"Mama, can I brush your hair?"

“Mama, can I brush your hair?”

We are standing in the bathroom, having the conversation about washing our hands, with soap!, for the one hundredth time. Today. Perhaps he is trying to procrastinate or get me off topic, and it works. This is such an act of kindness, a small and precious moment, that I can’t say no.

He sits me down on his little stool, the one he doesn’t need anymore to reach the sink, and begins to work his chosen brush through my hair.  It is the longest it has ever been and I don’t fuss with it much these days- no straightening or curling iron, so it’s wildly wavy and more complicated than he originally planned, I think. But he’s careful and meticulous, gentle, laughing as he brushes it all over my face, Cousin It style.  He doesn’t know how much I love to have my hair brushed or how poignant this moment is to me.

When I was first diagnosed, my first thought was that I wasn’t going to live long enough for my son to remember me. He wasn’t yet three. I would be nothing more than his mama in pictures. In those first few months, it took every ounce of self control I had to not cry every time I looked at him. I worked so hard to make life look and feel normal for him, but my whole heart broke if I let my eyes linger on him too long. Tucking him into bed at night, I would cuddle him up and wait for him to go to sleep before I would silently cry long after he settled into the soft breathing of a slumbering toddler.

I would love to say that this dread went away after my big surgery, or that December after I received my official N.E.D. status, but it didn’t. I knew I could handle pain, and I wasn’t scared of death in its terminal finality, but I was still so terribly, dreadfully afraid of leaving him behind.

When we got through Year One, I knew I was one step closer to not being a myth in his mind. This spring, as he approaches five, I realized that it has been months since I had to pull over on the side of the road to cry. He has real memories now, and I’m pretty certain I’m one of them. I also understand that my anxiety around cancer runs far deeper than whether or not my son will remember me, and I’m working on navigating the terrain of “survivorship.”

In the two years since my tumor was found, I have read countless stories of parents with cancer, and my heart breaks every time.  Tonight I cried over the diagnosis of a man I’ve known my entire life, someone not that much older than me who has a little girl who deserves to have a father who can watch her grow up.

There is so much about this disease, or any one that makes you significantly contemplate your mortality, that weighs heavily on your mind. No one wants to see a child sick, or anyone for that matter, but a parent with cancer has the additional burden of not only wanting to get better, but also fretting and worrying about making sure life doesn’t come crashing down around their children or what will become of the little person who is their world.

I am more grateful than I will ever be able to say for the time I have been given to be part of his world, and it’s because I know that my time may be limited that I work every single day to make sure it is a better place. I’m sure he doesn’t know that in any conscious way, but my hope is that somewhere, ingrained in his memories of me, he knows how deeply he is loved and how his existence makes me fight to not just exist, but to truly live.

So for today, that’s what I have to offer. Nothing grand or especially noteworthy, but a reminder that we are here for all of these precious moments, which, done in kindness and love, cannot help but make the world better for us all.  No one knows how many days we have or how many memories will will get to create, so it’s best to honor every one we are given. Twenty years from now, he may not remember asking to brush my hair, but it is my hope that I will be around to remind him of how much those little things truly do mean. And if I’m not, I hope the accumulation of many little memories paint a picture that small gestures can yield indelible good.

When my body hurts, there is nothing I want more than to be wrapped in something warm and soft, cuddled into a cocoon where I can try to forget about the pain. Reading (the right book) is a fabulous escape. Writing is the next best thing. Needless to say, today has been tough.

Please, could someone please wrap me in a nice soft book? My body needs a new reality today; I’ve been combing the shelves for something cashmere bound and down filled, a balmy 76 degree place to nestle and nest.

Adventure, romance, travel, happy endings all, filling the pages with the appreciative murmur of satisfied characters, plot and theme essentially irrelevant so long as I get amber gold imagery conjured from mellifluous language, deep rooted words smelling of sandalwood and exotic fruits.

