A Spring of Joy

It is the last Friday of Christmas break, and I find myself looking at the calendar and asking, “How is it possible that time, once again, has gone by so quickly?” We have basked in the joy of being together this season. We’ve filled our days full of friends and family celebrations, laughter and tears, good foods, skiing and snowboarding for Bri and the younger two, shopping, sleeping late and staying up to snuggle under blankets by roaring fires and watch movies. We’ve shared hearts and struggles and fought and forgiven and we’ve been intentional about just being together.

Yesterday was chemo.

I had an extra week in between treatments, and I am always amazed at how well I feel during that extra week. I was able to cook and clean and make meals for friends and get out and do things with my family that I wouldn’t have normally been able to do. And I’ve been able to do it well. In fact, I spent all day Wednesday in the kitchen, content in my happy place. I deeply grieve that loss.

Yesterday was hard emotionally and physically. I was worn from chemo. I was sad because I have to do this—that this is my life—but as we sat with friends who are in in town for the holidays and shared dessert and our lives and the gifts that God has given, I was overcome yet again with just how very much we have.

We learned during the holidays that my PET scan came back with no change. This is a good thing—a very good thing. This means my cancer has not metastasized to the bone in my hip and back like we had feared. While this doesn’t give answers to the pain I’m having, it does give the relief of no spread, and we are enormously thankful.

We have settled into the relief this news brought. Having Brian here for the week has been wonderful. He’s worked around the house and played and shopped. This morning he took Bella and Ash at 6:00 (yes, that’s oh dark hundred) to deliver a gift to a girl we love dearly at the hospital as she awaited wrist surgery.

This morning my Bella baked her brother’s birthday cake. We decided fairly spur of the moment for him to have a party with his friends tonight to celebrate his fourteenth birthday (which is Tuesday), and again I ask, “How is it possible that time has gone by so quickly?”

Our Bear is so dear and so funny and so gentle and so kind, and we are thankful for each and every day God has given us with him. So we turned up the music loudly (The Greatest Showman—-wonderful movie and phenomenal soundtrack. We saw it over the holidays and all loved it. We laughed and I cried and then cried again and then cried some more, but it was such a good kind of cry. We’ve been playing the soundtrack ever since.) This morning Bella taught me new dance moves as she stirred chocolate batter, and she baked the cake and Bear cleaned the kitchen and vacuumed while Brian took Ash to an appointment and picked up groceries and I sat down to decorate Bear’s cake. Tonight ten 13- and 14-year-olds will descend on our home, many of whom call me “Mom.” The significance and beauty of that does not escape me, and I cry just typing it. What gift to know and love Bear’s friends so well.

Earlier this morning I sat with another friend who is walking through struggles and trials and suffering unimaginable to me (we shared of the danger of comparing trials and the comfort of honesty and understanding), and as we talked about God’s goodness in the midst, how truth still stands, how He still has given us so much I’m struck once again at the wonder of it all. By the wonder of each day, the wonder of salvation, the wonder of the season, the wonder of how God became man and lived perfectly and suffered and died and rose again so that we could have life here on earth and life forever to come. I am struck by the wonder of these lives with whom He has entrusted Bri and me… our Bella, Bear and Ash… of each other… of our families… of our friends. We are entrusted to love.

There are only a few days left in Christmas break. I know when Tuesday comes my heart will be sad. The children and I are already lamenting time gone by too fast (and Bear always laments school resuming on his birthday!).

But, oh, y’all… all of this time is a gift not a thief.

This time gives us togetherness. It gives us joy in the midst of struggle, beauty in the ashes, hope of life forever where the only time that will matter is that we have yet one more day with Him.

This year has been a hard one for us, but it has been full of hope.

It will not disappoint.

Happy New Year, my friends… and wonders of His love.

Today was a chemo day. I’ve lost track of how many treatments I’ve had. There is no countdown to when I’m done. There is no bell to ring as I walk out of the chemo treatment room for the last time amidst the hugs and cheers of nurses who have become friends.

There is only, “We will see you in three weeks.” Or four weeks, because my oncologist is wonderful that way and scheduled my next chemo for after Christmas so I could feel well for the holiday.

