again.

In all our conversations about finding these kindred spirits, we have never discussed finding anything like that for Zoe. Perhaps we hadn’t dared to think that there would be another person for her to talk to already at her young age. Instead, I guess we thought she’d just navigate it with us. But, we’re not in her boat.

Our mothers’ lives have not been threatened with cancer. We have siblings. Like it or not, we’re really not in Zoe’s boat.

Even as I’ve watched Zoe field questions about siblings and as I’ve heard her explaining my cancer to a friend, I never thought about her finding a kindred spirit to connect with. Someone who was walking through similar waters and could talk her language. Apparently, God had figured that out already.

Today, Zoe had her friend Eliza over to play. They have known eachother since they were babies and are just 10 weeks apart in age. I drove them out to a park to meet some friends. This was their conversation in the back seat.

Zoe: I don’t have a brother or sister.
Eliza: I have a brother.
Zoe: No you don’t
Eliza: Yes I do, he’s younger than me.
Zoe: I’ve never seen him.
Eliza: Well, I do have a brother.
Me: You never saw him because he died right before he was born. Eliza saw him though, and you saw Miss Allison when Caleb was still in her tummy.
Zoe: Oh.
Eliza: Yeah.
Zoe: I don’t have a brother or sister, but I have a dog.
Eliza: Daisy.
Zoe: Daisy can’t have any puppies. And Mommy won’t have any babies.
Me: That’s right.
Eliza: Why not?
Me: Because my body can’t make babies anymore.
Zoe: Yeah, Mommy had cancer and the doctors had to take out the part that makes babies.
Eliza: My mommy had cancer too and the doctors had to take out the part that makes babies in her too.
Zoe: Oh…. My mommy doesn’t have cancer anymore.
Eliza: My mommy doesn’t have cancer anymore either. She had the cancer after I was born and after she had my brother.
Zoe: Oh.
Eliza: Yeah.
Zoe: I like dogs. I like Daisy.
Eliza: I like Daisy too.

Now I feel quite strongly that God did not give me cancer. Or Allison either for that matter. But I feel equally as strongly that God did put Allison and my friendship together 10 years ago knowing that it would bless us in ways we had never thought possible. And I bet he also intended for those blessings to be reaped by our one-minute-giggly-one-minute-philosophical-five-year-old-girls. Conversations like that cannot be an accident.

Here are the kindred spirits in a giggly moment from a winter playdate.

Zoe had her last day of preschool this week. Mark took her picture before she left. She had chosen the same outfit she wore for her school picture this year. On her school picture the orange shirt has a noticeable wet spot on it. She had been sobbing and sucking on her shirt a few minutes before the picture was taken. Her face looks normal enough, but the shirt was a reminder to me, as the picture hung in my office, that preschool did not begin easily for Zoe. It was a tiny dose of mommy-guilt as a I worked. Every mom needs a little, right? Oy.

But there she was on Thursday, in the same shirt. Beaming. Running in to show her teachers what she was wearing. Not even looking back as she joined circle time. And when I came to pick her up, she was holding her friend Anna’s hands and singing with the class “shalom my friend, ’til we meet again.” I could have become a puddle on the floor, had I let myself.

We capped off her last day of preschool by attending the yearly preschool ice cream social in the evening. I caught on film a candid moment with Zoe and one of her teachers. It’s no secret why Zoe’s preschool year turned around. She was, obviously, gently loved by her kind and amazing teachers into becoming a more confident child of God. Oh, those teachers could never know the high place they hold in my heart!

Is it me? Or does Zoe look like she’s preparing to start fires with her mind?

My friend Marie, who knows about these things, gave me a quote when I was first diagnosed with breast cancer. It was this:

“The further that sorrow carves into our beings, the more joy we can contain.”

I have been offered many quotes over the years–some of which have resonated with me greatly. Some of which I tossed out as not really being “me.” This one was different. I could neither embrace it right away, nor reject it. It jarred me at first. I didn’t have any interest in being carved. Nor could I see much joy around the corner. I wanted it to be true. But I was dubious.

Even so, I couldn’t deny the truth of being carved. Sorrow has carved me. It has left marks on me that feel visible, even if they aren’t. It has left me changed. And my family too.

This quote has also stuck with me because I have a visual reminder of it every time I walk up to our house. My Uncle Duane, three years ago now, carved a gorgeous cart for me that stands on our front porch right beside the door. During the winter I decorate it with a Christmas tree. In the summer; bird-ish things and plants. But the cart itself is decoration enough. It is intricately carved. Horses. “Morgan Mare, Way Cool” emblazoned above them. Quotes from people I love. Famous quotes. Rosettes. Vines. It really is something.

My uncle made it on his farm in Minnesota while I struggled through chemotherapy in Michigan. He carved. While I was being carved.

And, of course, all of us are carved. All of us have those hurts that dig so deeply into us we know the scars will linger. Often it seems even hard to hope that what feel like jagged scratchings might someday turn into a vine. A rose. A mare.

But what I’ve found so breath-taking over time is the truth of the quote Marie gave me. That really, joy has come to fill the grooves. Simple things turn over-joyful.

Yesterday I got a call from the oncologist. My bone scan that was done on Saturday because of my persistent back pain came back normal. Normal. Would it feel so joyful had the words “cancer”, “metastatic” and “nodules” not carved so deeply? I wonder.

“My mother is full of joy and life.
I am her child.
And that is better than being the child of anyone else in the world.”
Maya Angelou

I found this quote a few years ago and have yet to find another that better says how I feel about being my mother’s kid.

Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.

On Tuesday, I returned from the trip of a lifetime. Last week Thursday night I landed in Los Alamos, NM. There, I met up with some dear friends—even spent time with a favorite former student. It was good to be there. To see some old haunts; to recognize Kris and my duplex that was barely spared in the enormous fire of 7 years ago; to laugh with Karen, Diane, Chris, and Nancy; to meet Daniel and Brandy’s children; to see Gregg play with his band; to be charmed again by Kris and her sweet 1 year old daughter; to get to know Alison’s new husband Dave; and to get reacquainted with Jordan with whom I haven’t spent meaningful time since she was 2. (She is now a willowy and lovely 14.)

On Saturday, my sister joined me in Santa Fe. We spent our days thrifting, hunting for cheap turquoise, and eating chili (green, not red–I never even worked up to red when I lived there!). On Sunday night we spent a delicious hour in the Ichiban at 10,000 Waves, a Japanese spa nestled into the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. It had been my excuse for a return to Santa Fe and it did not disappoint.

In all, it was five days of bliss. Thanks, Mark, for taking great care of Zoe in my absence (a photo gallery of the ballet performance I missed will be forthcoming). And Jim, thank you too. That sister time was just what I needed!

and we liked it that way!”

I can just hear Zoe saying this to her grandchildren.

You know, she’d almost have a point.

Today, the big fancy playground sat empty while Zoe, Ben, and Lucy played on an enormous pile of dirt.

And loved it.

Of course, Zoe’s grandchildren would also have photographic evidence that she is a total nut and would assume her memory could not be trusted…

You know it’s been a while since a post on your blog when you start checking your own blog to see if you posted anything…

Just checked and the answer was “no.”

I think the next time I check, something new will be there. If only it had a picture…

Oh wait, it does!

But I can’t take credit for it.

This is one of the first photos my friend Emily took with her seriously cool new camera. It’s my all-time favorite.

Zoe and Vera.