Posts tagged Fuck Cancer

You all, I am so very proud of my friend Rich who finished his marathon yesterday, having raised money for the American Cancer Society. 

A few hours ago, I got a strange message from our contact at the American Cancer Society - he wondered how I knew all these different people on my team from across the country.  When I told him, he was floored. He is very thankful to have you all.  

And yesterday a new team member joined Team The Internet Blue, welcome Melissa!  

Anyway, it seemed a good day to visit the DetermiNation pages that I have neglected since I wrote the below words in February.  It is still very raw, our loss.  

But today is a good day to remember the people who are here now, who can be helped now through research, through support groups, through access to information and assistance that the American Cancer Society provides. 

Fuck Cancer. Let’s do this thing.  Let’s make sure the people in our lives, and those we do not know have a chance at another birthday as a way to honor those who did not. 

Donate now or Join the team. 

Last year I ran for Jake, because Jake couldn’t run.

A few days after I committed to DetermiNation this year, I got an email that crushed our world. Our dear Jake, who was the boy next door, a bright and vibrant kid, who we had known since he was a toddler playing on our block with Ella and our neighbor Isabel, went to be with the angels.

He was 7 years old. He fought cancer for 13 months. He never complained.

It is all too much to write about right now.

Last year, I ran the Chicago Marathon with Jake’s name on my back and with a red ribbon for him on my blue singlet. Along those miles, so many people asked me about Jake, and who he was to me, and it was a joy to tell them about him, and to tell them that the day before our community came together and over 500 people participated in a Jog for Jake, and to tell stories about how the kids were before Jake got sick.

This year, I will wear a white ribbon for Jake. This year we remember him in our hearts, and in our memories and in the images we make in our minds as we ride bikes up and down the sidewalk, run across the front yards on our block, and feel that someone is missing.

Someone was taken.

Someone is gone.

We miss him.

So I am running with a white ribbon for Jake, and a red ribbon for Julie, because cancer can suck it.

I am running the Chicago Marathon October 7, 2012 and I hope you will support me, support my friend Julie who is kicking breast cancer’s ass, honor the memory of my husband’s father, Richard, and my Grandfather John and the dear sweet boy who loved the color orange and to rock, Jake. 

And if you want, I will run for you and those you love too. 

Cancer can suck it. Let’s do this thing.

On all the playlists I make for runs, somehow the Beastie Boys ends up on 90% of them, most often Sure Shot, I think it has something to do with the line about “Don’t Stop” but also the pace, and the memories of seeing them on Mtv the first time when they were fighting for the right to party, and being along for the ride as they matured and grew, and stood up for something. 

Today I was running. And my iPod died in the middle of a song. And so I had to finish the run without music, about 5 miles out of a total of 8, and then when I got home, I realized Adam was dead. 

And that just sucks. 

Fuck cancer. 

Enough of this shit. 

Fuck cancer. 

We picked her up from school, she was light and happy and silly, like always.  In the car from the backseat, she falls apart.  She wants a Happy Meal, and we say no.  She starts crying and can’t seem to stop.

Head down, out of the car, she gets upset that her father has to go get gas, so she and I go upstairs alone.  Inside, she drops her bag and slumps onto the couch in a pile, sobbing. 

I keep the lights off.  The sun is going down and the room is dark. I turn off the alarm, close the door and notice the cat run under the bed.  

I pick up the blanket from the floor where she discarded it this morning and wrap her in in, still sobbing, and we lay on the couch. 

Sobbing. 

She says her tummy hurts.  I ask if she is worried about something. 

She says she misses Jake. She says it is not fair. She didn’t get to say goodbye.

The last time we saw him, on the couch in his green sweatpants and blue sweatshirt, hair growing in dark, face full from steroids keeping him alive, smiling at the dog, smiling at her, she did not think it was going to be the last time. 

She is sad. She is angry. She sobs. 

Then she wants to be done crying. So we are. 

For dinner, we have pancakes. 

I took an Anthropology class in College, I think I was a freshman, so more than 20 years ago, and the only thing I remember about the class was the Trobriand Islanders and yams. Yams were exchanged in the culture for what seemed like every occasion.  There was a chapter or a lecture or a daydream I had once after a particularly carb filled lunch at Lyman Hall that explained that when someone died, people exchanged yams in a ritual that took days if not months - anyway a long time. 

Everyone had to remember their parts, and knew what their role was and how it would go. 

It was elaborate. 

I remember thinking at the time “This is bullshit. When Grandpa died, we had a thing and we cried and we went on and I still miss him but at least there wasn’t some way for me to accidentally insult my Uncle Ron by giving him the wrong type of yams and end up dead myself which just would start another yam thing.”

But the yams gave structure to grief, to loss, and allowed people to pass through the ritual without fucking up and saying something or not saying something or being a burden or not being a burden or processing their own grief without taking over or imposing on those who are most grieving.  

So without yams we are lost. 

And everything feels like it is wrong.

Clumsy. 

Blind. 

Trying hard not to make someone who has lost their child have to take care of me, or what I am feeling, but at the same time having those feelings of profound loss, all while not wanting to accidentally appear as though it is “all good” and as a result just seized up - like an engine run too long without oil. 