I’d like to lie back on this raft of silken words, a river ride of clouds and sun, and watch the galaxy turn in slow motion while shooting stars land in a whisper like so much dandelion fluff or milk and honey rain pitter patting soft and low, percussive kisses, feather light.

Give me a thousand pages where I can alight barefoot and quietly wander, methodically picking my way through the dense forests of metaphors and allusions, seeking but not lost, senses heavy with wonder, my mind electric.

In return, I will strip off this weighty dramedy and put it back on the shelf or lose it under so many cookbooks and catalogues. It’s pages carry the acrid smell of pain and jutting plot points, sitting in jarring juxtaposition to an underlying maudlin theme. I’ve never been one to cast aside a book, but this one needs some serious editing.

Fixed State, Change State

As Americans, we seem fully willing to acknowledge that our bodies are a work in progress. We have no problem telling someone how many hours we spent at the gym, how many pounds we lifted, how many miles we logged this week. Our FitBits celebrate our steps, MapMyRun shares our routes and times with the world, countless workout selfies and pictures of chia seed-laden smoothies serve as “fitspiration” to keep us on track. Despite the fact that many of us don’t get enough quite exercise, there is no shame in proclaiming to the world our progress toward our body goals.

My body goals have very little to do with my mile time. I’m not working toward the perfect six pack or buns of steel. I’m just really psyched to have an essentially functional arm and I’m working exceedingly hard at breathing these days. If I had a little gidgy to count the number of hours I have spent over the past 17 months in physical therapy, (trying to) exercise, visiting specialists, redesigning my wardrobe, attempting this or that new technique, or simply flat on my back in a tube being imaged, all in the name of getting my body to cooperate, I would be rocking the celebratory confetti.

So last week, after a particularly miserable episode of feeling like I was either going to A) drown, or B) be poisoned, thanks to an overabundance of stagnant lymphatic fluid hanging out in my upper torso, I happened upon a snippet of a TED talk (which I will try to dig up and reference later) that essentially posed the question, “What if we worked on our minds in the same way we worked on our bodies?” The speaker was noting how willing we are to work on our physical selves, but our subsequent inability or unwillingness, thanks to our classic American reticence, to talk about our emotional well-being.

Full stop.

There was never a doubt that I would have help regaining my strength or range of motion, and it has taken an impressive team of experts, including oncologists, surgeons, neurologists, physical and occupational therapists, and chiropractors to get me to where I am today. Last March, when I started manifesting symptoms of lymphedema, I added even more members to my already full roster of health professionals, including three different physical therapists, professional compression garment fitters, skilled tailors, and soon, acupuncturists.  As frustrating as it can be that my body still doesn’t function in a way I would like, all of this was essentially expected. There was never any question that I couldn’t do this alone.

So why did it take a team of wild horses (and my best friends, my wife, and my mom) to get me to agree to at least walk through the door of an oncological therapist? And why did it take me over a year to do it?

I grew up the proud product of rock stubborn Irish stock. One of my mother’s favorite sayings, proffered countless times as I lay in a heap of reins at the hooves of some horse is, “Are you bleeding? No? Buck up. It’s a long way from your heart.” This woman has severed her big toe and finished barn chores and taken a hammer to the face and continued building (separate incidences, but no less hard core). Couple this with the fact that she was the primary caregiver for my completely unstable grandmother for a lifetime and you get someone with very little tolerance for nonsense and shenanigans. And while she has never treated me with anything but kindness, understanding, and softer kid gloves than I ever would have expected through this entire cancer ordeal, there is an undeniable vein of steel that permeates my consciousness, one that has frequently served me quite well. Stand strong, work hard, be independent. We don’t do wussy here.   

When I learned about my cancer, the radiation, surgeries, potential side effects, and, you know, the possibility of dying, I truly didn’t expect for it to have a profound effect on me. I thought, Suck it up, Buttercup. Many people have been through so much worse. I thought that I would be able to buck up, get back on the horse, and continue life as usual without much interruption. But for so many varied reasons, that has not been the case. And mentally, emotionally, I was not prepared. I was not prepared for anxiety, depression, and fear. I certainly wasn’t prepared to need help doing something about it. And for all of that I have felt so damn weak.

