Of Armor and Amulets

For Timothy, who has me thinking about all of these things
*************************************************************************

Most days, my hands roam over my jewelry box, seeking the pieces I am drawn to for the interaction of energy and effect. My dad's belt and buckle, my grandmother's amethyst ring, my daughter's handmade bracelet: I used to think of dressing this way as my armor, a way to steel myself to meet something rough.

I remember so clearly the act of dressing for court, the last act of a painful and gut-wrenching divorce that dumped me out onto those hard wooden benches raw and bruised. That day, I dressed in my typical black, fortified by my grandmother's gold bracelet on my wrist, my father's chain a protective amulet underneath. My lawyer leaned over to whisper that my makeup was flawless. It was all intentional, every bit, a way to end things with as much care and attention to how I'd begun.

But today, sitting in church on All-Soul's day, I realize these pieces I wear are less armor than talismans, ways for me to feel connection and strength from those I love. A symbol of authenticity from a dear friend at my neck reminds me everyday to have courage to be true not only to myself, but to all of those I come into contact with, my grandmother's amethyst reminds me of her gentle nature, of her kindness, her empathy, her compassion.

I've been thinking about kindness and compassion a lot lately, about the fragility of openness and intimacy, and the difference between intimacy and vulnerability and that warm space in between. A couple of months ago, my lovely therapist Marilyn and I were talking about what it feels like to be open to giving of yourself, only to be hurt in the process. "You don't get to have it both ways, Fran," she admonished me. "You can either be free with the deep intimacy that you are able to offer people --which is one of the greatest gifts you have--but you can't be hurt when people take what they need and go. You either offer yourself freely, without expectation, or you build expectation in and limit who you share yourself with. You can't have it both ways." Her words have struck with me, playing over and back in my mind in the past few days as I'm pondering that blending of intimacy and vulnerability that sits atop my personal foundation of authenticity, courage and self-worth that are inked upon my spirit.

It's too easy to wall off, close the vault and shell up, climb back in a the first sign of ouch. But that serves nobody and it certainly doesn't serve my own purpose as the person I am in the world. Most of us are messy, most of us are feeling around in the dark for a light switch, most of us are feeling like we are failing at something important in our lives. So every day we armor up and go out into the world, not sharing our deepest gifts with others in ways that would help to serve and heal not only ourselves, but also those that are treading water just the same.

What if, instead, we turned to our talismans, to our guides, to hold precious things close to us to remind us of who we are, to lean against each other when we stumble in the present, to live it less afraid and more honestly and with truth and trust. There is a vast difference between being defensive and being fortified, between being armored and being available, between keeping ourselves from the real likelihood of disappointment and instead learning to navigate when situations present us with choices on how to meet things head on, to talk them through, to care, to forgive and to heal. And to be so thankful for the choice.  

The Theory of Everything (on a rutted road)

*not sure if the above pic is of Oklahoma, but man it looks like it.

The dirt in our neck of Oklahoma is thick and orangerust colored, beautiful for growing wheat but hell on wheels when it rains more than the ground can absorb. I have felt this, firsthand more than a few times, but most notably when Hunter and I went out for a "drive" (a.k.a. my 14 year old boarding school self sneaking off to smoke) only to get stuck up to the running boards of my 1968 beetle. Elbow-deep in that clay-shale mud, dragging armfuls of sticky paste away from the wheels and laying down wheat hay for traction, we were able to get that little car out of the ruts and back up onto the middle drier ground so we could creep our way home.

The ruts in Oklahoma rainy season are no joke, deep and jagged, the earth peels away in thick sheets and tire tracks push so deep that you worry about damaging the undercarriage of your car. You have two choices: to be in the ruts, go slowly, grind out the undercarriage and risk getting stuck or to find a way to flip your car up onto a space where you straddle the middle ground with one wheel while bouncing along the warshboard (yep, warshboard) side on the edge of the road with the other. One requires you to risk long term damage and breakdown, the other requires you to attend to what you are doing with laser attention, as falling back down into the ruts could cause damage worse than originally expected.