I feel it strongly. The howl of Advent. The longing, the ache.

Over the Thanksgiving holidays we watched a movie together and during a voiceover, I found myself weeping (seriously, trying not to be a distraction) as she spoke something along these lines:

Darkness is always there, but there is something that is worse than darkness. The truest darkness is not absence of light but the fear that light will never return… But the light always returns… Hope is real. You can see it.

Oh, my friends.

This describes the past year of my life. I have wrestled and wrestled this fear that the light will never break through the darkness.

And now, as I face more procedures and tests and waiting…

The howl is still there. Some days it’s so loud it’s all I hear… other days it’s quiet. But it is an achingly lonely longing for the restoration of the brokenness of this world.

An achingly lonely longing.

I often wonder what it was like during those years of silence before Jesus was born. What did they think? How did they feel?

I imagine it was an achingly lonely longing.

The howl of Advent.

My biggest fear in all of my struggles with cancer has been that I would lose sight of Him. That the darkness would become so oppressive that I wouldn’t see the light.

But the light always returns.

Advent isn’t just an achingly lonely longing, it’s an expectant waiting.

Expectant.

Because hope is real.

Light always returns.

Today the light came in small ways:

“Mary’s Song (Breath of Heaven)” by Hannah Kerr on repeat in my car as I ran errands early in the morning…

My dear daddy, always my chemo buddy, sitting by my side sharing truth with me (and a lover of quotes, like me, sharing words)…

Kind friends, remembering, texting me, sharing love, understanding my darkness…

An oncologist who laughs with me and cries with me, who’s always on top of where I am and what I need…

My mom, stepping in to fold that load of laundry I didn’t get to, driving children from school and to appointments…

A warm “breakfast for supper” brought by a friend…

And now, a quiet night together.

He shows Himself in mercy after mercy after mercy as I wrestle over and over and over.

Hope is real.

Light always returns.

Only His light.

It’s never gone.

I just need eyes to see Him.

(The next two weeks hold more procedures and scans and waiting. I tire of the waiting and wondering. Of my inability to be and do all that I long to do for the holidays with my loves. Will you please pray for good results? And for a heart like Mary’s who willingly bows in acceptance?)

“After all,” Anne had said to Marilla once, “I believe the nicest and sweetest days are not those on which anything very splendid or wonderful or exciting happens but just those that bring simple little pleasures, following one another softly, like pearls slipping off a string.” (~L.M. Montgomery)

It seems this keyboard is a bit rusty these days. I’ve wanted to write. My brain sometimes thinks in essays full of vibrant color and ebullient words, but when I open my trusty laptop, it’s as if my fingers are paralyzed by my heart. Words. Stolen from me.

I’ve been here before, but never this long, never so dark as I’ve wrestled and struggled and grappled with the day in and day out of living with Stage IV cancer.

But my childhood friend, Monica, who knows a physically painful suffering far deeper than I, shared a nugget with me as we talked for hours over phone lines. “Oh, friend,” she sighed, “Don’t forget, sometimes the pause is just as important as the note.”

Yes.

The pause in writing, like in music, carries a weight of its own, and without it, the piece doesn’t carry the same wonder and beauty.

I’ve needed a pause. I’ve needed quiet space in my heart for my family and close friends and me to grapple together. And frankly, to just live together, seeing the simple pleasures in each day and holding them close.

Along the way our family has been given enormous gifts, huge pleasures, too… like four weeks out west together, slowly traversing in Merlin the Magic Bus, spending days seeing God’s grandeur, visiting old friends, curling up for quiet days in our home away from home, time together for which we deeply long. It was a phenomenal time, and with a three week break from chemo, I tasted and remembered for a short time what it feels like to feel well. I had forgotten, and the taste was delectable.

We finished our summer at the lake with friends, a working vacation for Bri, a respite for me, a week of laughter and learning and playing for our children. Gift.

Pause. Breathe deep. Exhale. Move forward to the next thing.