Cancer changes your life. It changes your body, your health, your job, your family, your sense of safety, stability, and well-being. It changes you. No matter how hard I wanted to believe that wouldn’t be the case when I was first diagnosed, no matter how hard I have fought for it to not be true after my surgeries, there is simply no denying this fact. Trust me, I tried for all I was worth.

This week, thanks to more body work, I achieved 15-20 degrees more range of motion in my arm. No one knew if this would be possible, and in fact, there was no indication that it would be. I also went to therapy and talked about my life adjusting to cancer. I didn’t think that would be possible. The fact that my body still shows signs of growth, rather than being frozen in the static state it has been stuck in for the past year, gives me hope. And more than simply giving me hope for strength and mobility in my arm, it gives me hope that my mind will continue to grow, adjust, and settle, as well. There is no shame in working on it. Now if I can only find an app that will deliver chocolate every time I hit a new milestone.

Erase Hate. Educate.

I was nine and my brother was three the first time my parents were asked, “Aren’t you afraid to leave your children with them?” referring to their gay best friends.

I was ten when our friend Greg was murdered, and his family was told by the state police, “He was gay. We’re going to just assume it was a ‘crime of passion.’ We’re afraid it’s not going to get a lot of attention.”

I was twelve my great aunt refused to come to our house anymore, for fear that she would contract AIDS.

I was sixteen, with my short burgundy hair and freedom rings (“Aren’t you afraid of what people will say?!”)  when I was told in the middle of my sociology class that all the gays should be put on an island and bombed. That the world would be a better place.

Shortly thereafter, the "gay plague" of AIDS took the first of our friends. His family didn't know he was sick because he had been afraid to tell them.

I was a first year teacher when I was told we needed to be afraid for Ryan, because kids were getting mean, and being not only gay, but a hemophiliac, if he got beat up, he could die.

I was an adult when my mother reminded me that we do not live in Boston or Burlington, when she apologized for encouraging me to be too liberal, too progressive, too bright and female and empowered, to work in the North Country and admit to my boss that I was in love with a woman. That that would be too much. She was afraid I would lose my job. 

I was an adult when I was asked by a closeted friend if I was afraid to walk down the street holding that woman’s hand.

It was this past spring that my wife’s parents sent her a letter, telling her that they were afraid they don’t know how to support her, through my cancer journey or really at all, because they fear she is an abomination and is going to burn in hell. 

It has been more than 25 years that I have sat with the fears of people coming out, staying hidden, praying for something different, because they were afraid of losing their friends, their families, their college funds, their faith, their safety, their lives. And I have always been afraid that I couldn’t do enough. 

I refuse to live a life of fear. We cannot live in fear.

In fear, our bodies and minds change. The way we see the world changes. We become primal. Are we going to flee, hiding from that which makes us afraid? Are we going to freeze, the proverbial deer stuck in the headlights, and do nothing? Are we going to flock, finding other people, similar people, with whom we can shelter from our fear, or are we going to fight that which we are afraid of?  From fear, we develop anger, from anger, hate. And from hate, all too often violence. 

But what if we refused to let fear control our lives and poison our hearts and minds? If we said enough of the fear and hatred bred of ignorance. If we decided to defeat violence, hatred, and anger back at their very roots.

In the words of Jonathan Larson, the opposite of war isn’t peace; it’s creation. Peace can be passive. Creation cannot. Similarly, I believe the opposite of hate isn’t love; it’s education. Active, concerted, meaningful, education. If we want the violence to stop, if we want our world to be a better place, if we want to start living with less fear in our hearts and our world, we must seek not only to tolerate, but to truly know, to empathize, to be educated in the lives of the people around us. To see them as we see ourselves. 

Life is too short, too precious, and too precarious to live in fear. As we come together in this space at this time when so many of us are left wondering, let us commit to not only filling the world with love, but understanding. Let us commit to educating ourselves and the world around us of the possibility of a world without fear. 