I first thought of this analogy when I was talking to a friend about behavior change in long term relationships, how it's so hard to change things when what you know is the rutted road, especially when you aren't sure if the road is going to change or get better or if this is it, turtles all the way down. It also applies to conditions in life that have locked you into patterns and beliefs and ways of being. "I'll just wait until the kids are out of high school to engage with the life I want to live" or "It's good some of the time, so until it gets really bad, I don't want to change ...(my job, my relationship, my habits)."

And so you keep going and going and going until one day you realize where you are, stuck in this wounding condition, and you can no longer bear it--the noise of the scraping and the tension of your arms having to hold the wheel straight. In essence, what you are doing to your very soul to stay locked in the pattern that is ultimately not where you need to be.

So you look for those few-and-far-between patches where the rut weaves and jags so you can work your wheels up onto the higher ground. And that getting up on the higher ground is not only difficult, but also in itself exhausting and unstable and new and naked. The ruts are easier to navigate but a painful destruction of your tender unexposed side, the higher ground scarier but ultimately probably better for long-term sustainability--the reality is that you just. don't. know. The truth is that sometimes you are in it and you don't want to be, but getting out of the car and into the thick muck on foot is not an option, you just have to ride it until it's done, wherever that leaves you.

I sat across from my dear girl Lara the other night laying out this Theory of Everything (on a rutted road), each of us feeling it in our hearts for the painful relationships we've been through, realizing also that this is just part of the human condition of change in life overall, from losing our mothers to thinking about our best selves and those parts of ourselves still waiting to be born. And we are still learning, and choosing, all of us.

They Gather Their Courage and They Give It a Try

You can’t buy a simple pad of paper in the New Orleans airport. Paper as it exists here is either the kind of list pad that has “hot & spicy!” or “Jazz!” written at the top, or comes in the form of a lined journal with biblical quotes at the bottom of every page. So I’m destined to write this post with my thumbs. Maybe God is telling me I should have gone with the journal.

Another door closes today as my treatment in New Orleans comes to a end with the embellishment done by a guy named Vinnie from Baltimore who has a penchant for beautifully made hats. We talked about home tattooing and PCP trips and stories about his youth as he tattooed my tits. Tittats. Tittats™ could be a great marketing schtick except that Vinnie is known as the Michelangelo of areola tattoos and needs no marketing help. Vinnie, who is incredibly cool and lovely to talk to, is flying to Memphis to check out a hat store tomorrow. Tittat™ business is good when you are talented. Thank God for the likes of Vinnie. Maybe there is a bible verse for that in one of those little lined journals.

I’m feeling all sorts of sassy and consternated here in New Orleans, gathering all of my memories to tally them up and close them out in a last-chapter roll finale my experience here. It’s humorous that I went from flashing my tits in this fair city to getting flash-worthy tits in this fair city. That’s something I’ll put in the thank-you note to Vinnie who tells PCP stories but not likely to my drs who might find my tit-talk a little off-putting, a tidbit I gleaned not only from their demeanor but also from the Romans 5:1-5 quote in my parting gift. And so it rolls.

There are things that wrap with this trip. Now the next four years stretches out before me as I am done fiddling with things. I have to put all of this fiddling aside and live in the present because being in the space of still having medical things to distract me is over. I have to dig in and realign where I am. I have to settle into the reality of now. On the way back to the airport today, I listened to my cab driver speak about his life. He poured out his story, this man, about his daughter who had cancer, about his wife who was depressed for losing her mother a year ago, about the spot they found on his lung that he’s not sure what it is. And all the while he holds out hope, this man who had lost his restaurant to the hurricane and who was driving a cab even though he was proud to mention that he had a college education. This man who came from Iran and was delighted to tell me that the Persians prefer butter to olive oil in their cooking. He told me about Jesus and hope and his confidence that I would be fine. “Eat oregano and garlic and onions!” he said. “I believe you will be well!” he shouted as he craned his neck out the window. “And Jesus! Don’t forget Jesus!”

I’m eating blueberry granola on the plane and wondering if there is really gin in my G&T. I’m winging my way back to Michigan, leaving all of this behind. I’m flying without net. I’m flying onto what is next. I’m flying.

Frank. True. Honest. Real.

