His face was brown, tanned from working outside in the summer sun. I asked him how she was and the lines formed on his forehead. His worry was palpable. His concern painful to watch. "She's been in the hospital. She has an infection everywhere. They gave her 12 bags of antibiotic." I asked if she was here today. "She's seeing the doctor. She has an infection. They gave her 12 bags ..." His words faded as he stared out the window. He spoke of her with the feverishness of someone who might lose the one thing he couldn't live without. Later he asked me if I was doing okay. And he talked for a few minutes of other things. Like what was growing in his garden and the irrigation pump he had built to keep it watered. But in his eyes you could read where his heart and soul was. She cancelled her treatment and they went home to the farm...a giving up or a giving in? He said he had cancer before, then he had some heart surgery and now he thinks his cancer is back.
When I go to treatment there are multiple stories like this. The suffering astounds me and I feel a connection with it. I feel the camaraderie of the others but at the same time the fear hovers over us all. There is a lot of joking, singing, encouraging, comforting...a strange mixture of love and sadness that brings us together in our illness.
1 comment:
This brought many emotions to the surface for me. Mostly the fear of losing the one thing I thought I couldn't live without. But I did live sort of
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