Reflections and contemplations

Went back to work teaching school today. I found that my mind was often elsewhere. It is just so hard to care about anything else right now. I want to spend my time with Keith and all else just feels as if its stealing my moments away from him.

I have hope for the future -- Keith is strong, young, healthy in every other way except the cancer. He is a good "candidate" (as the doctors say) for treatment. But, it's still all risky. Can't help but feel that every moment should belong to us, just in case.

I understood Keith completely when we were in the hospital and contemplated (for a moment or two at least) the option of just going away together -- traveling and enjoying life for as long as possible. But doing that is giving up and admitting defeat. We're not at that point. Hope is paramount -- hope is tangible -- survival is a possibilty -- it is within reach, so we will reach for it.

I hate seeing Keith have to go through all this. It is his struggle -- one that he ultimately faces alone, no matter what kind of "support" we give him. No one can really share that interior life that is uniquely our own. The voices and visions, the memories and moments, shift and change and make up our dreams and thoughts. I think of James Joyce and how he takes us into that interior life and how difficult it is to fathom, even when it is put into words for us. Each of us is connected, but yet we are ultimately alone -- each like a small universe -- isolated, but part of an infinite and overpowering whole that we don't really grasp.

Fear, love, hate, anger, joy, tenderness, despair, acceptance, affection, uncertainty, hope -- the emotions we all feel flicker from moment to moment and never settle into place. Should I still tell Keith to pick his clothes up off the floor, or take out the trash, or turn off the television? Do we continue with the mundane? Do any of these things matter? Does it matter that these things don't really matter? Don't those simple actions ground us in the here and now of our lives? Doesn't the trash still have to go out even when cancer alters our lives?

I guess I will continue with the mundane, at least just a bit. But, I also find myself looking up at the night sky, or into the sleeping face of my husband, and think -- life is a series of moments like these, precious, fleeting, and desperately sweet. The universe within and without is a magnificent mystery. By capturing those moments we also capture the meaning of life. There is no justice or fairness in life and death. There is only the mystery. There is only the truth. Love is all there is. It has to be enough.