ERASE HATE. 

EDUCATE.

The opposite of war isn’t peace; it’s creation.

The opposite of hate isn’t love; it’s education.

My 1000 Kids

In the early, pre-dawn hours of this morning, one of my kids died. I say "my" kids because when you teach, you have the special privilege of seeing a young person every day for 180 days grow up in front of your eyes.  This is especially true in middle school when the span of time from September to June can mean a six inch growth spurt, head gear and braces to radiant smile, facial hair and an octave drop in a boy's voice, say nothing of the relationship transitions, ah-ha moments when their reasoning fully shifts from concrete-ish to abstract, that first real conversation where the glimmer of the adult they will become shines through the bathroom humor or self-conscious mumblings. 

I have had the honor of seeing somewhere in the neighborhood of 1000 young people through these years, spanning 7th grade through seniors in high school, from about 12 to 19 years. Many I have watched grow from awkward middle schoolers all the way through self possessed, talented seniors, a decided perk of a 7-12 school. My oldest are now in their mid 30's and the youngest barely teenagers. I feel fortunate that I don't have much more grey hair than I do. 

After they graduate, I will accept their Friend requests, and I encourage them to call me by my first name.  A decade and a half out and some still just can't do it.  I love seeing their parents, or better yet, the kids themselves, in the grocery store and hearing about their first year of college, or how they landed this amazing internship or job, or that they are still playing soccer. I love the pictures of engagement rings and weddings, first homes and new jobs. Yet even when I get to hold their babies, I can still see that baby faced teenager who wreaked havoc on my third period class or cried in my office after school or wrote a brilliant essay about their favorite activity being a totally fictional underwater sport.

But not all news comes from benevolent social media posts. Yes, I read the police reports, searching for the names of "my kids." It crushes me every time I see one splashed across the news. I want to take them by the shoulders and shake them or hug them and show them a picture of that adorable (or sullen or purple haired) kid they were when they sat in my class wondering why I insisted they learn how to use a comma when really what I wanted was for them to pause and be good people. I want to ask them if there was an opportunity I missed or something that I could have done to prevent such unwanted notoriety. When I see them later in the aisles, head down and averting my glance, I try to catch their eye, smile, and search their face for the answer. I ask them how they are doing and I really want to know. I still want to know.

And then there are the headlines I could have done nothing about, even if I had made them read one more book about a better world or had given them an extra dollar for lunch money. These beautiful young people do not deserve to be fighting for their lives, or worse, have no fight left to give. I cannot save them from cancer or car accidents, and this incenses me even more than a trip to court or even jail.

I understand better than most that our time is finite. Tonight I look at my own son, snuggled in his bed, and I want to put him in a bubble and never let him out from under my protective watch. I have wished these past six months that I would live to see his graduation from high school, to dance at his wedding, to hold a grandchild. But it's on nights like this, as I watch my feed fill with the tears of my past students, when I fervently wish that I could protect all of those kids who have come under my care, that I simply, selfishly ask that he outlive me. Because anything else is unthinkable. 

Freight Train (A Permutation of the TEDx Talk)

I was honored to be able to give a TEDx talk at the first ever Littleton area event this past Sunday.  I drafted and re-drafted that speech a number of times, all with the same theme but decidedly different tones.  I like this one, but I figured it was better on the page than on the stage:

Freight Train

On May 8, recognition of my own mortality came barreling at me like a freight train with the word “Malignant” emblazoned on the side in angry letters. The name of my actual disease, synovial sarcoma, was a subtext, difficult to read and understand, overshadowed by phrases like “poor prognosis with metastases” and “1 in a million.”

In those first weeks, that train thundered incessantly along the dark, curving tracks of my mind, a clicking, clacking, constant reminder of this thing inside of me that was trying very hard to make my time finite.

It bore heavy cars filled with responsibility, regret, and the weight of lost moments: these cars were my son, my partner, my family, my school. Each one was painful to look into, but there was one, especially, that confounded me, and it was the one filled with Expectations.

.

