We had a walk and tapas yesterday afternoon and that quickly cascaded into a serious Fat Tuesday celebration as the pic shows. I really needed this! Winter walks sometimes can be lonely and tapas hit or miss compared to summertime. But we were rolling yesterday afternoon since we all know how to feed off each other to create a fire. My Rebecca termed it rootin-tootin!
My own personal journey was paralleling this. I have been scattered in a partying sort of way over the last few months. I was having a challenging time with my treatments and it seemed lots of other seemingly important things were coming at me stretching me to the max. It was all positive but scattered. But one of the important things coming at me was what to do about Lent. And Lent was starting at midnight.
Lent is always talked about as a period of introspection. It is a time to regroup and reconfigure. Maybe new ways of looking at things or a new way to operate is coming up. But all this requires calmness and an intention. As of yesterday’s party I had still not come up with any of that, still pretty scattered. Then last evening in just a few moments it all seemed to come together.
I was reading the book that I have been talking about lately, Cancer: Exploring Your Path, when it crystalized. This is an amazing book written by an amazing person. She really has spot on ideas and methods. She was buoying me up in my scatteredness and giving me a new angle to think about.
I was being dared to think about the idea of me being cured. Not living with this forever but actually being past it or clear of it in a real way. What would that be like? I know that is possible theoretically but is it possible for me? Dare I think about that? I think that I am being called to not only think about it but to dwell on it, to try it on and see how it fits. Wear it around. Look in the mirror and see what you think. Live with it.
I have come to think about my current situation of endless treatment as necessary to keep me in line. Like somehow I would fall into my old ways without this constant reminder. But what if I have now outgrown that template, that notion? What would be my role, my posture, my persona after being clear of disease? This is the ultimate in remaining positive about my situation. Dare I have a new template?
OK, I have a month and a half to work on this and am off to a good start. Sometimes starting is half of the effort. Will be at Mass at 1900 today for Ash Wednesday service. Lent has begun. Love, Felipe.
It is completely possible Phil.
Anything is possible.
I’m examining it, flexing it, yelling at it. Thanks for your friendship Ryck. Felipe.
Hola Amigo Felipe,
This is a very sincere post, but somehow too harsh on you… you wrote some of the most beautiful posts I have read in the last 2 months, you came up with wonderful topics that “buoyed” us all, and turned us all into a more committed attitude… so you may have felt being “scattered” but I am not so sure it was indeed.
in March 2012 I was in an investigators meeting and listened to an American doctor, a key opinion leader, saying in a conference about lung cancer that the aim of the treatment of cancer was to make it a chronic disease. And I got shocked when I listened to that statement, because the aim of my work in my mind (at that moment) was to find a treatment that would cure it, assuming that if the disease would not be “present” in the images, it was a cure. When I listened to that, I dwelled with it too, and came up to realize that it was true… if this would be a condition that people who suffered from it, can actually live with it, it would change the whole perspective. And for us, who at the moment may not deal with the disease, would look at those who do, as someone “living” with the disease instead of suffering a death sentence from it, all would already change.
And on a different point of view, I always think how these challenges in life we all encountered, some of them have threatened or threaten our lives, have been the ones who set us out to appreciate more this life of us we have. Yes, as Kavafis says in Ithaca, “you have to wish your journey to be long”, but if not meaningful, would it matter how long it is?
In this lent, I will work on welcoming those things I wish have never come to my path, those things I put aside all the time, and the ones I procrastinate to do and deal with. Maybe, that would be the equivalent of giving up the idea of “the perfect …” (fill in the blanks with whatever!) I always compare things with.
Loving you (all),
Cris
Cris ~ Welcome to Lent my amiga. Thank you for this great comment. I will try and comment on your ideas in each paragraph. Here it goes.
Maybe I am to harsh on myself, maybe. I am at a crossroads with things cancer right now. I must match the intensity of that.
Oh, in May 2012, you heard that doctor speak. So, you have lived with that idea for a while. Yea, that is right where I am at. We have been successful to some extent in being able to turn my situation into a chronic disease. And the two years that I went along on the Avastin was pretty easy although time consuming. The last year though has been a different story with trying to knock back the tumors with the stronger stuff. I don’t know if this situation is sustainable.
Yes, true true. I don’t know about how much more fun I can handle though. That is why my daring to be cured is coming up here at this time. I am no longer in my comfort zone. Figuring out this new drug is problemic.
I will pray for your Lenten endeavor. There is a Hebrew saying about the perfect being the enemy of the good. Yea.
Thanks Chief, Felipe.x. And Happy St Valentine’s Day.
Thank you! I hope it didn’t sound as if i would be saying “just live with this!”, nothing further away from that… I think I was trying to say that we have to try to live with whatever comes to us, doing what we can with what we are given, as you and PFJ says with the seed example. (Wow teachers class I got with you two!)
I think I think on this too because of the job i have too… studying and learning how success for our projects and efforts look like…
Loving you more than before!
Cris
Cris ~ I never take your comments the wrong way. They are all valuable. I am so glad that we have this salon to discuss it all in wherever we are physically and whatever shape we are in at the moment. Discuss on, Felipe.x
Hola Felipe, Amigo!
Sorry to be out of the conversation for while now! You’ve got a whole lot going on, and I really like the direction your Ash Wednesday Resolution is directing you. I know it’s a crass oversimplification, but it jumps right out at me that your “path” fits right into the stomped-into-our-skulls; “react, adapt, overcome” mantra of the Mother Corps. I just don’t think you’ve ever let yourself slide into the the possible thought that “overcome”, might, in fact mean just that with this cancer nemesis. You’re trying to decide if you can allow yourself to let that seed take hold, and that’s a truly daunting thought. I’m offering you the “farmer slant” on that and say, go ahead with the seed analogy and let that seed germinate. We’ve both been farmers long enough to know that seeds sometimes take off growing like a house-a-fire and still don’t make it. But you never know unless you plant them. I’m with you.
SF,
PFJ
Juan ~ welcome back buddy. I hope that you are feeling better day by day. I’d be sending you chicken soup in a 4 inch pipe if I could. Yea, I am on the edge of my capability here now with this stuff. Thank you for the farmer slant, everything is going in the hopper. Hey, have you ever read Hard Scrabble by John Graves. Good book about dirt, Texas dirt. Oh, our Curling Babes just won over Great Britain. Lovin these Olympics. OK, Skipper I have to go and try to sleep. Felipe.
What a beautiful post Felipe, why not see yourself as cured, free of tumors, free to live the measure of your days without their company. The tension between probability and possibility is rich territory; maybe like the Mesita. Who knows what you will discover as you walk it. We will walk with it with you, we will pray for your version of possibility with gusto. Truly you are a beautiful soul, a teacher to all who follow you here and know you as neighbor and friend. You are a gift. Time for the tumors to vacate. Sending love form down the road.
Doctor Johnson ~ Thank you for matching my intensity right now. There is a confluence of energy right here, right now. I think that I will post your comment on the blog today. Loved that Meseta! Onward, Felipe.x
Oh. Wow.
Keep being good to yourself, OK? Whatever, however that is.
See you soon.
Steve-O
Steve-O ~ Doing my best buddy. I need to pet your slobbery dog, you know what I mean. Felipe.