Boots On. Ready to Jump Up

I’ve spent four of the last six days with one of my favorite humans on the planet, my buddy from college, co-producer of a theatre in a basement at Princeton Inn, my maid of honor from my wedding, and one of my chief co-conspirators on life’s journey, Susan. In an act of unfettered generosity, Susan re-worked her trip to the states from Capetown, South Africa eschewing attending her High School reunion to spending time with me after my first chemo session.

In her former life, Susan was in consulting, and one of the things I’ve always loved about her visits is that they are a blast, but also incredibly, terrifyingly, productive. This time no less. Everything she and I have done this week has brought us joy. We have:

• Visited the neighborhood park to my husband’s bench where we shared a piece of carrot cake
• Gone to get my hair chopped off in anticipation of it’s flight from my head
• Walked at the Reservoir several times
• Had lunch with my brother, Don and his wife, Terry
• Had Friday afternoon ice cream at Baskin & Robbins
• Researched and purchased and taste tested the top five flavors of Gatorade after I polished off three horrible bottles of Pedialyte.

In addition, she urged me to call the repair person for my refrigerator which only wanted to spit out chopped ice and freeze my vegetable drawer; we’ve gone to the bagel store, wig shopped (not for the faint of heart), and in between these mundane tasks, we’ve had plenty of time to solve the problems of the word and world. She, Bob and I are devotees of the Wordle. Every day we start the day with our blind share of the scores to the others, then, after we’ve all completed it, we reveal our paths. She and Bob are much much better than I, frequenting the 3/6 score while I too often achieve “phew” status of 6/6. As for the problems of the world, my sphere is limited. Aside from my daily reading of the New York Times, my world currently includes waiting for my hair to fall out, while navigating the dread for the next cycle of chemo.

When I used that phrase “Navigating the Dread” in a text message with a dear friend across the country, she said, “That sounds so evolved and mature. What the hell does it mean?” After laughing, I launched into a text-sized description of the sage powers of PQ (Positive Intelligence). When I say navigating the dread, I mean now that I know what the last cycle of chemo entailed, I don’t want to spend the good weeks dreading the joint pain and gastro-intestinal distresses, the fear of fainting in the shower, dreading the loss of my hair. Au contraire, these are the symptoms of being alive that I need to embrace.

I want to spend the two weeks between treatments celebrating the gifts of my “free time.” Time to talk with friends, receive the literal gifts of time with my best friend, time to write, time to read, time to watch engaging series or documentaries. Time to keep up with the horrifying real-world events that put my individual journey in perspective. A few weeks ago, I had lunch with my friend Jenny at the Americana Mall in Glendale and after eating, we went to Barnes and Noble, where I picked up a copy of Jill Lepore‘s The Deadline, a book of essays which are some of the most beautiful reflections on the intersection of a human being and the world that I’ve had the privilege to read. She’s described as America’s Greatest Living Essayist in the Fintan O’Toole blurb to the book of essays I bought a few weeks ago and though I’ve read a lot of her work in the New Yorker over the years, I hadn’t allowed myself the time to really deep dive into the way she so deftly manages to weave her personal narrative into some of the early essays in this book. Her essay “The Deadline” about the race to give birth to her first child alongside her best friend’s race to the exit due to cancer was deft and moving, as was her essay about Jane Franklin’s epistolary relationship with her brother Benjamin Franklin while navigating her own mother’s expectations for her to finish her book about Jane Franklin. She has elevated my understanding of the power of creative non-fiction.

Meanwhile, the days’ outings are productive.

Susan and I went wig shopping the other day. If it hadn’t been so situationally depressing, it would have been funny. Granted, there were moments of humor in the hour-long introductions to various wigs (all women’s names) from the three or four different catalogues. The one at left was perhaps the most absurd but gave us all a moment of levity.

Our fearless guide, Henry, was helping me try on wigs as he texted with a colleague in Chatsworth and between the two of them, they came up with four more to order to try on this week. I had been planning to go today, but my body had other plans. It launched a big old ugly invasion of my left eye last night, thwarting social events for the next several days. Clearing the calendar.

I guess that’s the thing about chemo and why some people take the time off to go through it. It robs your body of it’s most basic immunity, making it more vulnerable to attack. As of yet oblivious to this phenomenon, I did journey to campus last Thursday leaving Susan at home to bask in her jet lag. It was strange to be on campus, with my shorn hair and my mask in a world where masks are no longer a thing. It turned out I came on the day before I was ticketed to do so. That’s the other thing about not having a schedule that is chock full. The relativity of events to time blurs. This was embarrassing, but fixable, even providing a learning moment for one of the box office student workers. It was so wonderful to see some of my colleagues prior to the show. The MFA Y3/UG production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, by Stephen Adly Guirgis was gorgeous. I was so glad to be there, grateful to see the work of the collaborative team. Some of the performances were breathtaking, on both the MFA Y3 and undergraduate rosters.

My building sent me a powerful metaphor message by putting itself on “diet power” for a day and a half; this phrase one of my USC Professorial neighbors, Leah, came up described perfectly the loss of power only in certain areas due to a flood in the electrical room. I was celebrating the purchase of the Uninterrupted Power Supply which powers my internet and television. So while others were huddled in the common room downstairs, I turned on my new Coleman lanters and watched the next season of LUPIN.

The moral of the story seems to be to live the moments between the medical treatments. I have witnessed many far braver folks, like my colleague Marissa do that but it had yet to sink in. Monday was misty at the reservoir when I walked with my brother, Don. I started to photograph the mist when he said, “get in there and let me get a picture of you! Do something like jump up.” That’s what this time calls on me to do. Jump up.