And a part of you wonders if people think you are sad enough or too sad. A part of you worries that people judge how you grieve because you have seen people do that before, and it is the worst of humanity when that happens.  

So you look around at pick up, and see everyone looking around just like you and no one says a thing, and you think - when Jake was alive and needed help, we were all clucking, now we are all silent, looking at our shoes, feeling thankful and guilty that we are here in the cold picking up our children, very aware of what a gift, what a tremendous gift it is to get to do that. 

And you can’t bring yourself to send much more than a few words to your friend who moved away to Wisconsin, because you know she wants to know, but you don’t want to say anything because it is too hard. 

All you want is to feel useful, and there is nothing to do to be of use, because you can’t undo what is done. 

So you go about hoping people at work refrain from bullshit because you can’t take it and know you would be unprofessional.  You go on Tumblr because kitten photos, Sherlock gifs and run recaps are respite from thinking about what is lost and how terribly awkward you are - all the time - but especially now.  

And you try to be honest and do what the pamphlet on grief and kids said to do when your kid asks about seeing the body and what that means and how when she dies she wants you to see her and you crumble inside at the thought.

And you wander the grocery store produce section and mindlessly load up the cart with sweet potatoes to make soup for Jake’s grandparents because they like it, but worry they must be sick of it by now.

And you think of the Trobriand Islanders and wish it was as easy as yams.  

We saw from our window, Isabel running around a tree chasing Liam.  Seven got to her feet and ran to her room for shoes, calling out “We are going outside!”

Outside, Andrea and Mike were talking while the girls chased Liam, just 2, around the grassy front yards.  We asked how he was, he had a smile, natural for him, on his face indicative of the joy he gets from his sons, life, despite what he faces everyday with Jake’s illness.  Mike is strong.  

He says Jake is inside the house, and the girls chase Liam off down three houses to the porch where they run up the stairs and into the house as though it was their own.  As fast as they enter they exit, back running through the trees, picking up downed branches and I before I can wonder what happened, Jake and Julie come through the door onto the red painted porch and settle on the top stair.

We make our way over. 

On the block.  

So many warm evenings spent on that porch, yet it has been almost a year since we were here together.  Julie and I sit on the stairs, Andrea leaning against the railing, watching the kids run in and out of trees, down the grass, having sword fights with downed branches from last week’s storms.   Only now, instead of being perched on the seat of his dirt bike, Jake sits with us on the steps and smiles, watching, commenting on what is going on out in the grass ahead of him. 

Someone goes inside to get his helicopter, and he flies it with the remote control in hand from his seat on the steps up above the girls heads, they run after it and retrieve it for him when it crashes. 

Julie hands out fruit chews, Liam organizes his by color on the step before popping them in his mouth.  A few minutes later they are gone and he sneaks up to get another package, and I see him “No! You have to ask!”

Julie smiles, she is helping Seven fly the helicopter. Jake giggles from behind me, and Liam scowls.  Julie says “Liam, Kris said no, so you have to give them back.”  Liam looks at her, turns to me, then chucks the package as far as he can down the sidewalk. He stomps off and falls into a pile a few feet from the chews.

I go over, put my hand on his back, “Liam, too many chews and you will spoil your dinner.  You are going to have delicous dinner soon, you don’t want to miss that.”  I hear a giggle, “Mmmmmmmm…..Dinner! yum!” Up with a pop, he runs down the sidewalk past the girls. 

The steroids have made Jake’s face full again, just two weeks ago it was thin and gaunt. The Chemo he is on now is working on the scar tissue in his brain.  The steroids have made a huge difference in his mood, his disposition, his ability to move his body and how he feels.  You can see it, he is more comfortable and relaxed on the porch than I have seen him in so long. 

It is hard to believe that a few weeks ago, we thought there was no hope, we had been told this was the end.  And I have to remind myself that this is a happy evening, and that I should hold back my tears, they have no place here.  

His mother, to his horror, offers that his underpants are tight on his body because of the steroids.  He shrinks into the floorboards.  We all smile - “Oh, yeah, I’ve been there. Grown out of underpants is a sad day.”  He recovers quickly, realizing that we are all on his side. 

We comment about the hair that has returned to his head, it is blond mixed with black. He is different.  There is a comfort with adults that he has that was absent last year at this time on he block.  It comes, I suppose, from spending most of the past year in the company of adults rather than children. 

Isabel finds a worm. Seven gets a stick and brings it over for Jake to see.  He holds it in his hands, someone mentions that the dirt is worm poop. Drop. Worm falls to the step, Julie picks it up and pretends to eat it.  ”EEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!”  Squeals all around, “Gross!”  Delight. 

It reminds me of a simpler time, when being on the block together was a daily occurrence once the snow melted until the snow fell again nine months later.  The block is where Seven, Isabel and Jake met as toddlers. The block is where they rode their trikes, then their two wheelers.  The block is where they trick or treat, where they run, where they play and imagine.  The block is where friendships were born.  

The girls scream and run down the sidewalk, up the stairs, where they hug Jake goodbye, and head towards my house, Liam in tow until I turn him around and send him back towards his Mom.  Julie gets up from the step, and helps Jake stand, and I turn away towards the girls already at my door.