Because I’m writing from Vermont, first, the weather: cheek-slashing cold, furious wind.
Second, back at Dartmouth these past few days for a consult and an infusion. Checking in, my insurance card was denied. Denied because it’s January and the new year wasn’t set correctly, or denied because some system is broken? I imagine these numerous co-pays, from ninety-cents to $750, piling up in my electronic portal. I’ll kick that to Monday, begin to straighten that out then…
Halfway through my treatments, the Good Doctor gives me the heads up about what’s to come, including the shift from what I’m calling Cancer Land back to the Everyday World. Although I’m sure he hears this repeatedly, I say how otherworldly is this cancer journey. Rarefied isn’t precisely the word I’m looking for, as so much of disease isn’t lofty or grandiose but mundane and sometimes miserable. But the journey is like nothing else I’ve undertaken, laced through at times with impending death, elevating the stakes to the utter center point of what matters. There’s nothing trivial here.
Third (and certainly not last), I’m so grateful for the lovely mail in my P.O. Box – cards and books, seeds and poems, such as this one by Danusha Laméris.
Insha’Allah
I don’t know when it slipped into my speech
that soft word meaning, “if God wills it.”
… How lightly we learn to hold hope,
as if it were an animal that could turn around
and bite your hand. And still we carry it
the way a mother would, carefully,
from one day to the next.
Stony Soil Vermont 
The journey is like nothing else I have undertaken, laced through with impending death…
You have described it so well. I am happy you are in the Everyday World right now. Praying you can rest there, and stay there ❤️
These kind words are much appreciated! 💛
Cancer has a way of cutting through to what’s most important. I’m glad to hear you’re beginning to shift out of Cancer Land. May it be filled with as much grace and ease as possible. Thank you for sharing the poem – it’s beautiful.
The poem was a gift to me. I’m happy to share it…. And thank you for kind words.
I bet, when you look back on these days, it will seem a dream, one of those floaty ones where your feet don’t really touch the ground.
That’s a lovely thought… I’m hoping to look back on this thirty years from now.
💕❤️🥳
I hear you where ears don’t work. I hear you through sensate body and memory mind. I am 86, and a 19 year survivor of Lymphoma. I know this terrain very well. Thank you for reading my blog post: Quiet Resistance.
Hi Naomi, thank you for writing in and writing your blog. So happy to hear your remission success.
🙏🏻
Insha’Allah – when we lived in Qatar we (expats) learned that the word often meant ‘maybe, but probably not’.
Interesting….!
I see wha you are going through. My biggest health concern about spending extended vacations in Vermont would be how far away I’d need to go to find the nearest specialist doctor. I guess you’ve solved that problem fairly well..
I think it was just luck…. And Dartmouth is a drive for us, too.
I would probably look into Canada s well for some alternative health ideas there.
Love the poem. As the wife of a cancer survivor and a heart attack survivor myself, I can relate.
🩵
Thank you for always sharing words of hope with your posts and literary quotes.
I don’t have a cancer diagnosis but your struggles and resolution also help those of us afflicted with other diseases.
Hoping with you for the best,
Tanja
These kind words are so appreciated.