Commemoration, not Celebration

Tuesday - April 30, 2013

We Ammiratis have a division of opinion that happens to break down by gender lines....  Joe and Jonathan think it's not entirely understandable to mark diagnosis and procedure dates.  However Megan and I are noting the passage of time as we reach some truly monumental milestones.  As someone who has always liked to count down, count back, and count forward (perhaps) as a means to anchor myself relative to experiences past and present, I view these dates as "red letter days," moments in time that mark a transition, proverbial forks-in-the-road that highlight life shifts. 

One year ago today was nominally the last (semi) normal day I enjoyed before entering a medical vortex. I view that Monday 4/30/12 as a (semi) normal day because it turned out to be my last day of a regular schedule at school.   I use the (semi) designation because at that point I had been ploughing through a continuous migraine that had started on Dec. 28, double vision that had begun on Jan. 12, and the bizarro reality of wearing an eyepatch in order to function for three months.  (Semi) also seems appropriate since I had already absorbed mid-April's pronouncement of the likelihood of cancer.  What an odd situation ... but it had become my normal and I did NOT want to cede it to memory.

So counting back to last year I am remembering - commemorating - one year ago today, a spring Monday in Williamsburg when life still had some normal rhythm.  I lesson planned, enjoyed morning circle and daylong instruction with my students, consulted and shared with colleagues throughout the day, and escorted my first- graders out to their buses in the late afternoon with the thought that these small moments would be repeated at the end of that week, in the following week, and throughout the remainder of the school year.  I could imagine that soon I might be clear, cured of whatever ailed me, and returned to a standard definition of "normal" rhythm at home and at school.  Instead, that was the last day before I transitioned into full fledged medical mode.  Pre-op on May 1.  Biopsy and oops-said-the-surgeon-is-that-a-bladder-nick on May 2.  Laid up with bags hanging from me until the cancer diagnosis came in on May 11.  Intrathecal chemo on May 14.  Hospitalization on May 16.  At that point, I was fully down the medical fork in the road.  I never returned to the classroom to teach.  On May 14, I went in to say goodbye to my colleagues, to start the day with my class, and to introduce my students to their amazing and fabulous (so lucky to have her!!) substitute.  One month later, I returned (SO weak, without hair, and with Carolyn helping me) to say goodbye; most of the children and adults did not recognize me.

But one year ago today on April 30, I could have gone either way. I was still in a (semi) normal routine.  That's surely worth some commemoration, yes?