School started along with cross-country races and Boy Scouts and volleyball and adjustments and piles of homework, travel for Brian, weekend trips and camping for Bear, wisdom teeth surgery for Ash, and chemo after chemo after chemo. We just adjust our sails every few weeks knowing I will be out of commission. I cry over missed field trips and I delight in events I can attend (I tried real hard last night not to be the blubbering mess of a mom when my boy lettered last night in XC). But I delight mostly in being here, a welcoming face for my children when they walk in the door or when I pick them up at carpool. The smiles on their faces when our eyes meet… simple pleasures.

Honestly, the past year and a half, I’ve wrestled through a darkness that is terrifying, an anxiety that is paralyzing. And the cupped hands together in prayer, the bowing in worship tasting and seeing that He is good, the clinging to friends’ arms and weeping together, the sitting with my parents and working through the same fear after fear and struggle after struggle has been a necessary pause in the story I write.

His story for my life.

And I’m learning what I already know as I frantically beg, “God, I need you.” or “Stay my mind, dear Jesus, stay my mind” that He is here. Even in the darkness, He hears. He never leaves. Never forsakes.

Right now I’m in the midst of tests and procedures routinely run making for long, hard days… any one of them could mean our lives change all over again. But it could also mean it all stays the same. Chemo. Feel miserable. Feel okay. Push through. Live the life God has given.

That is the choice we make every day.

To live.

Today. Lovely today offers itself to us. Life. Together.

Simple pleasures.

Following each other softly.

Notes.

And pauses.

Held close.

(I have heard from some of you, wondering if I am okay, how we really are. Thank you for asking, for checking in, for cards sent to remind us we are not forgotten, for meals on the hard weeks. Thank you for pausing with me. Your care for us resonates.)

The excitement in our home is palpable.

We are so glad for school to be over. Oh, how I miss them when they are gone!

I’m a little behind because of chemo this week, but I’m readying our summer basket and we’re putting the finishing touches on our summer list. We’ve even checked a few things off already! The past six weeks have been hard on all of us as we’re learning to adjust to my new chemo–what it takes, yet what it gives. I’ve been quiet here, needing space to process and grieve and accept all over again. We all have.

But in the midst of it all, we anticipate and relish the thought of our summer days together. I’m shedding a tear over the passage of time. It seems to be speeding up these days. As Jack London said, “Darn, the wheel of the world! Why must it continually turn over? Where is the reverse gear?”

As my Ash breezed into the kitchen yesterday, I looked up into his confident face as he draped his arm over my shoulder. He’s a full foot taller than when he started ninth grade. And it’s over, his first year of high school, where he gained insight and friendship and wisdom and confidence and maturity. My eyes welled with a mama’s pride.

And my Bear, who flopped next to me, shining eyes, dimpled grin. “Exams are over.” He has stressed all week, this boy who struggles to test well and tries so very, very hard. Our eyes are level these days, and his arms that squish me in hugs are stronger, lean with muscle. His heart grows larger each day and he revels in adventures… even creating an adventure for himself and his class tonight, planning party food with his Grandma (Brian’s parents are here for a visit) so he can have capture the flag in the yard with his class and then a big bonfire. “I can’t wait to burn my Latin papers!” he laughs. I love having his friends in our home and I love watching him with them.

And Bella girl, our last elementary schooler. She’s finished. Elementary school is over. She’s grown up on us despite our stern warning to the contrary, and as she settled into my lap yesterday at our lunch on the terrace, she tucked her head under my chin. “I’m so ready for summer with you.” Her girlishness is settling into a womanly grace and strength I don’t feel prepared for… yet I know I need to prepare her for. She has thrived in fifth grade and fills our home and her friends’ lives with kindness and beauty, compassion and empathy.

My oncologist is working with our summer schedules to allow for travel times and to give me “good weeks” when it suits our summer plans best. I am so thankful for her.

Even with cancer’s shadow in our lives, we are still chanting our summer mantra and filling our days full…

The only option as I see it, is this delicate weaving of action and celebration, of intention and expectation. Let’s act, read, protest, protect, picket, learn, advocate for, fight against, but let’s be careful that in the midst of all that accomplishing and organizing, we don’t bulldoze over a world that’s teeming with beauty and hope and redemption all around us and in the meantime. Before the wars are over, before the cures are found, before the wrongs are righted, Today, humble Today, presents itself to us with all the ceremony and bling of a glittering diamond ring. “Wear me, ” it says, “Wear me out. Love me, dive into me, discover me,” it pleads with us.
(~from Shauna Niequist’s “Cold Tangerines”)

Yes, we are ready. And we heave deep sighs and look forward to pool days and learning new games and root beer floats and catching fireflies. To travel and concerts. To us being together. To growing up and growing old. (Y’all, what a privilege it is to grow!)

