Not Fine

Please excuse me while I vent.

An individual's journey with cancer is as unique as the individual. Stage IV brain cancer is not the same as stage IV some other kind of cancer.

FACT #1 My mom knows her name.
FACT #2 She knows mine too. And the kids. And J's. If she knew your name at some point, she still knows it now.
FACT #3 She can walk.
FACT #4 She can feed herself.
FACT #5 She can use the bathroom by herself.
FACT #6 She is not bedridden.
FACT #7 She can travel in cars and airplanes.

FACT: Brain cancer can kill a person without ever leaving the brain.

The above is amazing and wonderful, but it does not mean she is fine. There are many other shitty ways cancer can fuck with a person. I know how incredibly cruel it can be to watch a loved one die of cancer, to be bedridden and incapable of taking care of the most basic of needs. I've been there, as an adult, just a few years back with my grandfather in his final weeks. What my mom is going through is not that, at least not yet, but that does not automatically mean her journey is full of rainbows and cheery birdsong either.

She is not okay. She is not fine. Trust me.

Steps

She turned herself around, let go of the wall, and took two steps into the middle of the room. And then she just stood there, prairie-dogging for a good 15 seconds, before dropping down and crawling over to me with the biggest grin on her face.

And then I cried.

It's Not a Penis, It Just Looks Like One On the Internet

For Mother's Day my amazing son wrote (in Kindergartenese), illustrated (in green highlighter*), and bound (with staples) a book for yours truly. And quite the egocentric flip book it was.

Awww...he made a flip book!

"This is me! And this is me! This is still me too!" Flipping, flipping, flipping. Uh oh. This page no writing.















Phallic art! My favorite!


"And this is our house!"


Ehh...












This is our house. Where do you live?


Somehow my dear husband senses that I'm thinking about peni and comes running.

Seriously dude, there's no fire. Go on now and run back to wheres youse cames frum.

"Look at this beautiful representation your son made. OF OUR HOUSE."
"Our house?"
"OUR HOUSE."
"It has grass! See the grass! Hahaha! Grass! No wait! No wait! I meant bush! See the bush! Hahahahahahaha!"

Whatevs. You're a penis.


*Highlighters are still so banned for being NOT washable and having been used as late as 4 to draw on the furniture purposely and more than once. If not drawing with highlighters keeps him out of an ivy league school I'm okay with that.

The Cracker '09 Recap

JANUARY My first time ever out-of-town without my Cracker, J gets this call. The Cracker has stuck a pencil up his nose. J wants to know "How do I get a surprising amount of blood out of a school uniform shirt?"

FEBRUARY Reminder that plastic tools = real damage. The Cracker dismantles the whatchamacallit that encloses the gas shut-off for the living room fireplace. How he managed to unscrew a hollow male shaped part that is flush with the wall with pliers and then pry off the caulked-on plate in less than 5 minutes is still beyond me.

MARCH Off apparently. Or more likely blocked out.

APRIL School nurse calls. "You need to take him to get x-rayed." He tripped over his own (big ol' puppy) feet while walking in a single file line to lunch and his a finger is very swollen, very discolored, and no longer bendy. Oy. Dx = "Minorly sprained, badly bruised."

MAY Instead of brushing his teeth, the Cracker takes an oral syringe, fills it with water, and injects it into the bathroom electrical outlet. I hear there were alarms, crying, smoke, and water sizzling in the wall and shooting out of the outlet. (cough I-was-at-Target.)


At the bus stop this morning my question for the more seasoned mothers was "When will common sense and knowing-the-fuck-better finally prevail?"

"It doesn't. And then you hand over your car keys."

Insurance, people. Medical, dental, home, and auto. Make sure you have great insurance.