This car shined ominously with All The Things You Were Supposed To Do. All of the Dreams Others Have Entrusted To You. The World You Were Supposed to Change.

That car, with all of those Expectations, started filling up when I was quite young. When I would jump on my adolescent soap box and preach for gay rights and gender equality, animal welfare or the arts in schools, opportunities for kids to stay drug free, there was always someone- my parents, a teacher, an administrator, saying, “Go ahead. Give it a try! You can do it!”  Never once in my young life did an adult tell me that I couldn’t change the world. You see, if you are told something often enough, you begin to believe it.

Every one of those people had taken a wish, a sparkling, hopeful, beautiful thing, and handed it to me. So many of them expected “Big Things” of me, their wishes filled with grand expectations, fancy job titles, aspirations that were bigger than I thought this little town could hold. And there they sat, in the depths of that car, waiting to be fulfilled.  

For years, I felt guilty that I had chosen to become “just a teacher.” Deep inside it felt like I was letting down all of these people who had expected such Big Things of me. Teachers don’t become president of the Ford Foundation or win MacArthur Fellowships. But I had no desire to join committees just to step up the political ladder so I could be Secretary of Education, or to publish articles that are simply a restating of something someone else wrote 20 years before.

But I thought I had time, decades of time, to teach, to work with students, and then, maybe when my son had gone off to college, when I was ready to retire from the trenches, maybe then I would be able to do those nebulous “Big Things” that were expected of me. Maybe later I would be able to make their wishes for me and the the world come true.

But now, something else was driving that train, telling me that I might not have that kind of time.

And then, on May 26, 42 of my students changed the world with an act of kindness. It wasn’t about money, or about me, but about showing the world that there is good to be had in abundance. And literally millions of people heard them.

By June, a month after my diagnosis, and a week after our story went viral, the train finally started to slow down.  I looked back, and that car, so ominously filled with unmet Expectations, was replaced by the 42 students from Profile’s class of 2015. Behind them, I saw the nearly 1000 faces that I have known and taught in some capacity, including that very first group of World Changers from 15 years ago, and in all of them, I saw the most beautiful things:

I saw eyes opened up to the possibility of being the first person in their family to go to college.

I saw passion sparked by reading the first book ever, in their whole lives, as a freshman in high school.

I saw hearts and souls poured out onto countless pages, edited and reworked, published.

I saw young people who had been so lost, found.

I saw engineers, teachers, nurses, parents, artists, carpenters, loggers, clergy, non-conformists, activists, soldiers, athletes.

I saw people being elected to public office. Traveling the world to make peace. Solving the crises of developing nations.

I saw hundred of tears, but thousands of hugs.

Nowhere did I see a number, a test score, or a face without a story.

And saw THEIR wishes.

I saw World Changers. And I saw the world change.

And stretching back behind that car were all of the other teachers who had come before me and the ones that I’ve worked alongside.

I saw people from our communities, waiting to welcome those young people and share with them their wishes and dreams.

I saw the connections, handshakes between a brilliant student and a member of the community who was willing to take them under their wing.

And then farther back still, thousands upon thousands of strangers whose lives had been touched by the 42, and others by the rest of the one thousand.

What I hadn’t realized until that moment was that those Expectations had become my Wish, and that wish was made of all of the wishes that had come before me, stardust forming dreams, back and back, through time immemorial, through everyone who had come before me, taught me, and loved me.  And that to every one of those thousand young people, I had given them a piece of my wish, and thus the wishes of everyone before me. A legacy...

That they feel heard. That they feel they belong That they know they mean something.

That they know world holds amazing things for them, whether they choose to go away or stay right here.

That THEY could change the world.

And now, all of those people, 42, a thousand, millions, now hold a little piece of my wish.

They don’t need to know my name, but through my students, they hold a piece of my heart. And they hold a piece of all of those wishes that came first to help me make mine.