I wrote this post about a month or so ago, right on the heels of the dream I described. In that time I had begun to believe that the things I was writing here were too goddamn depressing, that there was no joy in anything I had to say, that people didn't want to read shit that made them cry.

Which lead to me not posting. Which meant that I wasn't being true to myself.

And then I got an email from my friend Lara last night, a long-ago woman with whom I shared a voyage around the world that will forever be imprinted on my mind. Lara is a kick-ass woman and kicked me in the ass to post again. Because Lara is not afraid of scary things. She's not one to need to mark of sunshine and optimism on everything. She just deals with things as they are. At least this is what I remember of her,  and loved about her, those many years ago.

So here we go again. Some things not so lovely, some things will be. It is what it is.
*********************************************************************************


Every once in awhile, there is a dream so vivid and real that I can't erase it from my eyes. Stark-still morning leaves me reliving the flashes and images that the soup of my brain has created the night before: some delicious and gorgeous and sensual and beautiful; others deep and lasting and disturbing and filled with resonant worry. Last night was one of those nights, delivering to me the dream that I've pushed off and aside for the past three years.

I can remember the colors in the dream, deep sapphire blue, lime-emerald green, white...all outlined in a contrasted black...and the incredible realness of what was going on. Frank. True. Honest. Real. Sitting in this dream, watching it unfold, participating in the scene, I believed that it was really happening.

That's because it can. And might. Which is what I thought of in my dappled-sunlight morning, swaddled deep in the sheets, unwilling to peek open to the new day.

It was the first dream I've ever had about getting cancer again, a recurrence which is pretty much a death sentence in the triple-negative world. See, I've never checked the stats, never typed "likelihood of survival after recurrence triple negative breast cancer" into the google jackpot to learn about my fate. My sister mentioned it once, the likelihood that I wouldn't survive another bout, but I plugged my ears and danced around until that voice in my head was gone.

But this dream was the real deal, it was sitting in the hospital getting the news, it was the reality that I was going to die, not a question of if, but when. Fuck. So real, so very real that I did type in those words and my sister was right. Likelihood of recurrence? Much, much higher than other hormone-receptive breast cancers. Survival rate after recurrence? 10%. Survival time? Average of nine months. Nine. Months.

I can't begin to understand what it means to die from breast cancer. My mind goes into overdrive trying to picture it in my head, what it would look like and comparing it to my mother's death from lung cancer. What happens? How do you die? What happens to your body? Who are you in that space? And in nine months? Nine months...on average?

I've lived the past two years in a daze, half denying that I ever had breast cancer, half denying that it can or will come back. It's comfortable, this denial, until you are lying in your warm bed completely awash in the reality that you very well may. fucking. die.

Die.

That something fundamental has happened in your life that threatens your existence in a way that you can't resolve. That you may be that life cut short that people cluck their tongues and shake their heads about. That all of your bravado and feeling good and pushing past the looks of people who know your story may be total bullshit because you may get this again and have to make decisions that are horrible all to extend your life by months...months, not years.

I suspect this reality check is something that every woman who gets breast cancer goes through. I know friends who have had recurrences who are there and are winning. I know few people who have died from this disease. But I have watched my friends and loved ones waste away from cancer. I have watched the bizarre deceleration and crippling otherness of an otherwise vibrant life.

Honestly, this reality is too much for me to handle. It's bankrupt. It's the end of the road. It's the edge of the universe. I can't wrap my head about what it would mean. And I want to believe it won't happen to me. But I'm not that arrogant and I am just that pessimistic.

So how do you live when that veil has been lifted? Does it change anything? Is it just roulette? Isn't there some huge life revelation that I am supposed to get from "holy fuck, I really may die?"

All I can keep with me is the blue and green of the scene, of the movement of people through the film in my brain, of the feeling of reckoning that stayed with me in the dream and beyond.

Final. It is what it is. No way around it. Real.

I wish there was some big pledge at the end of this post, something that would tell everyone that this was going to be ALL RIGHT and that things will be fine. But I am just going to sit with this reality for a bit because I need to, it's been too long that I've pushed it away.

