A Raging Bore

A raging bore...which is better than being a raging boar...or boor.

Friends, my most recent CT scans have been deemed "unremarkable" in the language of medical reporting, and I couldn't be happier to be so dull.

The imaging machinery found no evidence of cancer from my neck on down into my pelvis. So. Eight weeks, and we roll again, next time with the brain, since my particular brand of cancer keeps wanting to throw parties up there, and we need to make sure no revelers are setting up for a rave.

But seriously, it feels impossibly silly to crow about my good news in the face of our current national meltdown, eh?

Despite the ill-effects on my mental health, like normal folks, I've been following the news, which recently has been way more important and way more interesting than my scans. But not interesting in a good way. As wonderful as things are inside my body, and as grateful as I am for that—for all the prayers answered and all the medical science that went into keeping me in good shape on the inside— things on the outside of my body are looking pretty grim. 

America, we have a problem. That problem is us.

We know the root cause of it, going back to the very first time a European brought an enslaved person from the continent of Africa to the Americas, believing humans could "own" one another. Or more precisely, that white people could "own" black people—and force them into labor to enrich white people. It was a fucked up idea then, and we continue to fuck up now when it comes to matters of race and justice.

Our country was founded with the evil of slavery already in place. And despite a war supposedly fought to end it, and laws written to bring all people justice and harmony, we are reminded every day that we still live in a country intensively and hatefully divided.

Unfortunately, much of the current leadership is not up to the task of bringing us together. Speaking of boors. The person whose job it is to lead—to be a model of citizenship, fairness, and good sense—sits tweeting madly on his throne about non-existent conspiracies. (Has anyone seen The Madness of King George? About King George III? Remember how that turned out for him?) We can expect nothing good from Washington.

Oh, and don't get me started on the ideological schism over who wears a mask and who doesn't? What is this...The Watchmen?

People, it's up to us. Up to us to call out racism in ourselves and when we see it in others. It's up to us to be kind and smart. It's up to us to stop racism, violence, injustice, coronavirus, a tanking economy, environmental devastation, general rudeness, and lots of other shitty things I've left off this list. Oh, and cancer. All. At. Once.

No wonder the country is having a meltdown. No wonder I am. See! A complete, raging bore.

So folks, this is all I've got: For God and Country, or just Country if you're an atheist (which is FINE by the way, no judgement here) mask up. We've got some voting to do.

On Boring Old Hair

My hair has grown back, almost a thick as it used to be. While I didn't lose it all to chemo and radiation, after my second infusion, and again after a second round of brain radiation last fall, my silver-white locks fell out in small handfuls, like passengers abandoning ship. The once-thick mane (of which I was quite vain) thinned and thinned, but never so much that it felt necessary to shave my head. I was thankful for the strands that hung in there. The texture changed, though; whenever I combed what was left, it felt brittle and fake, like cheap doll hair.

Lately, the pandemic has everyone up in arms about getting their hair cut. We've all been doing various degrees of quarantine for weeks and weeks; salons and barbershops have been shuttered. We've squabbled up and down about when and how to get them (and lots of other businesses) back open. I'll probably just cut my own hair until I am confident the COVID-19 risk is gone. So maybe it's just that the salon question has made me pay more attention to what's been going on with my own hair, but recently I've noticed it's grown below my shoulders again and looks and feels like mine, not like a plastic doll's. The other day, I braided it into a couple of convenient pigtails and went for a bike ride. So what? Right?

Yeah, not a big deal. Kind of ordinary. Kind of boring.

Except for the cancer. Except for the depth of gratitude I have, now, for boring.

I have scans coming up in a few days. I hope the results are equally boring.

Betwēonum

Between. The word comes into modern English from the Old English; be (meaning by) + twēonum (meaning two). Between two things. Between yes and no is maybe. Between red and yellow some orange.

We are between the beginning and (we hope, someday) the end of a pandemic, our lives suspended...by...what? The strings of our masks, maybe?

I am between scans, between cancer-free (inactive disease, at least) and possible recurrence (this disease comes back...we just don't know when), in a kind of dangling dance between jubilant and cautious – what I've taken to calling my "little life of living large." And right now, the world is with me on this. We're not making any plans.

I walk around the neighborhood, keeping a safe distance from other walkers (though I long to pet everyone's dogs!), and it seems that all the peonies elsewhere have been blooming for weeks. Wet flowers topple their stems after rain in every yard except mine. My pink peonies are still shy, balled up like big marbles, and just starting to show a little color. In this faint pushing forth, they are between bud and full bloom, with tiny ants busying themselves at the sepals' nectaries and standing sentry against other would-be invaders. Nice gig if you can get it.

I've been in a holding pattern with the peonies. I know better than to fret–or to dream–about the imaginary future. But I fret and dream anyway. The virus. A new front porch. Flamboyant flowers. Kayaks. Scans. Shortages. Hiking for miles and miles through another country's mountains. Stop. I'm not going anywhere.

Grief and loss are strewn about the planet like wreckage after a worldwide storm. Except we're not after. We're now. Which is another way of saying we're in between. Now is always in between. Here. In the muck and almost-bloom of it. Yes, I'm not going anywhere soon. I could get used to this.