The train has slowed enough for me to see it clearly now, to jump back on and enjoy the ride. And that car filled with Expectations? All of those wishes and hopes for the world that were given to me? I have shared those hopes with a thousand young, eager minds. Minds that will astonish you with their capacity to take those hopes, make them their own, and run with them. To do good.

Because that’s what teachers do: They take a wish for the world and they wrap it up in punctuation marks and quadratic formulas, chemical equations and maps of the world, and they gently pass it, or they lob it and run, or they hide it for a student to find later, but they find a way to pass it on.

If I had been one person, on a quest for fame or power with a fancy titled job, those Expectations would have rested with me. But instead, I chose a passion, a vocation, that has blessed me with the chance to share them with countless capable hearts.

I have realized in this that I simply may not be meant for Big Things with fancy titles. That I may never have been meant to work for Bill Gates or be president of the NEA. No one is going to miss the book I didn’t write or the committee I didn’t chair. But the world would miss those 1000 students with their dreams. I know I would.

Who I Was and Who I Am

Four years ago I was strong. I was working in a school that I absolutely adored, with a phenomenal team of people, designing and implementing programs that I believed in whole-heartedly. Even when I was putting out fires, which was often, I felt like I was making a very real difference in people's lives. I had decided the summer before that, if my body wasn't going to allow me to have children, I was going to find joy in other ways. I was seizing the chance to work a bit on me, to be the best version of myself. Two days a week, I woke up at the not-even-crack of dawn to work out with a group fun and inspirational women. I learned I could push my body and keep up with people I considered "fit." In the evenings, weary and bleary from a ten hour day at school, I would truck off to rehearsal for My Fair Lady, which allowed me to sing, dance, and play, to transform on stage. I was excited, joyful, bold. 

I met my wife four years ago this week, while she was visiting my school as part of our ten year re-accreditation visit. We had no fireworks moment then, just a shake of hands and smiles at the welcome reception. For the next four days she toured the school, learned about its programs, interviewed people, and apparently, watched me- not in a creepy stalker kind of way, but the way someone watches the second in command of the school they are assessing. And apparently, she liked what she saw. "You were such a powerhouse of a personality," she has said to me. "You radiated confidence. And you were beautiful." 

Four years and one week ago, I found out I was pregnant, and I was absolutely elated. Maybe it was the working on me bit that allowed my body to take on the task of creating a new person. Everything about me felt capable, powerful, and in control.  I believe then I truly was the woman she saw, a woman in charge of her own life and making another. My year continued on an upward trajectory: good things at school, a best actress nomination for the state theater awards, a healthy pregnancy supported by a husband and friends who told me I had never looked more beautiful, that I handled pregnancy and work like a trooper. I was exhausted but ecstatic. The next time I saw my now wife, I was six months pregnant. I sat to her left as we interviewed her for a position at our school. She had fallen in love with it, a school I had helped to create, during her visit, and we were anxious to bring her energy aboard. "You were such a cute pregnant lady," she tells me. "You and your basketball belly. I knew you were someone I wanted to get to know." 

We saw each other once again that spring, when she visited to see how we created the schedule, but not again until after my son was born. By that time, in the end of July three years ago, I had taken on the pallor of a new mom: dark circles masked by big smiles. My body was depleted from breastfeeding and lack of sleep, but I had this new little life that was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to me. However, behind the scenes, his father had started to disappear. He spent countless hours away from home, rarely touching me or talking to me. He told me at to do so was "off-putting." I had no idea how to be a new parent (no one does), and I certainly didn't know how to do it alone. That powerhouse of a woman? She started to fray around the edges. My migraines came back with a vengeance when my son was six months old. I tried very hard to keep myself pulled together at school, but as my physical self began to wither away to nothing, it became outwardly clear something was amiss. 

When a dear friend questioned me about having an eating disorder, I had no choice but to tell my administrative team that no, I wasn't starving myself, but instead, my world was collapsing, and my body was responding in kind. My husband was having an affair, which had been going on for months, with a woman-child twelve years younger than me. I had tens of thousands of dollars of debt from helping him start his business, a six month old infant that I would now be raising essentially alone, and a sense of self that had been shaken to the core. All of that confidence, that physical glow and inner light? Gone. My colleague then friend cried in her office for me and wondered what she could do to help.