Checking in

Day three in the hospital down in the Big Easy and things are going really well. This experience is so different than the last. I feel safe and secure, comfortable with what is happening. And, the weirdest thing is that I have boobs again. Seriously, it's weird. You get used to what you have, what has happened, what you know. I'm not sure how they did what they did, but they are less Frankenboobies than I thought they'd be. We'll see. I came here hoping I'd have a Mardi Gras-worthy rack :)

So, things are going well here. Thanks for all of the love, support, positive vibes. Lisa comes in on Sunday, Nick goes home for a few days.

Letting the Days Go By...Once In a Lifetime

The sky was blackened by the cloud cover, rain sheeting down as I drove to work for an early meeting. I was up early and would be coming home late, as was my practice for 80 hour work weeks at the helm of a small nonprofit organization in Portland, Oregon. I had had to drag myself out of bed that day, the black dog of depression at my heels as it had been for months upon months combined with lying awake in the middle of the night worrying about guiding this fantastic, but fragile, organization to the next level.

In short, I was miserable. But a week before, my friend Annie had come to town for a reconnaissance trip visit, pregnant with her second child. I had taken a call (for work, of course) while she cruised into the kitchen for a snack. Thump, thump! Thump, thump! The strangest sound came from the kitchen. Thump, thump! [pause] Thump! When I walked into the kitchen, there stood Annie with an incredulous look on her face. "I have been through every cupboard. There is nothing to eat in here. Nothing." "Bah!", I said, "Look in the fridge." "Fran. Condiments don't count."

Wind and rain pounding on my windshield,  I remember driving down 39th street when the eerie first notes of the Talking Head's song Once In a Lifetime came on the radio.

[You may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
You may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife
You may ask yourself, "Well, how did I get here?"]

And the weight of it all just hit me. How in the hell had I gotten to this state? I was in terrible shape, depressed, lonely, too busy for friends and living a life that was the polar opposite of what I thought a good life to be. I had become a slave to what I thought was important...but important was a single dimension of my life.

I drove to my office and emailed my good friend to ask for the name of her therapist and started a journey of reframing my life.

So, here I am again. Not in the stressed out, hating life mode, but given the utmost gift of a really incredibly intentional space of reframing.

What occurred to me the other morning was that I have six years to make life as good as I can. Maybe this is not the right way to think about it (I am sure my friends in medicine will find flaws with this reasoning), but when you are a triple-negative breast cancer, uh, person (I can't say survivor), your stats for recurrence look kind of crappy for six years and then they look really good. Getting through those six years is the deal. But, in some ways, it's the deadline.

So, how am I going to feel in two years if I have a recurrence and I have wasted those two years just operating out of the same mindset that I have had for the past ten? How am I going to feel about only seeing my kids for 2 hours a day because I commute to a job that has me leaving at 6:45a and getting home at 6:30p? Six years broken down into the very real possibility that at any time, the shit can hit the fan again.

How many times in your life do you get to ask yourself the question:
"Will I be satisfied reflecting on the life that I am living now, if it happens again?"

Because that reframes *everything*. If I get sick again in two years, will I be happy that I wasted time on the drama? If I get sick again in two years, will I be proud of making a difference in this world? If I get sick again in two years, will I wonder where the time went with my kids? If I get sick again in two years, will I have spent my time *filling my time/my heart/my life with things that make my spirit sing*?

Because, my friends, that is the shit. To have a life that is fulfilling and good. To feel like you are living your best life in your best self. To be loved, to love deeply, to appreciate, to think of the future  as it relates to this reflection of 2 years instead of 10.

What a gift. What a freaking gift.

Because you can plan all you want, but the reality is that shit happens.

You die of appendicitis at the age of 50.
You die in a car wreck at the age of 15.
You get diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer a week before you retire.

You get diagnosed with stage I breast cancer at 39 with very good outcomes...and you have a chance to make life what you want it to be.

How many more big, huge freaking billboards does one woman need?

When I hear that song by the Talking Heads, I am reminded that we get to reset, that there is time/it is time to think about the choices we make

[You may ask yourself, "What is that beautiful house?"
You may ask yourself, "Where does that highway go to?"
You may ask yourself, "Am I right, am I wrong?"
You may say to yourself, "My God! What have I done?"]

Just listen...chills.