She works in the same building, on my floor. We talked at the staff Xmas party two years ago. She cycles to work along some of my route and so we exchanged our delight with the chestnut trees and the snow and the horses and cycling through a mature forest after work. Occasionally, she brought one or both of her (pre-)teenage daughters to work.
Last week she phoned me. She had been asking about me having not seen me around for a while and was told I had something serious.
She told me that eight years ago she was diagnosed with cancer. That she spent months in the same clinic I was in after Easter. She spoke about isolation wards, face masks, multiple infections after chemotherapy, hoping and waiting for a bone marrow donor, her five years of treatment and her annual check up days back at the clinic. She told me about her fear of big crowds, of infections, her lack of energy that renders her unable to work fulltime and of her joy of being alive.
She told me that I will get better.
This is something hopeful. There are days when I am hopeful. But for two days now (and yes, it is a daily effort), I just want to tear off the something off the daily - something that is blocking me to my way to 'better'. I just want better to stay, you know?
ReplyDeleteSo do I, But what is better? Sometimes I think I am looking for the wrong better, the too elusive one. And then again I think looking and wanting will get me nowhere or rather will only get me in a fuzz because I can't seem to get there.
ReplyDeleteFor me, to be able to float through the day without a breakdown of some sort is better.
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