A month later, my friend and trusted mentor announced that he was retiring from the superintendency, and he asked me to apply for his job. He knew what life had dealt me recently, but he still thought I was up to the task. It was wonderful to feel like someone believed in me, still saw me as strong and worthy, but the prospect of taking on that responsibility was daunting. I polished up my suit of armor, bought some new big girl clothes to fit my fragile frame, and tried to muster that glow my friend had seen in me. I was honored to be named one of two finalists, but I wasn't sad to see the job to go to someone else. But then my second trusted friend and mentor, the principal of my beloved school, also announced that he was going to be leaving. It felt like I was getting jilted for a second time in less than six months. 

While finalizing my divorce and celebrating my son's first birthday, I was also named interim principal of my little school. This should have been cause for celebration, but it wasn't a job I was expecting, or even one I really wanted. I loved what I was doing before. I missed the people who had helped me do it. Instead, I was thrust into the role of new principal on top of new mom, with little to no guidance for either and a new superintendent who found fault with just about everything I did. Somehow, in less than a year, I had gone from the top of every aspect of my game to second-guessing my every move, every decision, every aspect of myself. 

There is nothing like being lied to and abandoned, told you are essentially revolting, balancing on a financial abyss, and being constantly berated, all while trying to figure out how the hell to operate a school and this thing called a child, while your staff stand back and watch you go down in flames, to make you feel completely and utterly inept. I was a shell of that person my friend had first met, although she repeatedly told me she believed in me, that that woman of before was in there. I cried all of the time. I was angry at the world. My migraines were so severe that I was sick nearly fifty percent of every month. I vacillated between trying to protect myself and protect my staff, and I did neither well. I existed in a perpetual fog of guilt at not being able to be the mother my son nor the leader my school deserved. I gave up on thinking I could change the situation at work and began to look elsewhere for jobs, for a place where I could start fresh, where no one would know that woman who had stood so strong, so capable, and so proud. A place where they would know only me in this present incarnation, and would hire her anyway. A place where maybe I could shuffle my way back to competent and confident. My friend had become my partner, and she supported me in this effort at recreation, at finding myself again.

And then I was diagnosed with cancer. 

My body, seemingly healthy and back from the brink of emaciation, was in revolt. A bunch of cells flipped a switch and somehow decided that if the stress of the last couple of years hadn't killed me, they were going to try. You think job stress is tough? Parenting? Let's try the prospect of dying. But before that, let's see how much trauma and physical pain your body can withstand.  How many times can a needle pierce your skin? How many hours can you spend in a tube? How much radiation and burning before your skin splits and oozes? How many inches of hair can we cut off, or flesh can we cut open and out? How significantly can we rearrange and disfigure your body before you snap?

People see the adversity I have faced and they tell me that I am strong. And yet sometimes I feel like the frame supporting this troubled body and anxious mind is made of glass. I am told that woman of four years ago really did exist. I have a vague sense of her voice and poise, the command of her limbs, the shadow of her mind and will, all the shimmer of a distant memory. My partner saw her then and tells me stories about her, and believes in her essence today, enough that she signed on to be my wife. I know I will never again be the person I was four years ago. But I would like my present self to have a chance to know her strength, her confidence, her inner and outer beauty, to allow the now me to be shaped by her. How desperately I want the me of today and the four years ago me to take all of the days in between and smooth them out and balance them, pain resolved to humility, rejection to resilience, guilt to acknowledgement, chaos to calm. I want my wife to have a chance to be married to the brilliance she first met and for my son to be raised by a mother who can embrace the weight and wonder of the world without being crushed by it. I believe there is a capable, beautiful, powerful woman out there searching for this wounded soul to claim and inhabit. And only by accepting that I have work to do can I hope to find her. Maybe then I will get to see her with my own eyes and not simply through someone else's. And perhaps, if I am lucky, she will be even better than before.