The Moving Finger writes..

The Moving Finger wrote:

“Live on”.

And what words can I write to describe what it feels like to be granted the potential for an old age?  What words can I write to express the relief I feel, yet, at the same time – anxiety?

I am at a loss for words.

“Your surgery, Stacey, went extremely well”, were the words iterated by my surgeon yesterday.  “The doctors in Toronto are bragging about you.”

How can I write,  “thank-you” adequately to express a gratitude for life?

For six months I have been fighting for my life.  Now, it seems, I have a good chance at winning this battle against cancer- at least, as far as I know.  That’s the best that anyone could do – to sneak an optimistic peek into the near future.  For one day now, I have enjoyed this good news. It feels like I have almost turned on a dime.

I stand on the precipice between my past and my future – not sure of which way to look.

Words escape me.  I wait for them.  It was easier to “feel” the sense of living with cancer than now living without it.  I am stunned, mute, almost numb.  The good news was almost like a monkey-wrench was flung into my “view of the world machine”.  I am shocked.

Speechless.

I am blinded.  I am baffled.  I am humbled.

I am awake, yet asleep at the same time.

Elated.

Three more chemo treatments to go to ensure there are no “radical free-wheeling” cancer cells floating around.  And chemo has not been so bad for me in the past – –

Three more immune booster shots.  These scare me more than anything as the last one I had sent me into pain worse than child labour.  “We will give you some pain medicine, Stacey.  That should help.  If not, then come to the hospital.”

I struggle for balance between joy and fear, present and future, optimism and realism.

I know I should be happy.  I am.  I think.  I think I am over-joyed.

My words escape me and my emotions are muddled.  Happiness, fear, faith seem to spill over in me and become one and the same.  The Moving Finger continues to write.  Thank God.  Because as long as It is writing – I am alive.

The Finger wrote:  “It was all ovarian cancer”, I heard the doctor say about the pathology report.  “We got it all.”  I heard the words.  The fear melted away.  No guesses.  No statements to follow that, “it is incurable, you will live with chemo…”  I have no words.  I have no thank-you’s.

I am a carte blanche, an empty book upon which a new life will write on my pages.

“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.”

– Omar Khayyam

…And I would have it no other way.  I would not wish for it to stop.  I would not wish to have it cancel half a line.  Although not easy, this journey has caused me to “pause”, to “consider”, and to “really live”.  No, I would not have it any other way.