Each night, I put on my moisturizer. I smooth the cool cream over my crow's feet forming at the corner of my eyes. They are there because I smile. I smooth it using upward motions on my neck so it will stay as young as my face. I think, for a moment, "Why?" Why do I tend to my skin and save my youth if I am going to die before I form proper wrinkles and white hair to distinguish my wisdom of a full three quarter century?
I scan my body. My toe nail polish is chipping. It needs to be redone. Under the metallic lavender is a yellow nail, brittle, fighting to grow out the chemo frailty. My ankles are thick from the Herceptin treatment two days ago. They ache as I only imagine they should when I am like 60, not 35. My thighs are fine. They have pounded the pavement in a dire need to slip back into my size six jeans. They do, finally. Yet, they may plump out like a chicken on steroids because, heck, I am on a steroid now. I will trade my six jeans in for my eights so I can see better by reducing the swelling in my brain.
Then I move on up to the battle zone. Stretch marks roam free across my abdomen from hip to hip and pelvis to belly button from to pregnancies. It is marked only by two puncture scars. A third scar from the appendectomy slithers atop the stretch marks. Here, my mucous filled, giant appendix left my body to be discarded in a red bio bag. Somewhere in my middle is the memory of a tummy that was once a prized symbol of my youth. There are four purple dots under each arm marking the drains that hung out of my body like octopus arms four times. A red line reaches across my breasts. They aren't mine. These breasts are too round like a bronze sculpture created by a man whole has no knowledge of the sagging history of a woman's breast. The skin folds funny on the left one and there is a purple scare where there was dime size hematoma.
Around on my back is a puncture to my spin. And, on up to my arm pit I find the hollow where six lymph nodes where removed. Each time I stretch into mountain pose and look into the mirror at yoga, I can see the deflated skin and the little hairs that I can not shave in the pit. My right arm looks as if it has track marks of a druggie. It is the only arm to give blood and take in contrast for the MRIs due to the lymphodemma in the left. Each open vein was violated and screams in a blue pool of blood under the skin. My finger nails are ripped and peeling. Once my pride and joy and hard as stones, they now suffer in weak attempts protect my finger tips when they feel numb from the treatments.
My clavicle is highlighted with the bump of my infusion port and callous from the hundreds of needles pushing drugs through my veins. The slit scar that marks its entrance into my body reflects the slash where the appendix left my body, same surgeon. Yet, I move up to my neck that is smooth as it is lathered with moisturizer. My cheeks are mine and this hair is on my head. Hair that I am privileged enough to hate how it looks. With hair, I look like you. Hair, how beautiful.
Why should I be this person who in twenty months gained over 15 scars in 9 surgeries and procedures? Is it fair? No. Maybe I am the perfect candidate for the job of staying a live. Here I am someone who studied meditative breathing since high school. True, I used it to quiet my head enough to fall asleep. And now, I use it each time a needle dangles over my veins. I breath in and out. I can rise from sitting using only my legs when my chest was wrapped in the pain of surgery. And, I find joy in the twist at the end of each yoga class as it pulls the violated pectoral muscle that pulls like a rubber band between my shoulder and fake breast. It burns, and I love it.
Who better to fight cancer then someone who can be scared but knows it is going to be okay. I may die before I am grey, but I have given gifts each day. I see my children shine in the gifts of radiance. I am apart from them now so I can rest in preparation for radiation treatments to my brain. I talk with them on the phone and see what they are becoming. I want to be selfish to say that I am the only one who can bring them up to beautiful human adults. Yet, this is a lie. They are umbrellaed in love of so many others. They have a father and grandparents with great gifts. I have set a foundation that is strong in them. Should I not exist tomorrow, they will continue to shine.
Fay, I do not plan to leave you. No, I plan to rub moisturizer on my face every night in an attempt to keep my skin young. At times, I wonder why bother as a tumor grows in my brain. I shake off that thought because today, today, I have too much more to live. Today, I am going to be selfish and say that my kids need me. I will tell myself that no one else can raise up beautiful humans better then me. That is a lie, but it keeps me alive.
Perhaps I can answer the question. Why me? Why not me who is strong enough to acknowledge the world will continue if I am not in it. I give today how I can. I love all this moment and not wait until tomorrow. I clean my kitchen and worry about my pant size as is the human way. I acknowledge the gifts that yoga and meditation have given me this past year. So why not me? I can be a good liar and fake it until I make it like no other.
I just ask you this, tell me I said that should I find the fire burns low in my body before it should. Tell me it is okay because I gave all I could and loved more then I should. Tell me you will raise up my babies into the beautiful humans they already are. And remind them that each day I will be there to listen if they still themselves long enough to listen. This is only a body. It failing me. Yet, it is stronger then even I know and is full of surprises. I love you.
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