There's No Place Like Home
“A heart is not judged by how much you love; but by how much you are loved by others.”
– The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
This was an especially hard week for me. Sometimes life just has a way of kicking your ass. There are things that happen that you don’t always get over, days that sting you so bad they set you back, emotions that knock you down so hard you don’t think you’ll get back up. Is done an emotion? What about exhausted? Because I feel them all the time.
Lucky for me there is one place I can always go to make me remember that life doesn’t always have to be cruel. That there are people who love you without condition. That circumstances can bring you down, but they can never hold you down should you choose to find faith in knowing that life has a funny way of working out exactly how it’s supposed to…
Where is this place you ask?
Home sweet home obviously.
I was fortunate enough to sneak away for a short weekend in Wisconsin to spend some quality time with mom and dad. And it was exactly what I needed. We laughed… A LOT. I kicked dad’s butt in a couple games of Yahtzee. We laughed some more. We watched the Brewers win. And then the Badgers win. We hung out with Charlie and Hailee and then laughed some more. My heart felt happy.
The worst part about every single visit home though is the drive back to Indiana on Sunday. It’s not the actual trip, the Chicago traffic or the horrendous drivers that sucks… it’s the 4+ hours of road time. The quiet, the day dreaming… the thinking. SO MUCH THINKING.
“How am I going to get through everything I need to do at work this week?”
“I wonder if Seger’s leg is any better?”
“Why is this happening to mom?”
“What happens next...”
“Why am I crying?”
“Shit. What am I going to blog about?”
Obviously the first title that came to mind after such a perfect weekend was “there’s no place like home,” because there truly is nothing like it. Once I was set on my title, I found myself trying to recall random scenes from the Wizard of Oz because well… duh. I then successfully managed to waste two hours of my night googling quotes from the book. #procrastinationatitsfinest
As I mentioned in my “introduction” in last week’s blog (don’t even get me started on how disappointed I was in the lack of participation from you all!!!) I am a self-proclaimed book nerd. I prefer fiction because, with everything going on in the world today, I love to get lost in the make believe, the characters and their stories. The Wizard of Oz is such an amazing book with so many unique characters that offer so much insight and inspiration.
“You are capable of more than you know…”
- Glinda The Good Witch
Mom starts phase two of “operation poke its eyes out” on Tuesday. She will meet with her team of oncologists, radiologists, surgeons (and whoever else makes this stuff happen) to get an outline of what to expect over the next 6 to 8 weeks. She will then receive her first ever round of radiation followed by more chemo. Yayy….
The “chemo cocktail” this time should be less intense so hopefully her side effects follow suite. From what I understand, it’s the radiation treatments (5x per week) that will likely leave her the most exhausted this time around.
But like the good witch says… we are capable of more than we know. And that’s why I believe mom will fly through these next few weeks like a champ.
“You have plenty of courage, I am sure. All you need is confidence in yourself. There is no living thing that is not afraid when it faces danger. The true courage is in facing danger when you are afraid,
and that kind of courage you have in plenty.”
- The Lion
That lion was one smart kitty cat. True courage is facing danger when you are afraid…
Luckily mom doesn’t need to follow a yellow brick road to Oz to find her courage because she has more than enough to last ten lifetimes. Sometimes, when we’re having one of our weekly calls about nothing, I actually find myself forgetting she has cancer. I forget that she is sick, that she is in the face of real danger every single day. Want to know why? Because she KNOWS she will beat it. She has all the confidence and all the courage to face this nasty cancer and it doesn’t even phase her. She never complains, she never asks for anything. She never blames God or feels sorry for herself. She just accepts what is. It amazes me. But it also scares me because sometimes it feels like she has so much courage that she covers up how much pain she is in. That she hides her feelings and minimizes the severity of what is happening to be strong for the rest of us…
“Now I know I’ve got a heart because it is breaking.”
- The Tin Man
I think she feels like she has to be strong for the rest of us because she can see the fear… the sadness on all of our faces. She can sense it when I hug her and hold on just a little too long. Wrapping my arms around what can only be described as skin and bones, wishing for her old body back. When I find myself doing double takes as I walk past her napping on the couch, pausing just long enough to make sure she is still breathing. When I make mental check lists of everything she has eaten, and ask her for the 100th time why a feeding tube hasn’t been discussed. She has to be strong for us because she knows we are all hurting. Every time I see her I feel like my heart is breaking all over again. Because unlike her, I’m scared.
“All the same, I shall ask for brains instead of a heart;
for a fool would not know what to do with a heart if he had one.”
– The Scarecrow
I get where the scarecrow was coming from…to ask for brains...having a heart sometimes really sucks. But in this instance, what I want more of is clarity. Knowledge. I want to know what happens after this 6 to 8 weeks is up. Do they expect to get all of the cancer? And what if they don’t? Mom dropped a bomb on me and dad this weekend announcing, with zero hesitation, that the esophagectomy is out of the question. She doesn’t want the surgery. Which means, this round two stuff better effing work. Because if these 8 weeks pass and the tumor hasn’t shrunk and the cancer cells are still there, well then what? Does anyone know what happens next? Why is it so hard to get some freaking answers?
“If I ever go looking for my heart’s desire again, I won’t look any further than my own backyard.
Because if it isn’t there, I never really lost it to begin with.“
- Dorothy
I’m grateful for the time I spent at home. I am so grateful to have amazing parents, a goofy brother and a sister-in-law who loves our strange, weird little family. This weekend was exactly what my heart needed, but as I sit here now writing this, I can’t help but feel a little sad knowing it will be weeks before I see them again. So, if any of you find yourself on Beaufort drive over the next few weeks please give mom an extra hug for me… it’s OK if you hold on a little too long – I don’t think she minds.
Until then, I’ll keep clicking my heels together.
XO