November 2
St. Agnes, Roscoe
“Before the Lord, the whole universe is as a grain from a balance or a drop of morning dew come down upon the earth” Wisdom 11:22. Though this made me seem very small, further lines explain that God loves everything he created, shows mercy on all and preserves and spares all things. Whew! As I was the lector at the Mass, I was able to reflect on the readings a bit more before Mass. While we waited in the sacristy, Father Glenn asked about my health. Scott and I had visited him a few times when the cancer progressed for Anointing of the Sick with oil. When we first met with him, I asked for an unusual prayer. I felt my parents’ love from heaven, but also a pull from them. Desperately I wanted their intercession as prayers on my behalf, but I did not want to join them anytime soon. The tug dissipated after we asked them to pray to help keep me on earth as long as possible. Asking for Anointing of the Sick made me pause since it was the last sacrament I would receive, but the blessing itself was a blessing and I always left feeling the grace and peace long after the scent of the oil dissipated.
Later that evening I joined my English department mates, Barb, Patti, and Nate, to watch 1984 at the Paramount Theater in St. Cloud. The performance was solid, but the discussion after was exceptional as we marveled how the play stood the test of time especially given the political turmoil at the time. Orwell’s DoubleThink is a concept of believing in two conflicting thoughts like “I am small, but I am worthy,” which are not really opposites, but seeing the play reinforced how fragile the spirit can be and how difficult it can be to remain steadfast. Since I had more time now it was a challenge not to have a pajama day (or week) whiling time away bingeing on snacks and Netflix. I relied on the daily Mass to give me focus.
Time
“Time is a slut, she screws everybody” John Green writes in his novel The Fault in Our Stars, featuring two teens with cancer. I appreciated the way Green’s characters described their afflictions and honest frustration with their plight. Time is definitely promiscuous. How often had I felt hurried and rushed and stressed and long for time and now without teaching I had too much. Yet, I wanted more time, as in days and weeks and months and years. With every glance at a calendar, I hated thinking that my timeline had been lopped off. It was a supply and demand time paradox — with less time, I want more. I appreciated it more.
Time also became measured differently. At the beginning of life we calculate babies’ age in weeks and months and around two years we focus on year and year and a half. After a certain age, adults’ birthdays are often celebrated only every ten years. With cancer, I saw time in shorter increments again. Perhaps a study found a new drug or drug combination is successful because it offers a few months more of progression-free survival or median survival increases in a small range with those ranges further delineated by age and tumor subtype.
Time was stuck in my craw. I had too much and not enough. Too much without teaching and not enough as the cancer progressed. Because it was so central to my life, I started finding more references to time. Father Mike Schmitz, Ascension Press podcast, discussed time in a relatable fashion based on a concept Mark Connor writes about: “If you are born at 12:01 am and die at midnight,” and gave examples like by age 10 it is 3 A.M. on your clock, at 20 it is 6:25 am, at 40 it’s past noon, at 50 it’s 3:18. I am at about 4:20 pm. My clock might speed up a bit to get to midnight, but 4:20 is still afternoon and made me feel like I had a lot of time left in the day.
I stumbled across another view of time that I appreciated: the Linneaus flower clock, a glorious garden concept. Carl Linneaus,“the father of modern taxonomy,” was a Swedish botanist, who conceptualized a flower clock, planting flowers that bloom on the hour in the circular garden, so you’d see Morning Glories in the early morning section and Moonflowers in the night. I enjoyed my time in my flower garden, rearranging plants by height. The visual of organizing by bloom time was so appealing. I had purchased a sundial for my garden as a treat and laughed every time I checked it. The directions had been very precise about setting up at exactly noon with the gnomon facing north, but the accuracy was +/- 16 minutes on sunny days. Some days when I felt gloomy and overcast, I needed to reset my inner gnomon to find the light.
Basically, I found solace in reading through research summaries and findings and settled on my understanding as my statistic of one. Just like everyone grieves differently, I found my comfort zone in needing to have information. I would have to settle for information not answers because they don’t all exist. Before my first cancer diagnosis, I was a homebound instructor for a student with cancer. This student did not want to know anything about their prognosis so the family did not speak of it in their presence. But I was on the other end of the spectrum, needing as much information as possible. Not a prognosis though–I was not comfortable with an end-range and since my oncologist never offered one, I felt he would prefer not to guess. With so many variables in my care I did not set an end-goal. I had lots of future events I hoped to see, but chose early on not to focus on a date or event because I did not want to live in anticipation, almost superstitious that setting a goal might actually limit my existence. As the “maybe” answer for events in the future taught me to hedge, it was also a protective mechanism, to be aware that I might be too sick to attend events. I loved having plans–weddings, vacations, holidays–but consciously tried to appreciate every day so the days I had would not be spent in regret. Not to miss even a moment of joy, I fully embraced why a former coworker termed “anticipatory fun”: all the time spent planning and looking forward to an event. I loved making plans and packing for a trip, but always kept a bit of hesitation in reserve in case things went south so as not to be as devastated.
With a full-time job of taking care of myself, I was a “professional sick person.” Honestly, I was not such a hot mess, but my experience with chemo kept me close to home, avoiding crowds and forced me to be more isolated than my extroverted self wanted. It paid off in fewer chemo complications and ultimately scans that in the first months showed that the bone cancer was no longer active and the brain tumors shrunk and were likely inactive as well.
Agonizingly, my too-much-time/not-enough-time paradox was really amplified by a lack of purpose. During my first year of medical leave, not teaching left me adrift, which became quite apparent in May when a letter filled with thank you notes appeared. My coworker had students write thank you notes for Teacher Appreciation Day. Eager for any connection to school, I read as I walked from the mailbox to the garden in the backyard. The first was from a student who had lost a parent and stated their appreciation for all the extra gentle support that helped them complete a long essay project. Tears ran, sobs wracked my body and my wailing was matched by Sam, our neighbors’ German Shepherd, whose fence ran behind the flower garden. His lovely tenor howl harmony made me laugh until I opened the next note. Written by another student I was so proud of who had also persevered over difficult times, this note made me cry just because she picked me! Even though her letter was upbeat and showed her appreciation for the “fun and friendly classes” I taught, it kept me in tears, this time because I missed teaching so much. Once again, the yard filled with more crying, sobbing and wailing then howling and laughing. With the garden dirt in muddy rivulets of tears on my face plus the level of noise Sam and I created, I put ugly crying to a new level. I made it through the next letter as Scott came home from work to the backyard cacophony. I said nothing but handed over the letters and snuggled in for a long hug as he read.