To celebrating, really celebrating, this life we’ve been given, tasting the simple joys of ordinary days and the exquisiteness of new adventures. And to being thankful every day for the life our God has chosen to give us.

Yes, as Hannah Coulter (one of my favorite reads) says, “This is [our] story of giving thanks.”

Our summer basket is “almost” ready.

And so are we.

“Oh, Marilla, looking forward to things is half the pleasure of them,” exclaimed Anne. “You mayn’t get the things themselves; but nothing can prevent you from having the fun of looking forward to them. Mrs. Lynde says, ‘Blessed are they who expect nothing for they shall not be disappointed.’ But I think it would be worse to expect nothing than to be disappointed.”
(~L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables)

There is a word in Dutch that we don’t have in English, voorpret. It describes pre-fun, the sense of enjoyment felt before a party or event takes place.

I’ve watched my Bella-girl these past couple months as she has planned and prepared and anticipated her birthday party. She had a folder with sketches and artwork and plans. She looked through pinterest ideas with me, so she could create a beautiful table for her friends. She made lists of fairy garden supplies and tea flavors and hors d’oeuvres. She could. not. wait.

Last week was brutal for me. I could not function. This wasn’t just a curled-up-on-the-couch kind of not functioning, this was an I-can’t-even-crawl-out-of-bed not functioning. She would curl in bed with me, and we’d scheme and plan. The invitations had been sent. The party was Saturday. It couldn’t be moved. What would we do?

Bri was in Seattle for the week, and my parents came up to help us. They ran errands and bought food and Daddy scrubbed outdoor tables free of pollen and helped prepare the outside for her party. A friend mowed our grass. Another friend lent us her tea set to add to mine (inherited from Brian’s Grandma). Knowing I might be down from chemo, I had already asked a sweet friend if she’d make Bella’s cake. Mom helped make tea sandwiches and chopped veggies. I shopped with Mom one day for fairy garden supplies, and ended up sitting down in the middle of the store because I couldn’t go any further. Home we went, where I curled up again. Mom and I both ended up with colds, neither feeling on top of our game to put it mildly. You have to be kidding me?

On Friday, sweet Bella girl had two friends spend the night. My parents had gone home and Bear was at a sleepover. I loved the sound of my home filled with giggles and late night stifled laughter. We ordered pizza and they prepared for the party, tying twine around napkins and creating name cards for each place. They prepped mason jars with straws and filled containers with fairy garden supplies.

My fever spiked that night, so I got the girls settled and Ash hung out with me in my room to watch a movie. As he readied for bed, he came in to wish me good night. “Mom, you look miserable. What can I do?” I told him I just needed a good night of sleep, and he leaned down, kissing the top of my head, “Mom, if you can’t run the party tomorrow, you just tell me what to do. I’ll run it for you.” Y’all, that dear, dear boy… just imagine him running a fairy garden tea party for fourteen giggling girls! His heart is huge.

I woke the next morning with no trace of cold, no fever, and just a tinge of laryngitis. Bear arrived home. Then Brian. Things were falling into place as the boys moved tables and set up canopies outside to prepare for the heat. A sunny 90 degree day! The girls worked tirelessly on decorations and food, chattering and laughing together. They covered the table with glittery twists of tulle and organized Brian’s grandmother’s tea set. Bear made an appetizer for the party while the girls ran off to change and do each other’s hair and wait for friends to arrive.

Tabitha arrived with the cake, and oh, y’all… the cake. Tabitha not only created a wistful thing of beauty, she prayed over it, she knew words were my love language, so she filled butterflies with words that Bella could keep in her memory box. She went above and beyond, even stopping by the side of the road on her way to our house to pick poppies and add them to flowers she had chosen for our girl.

Girls started arriving. Dear Gen, an older sibling arrived with her sisters. She came to be my helper, and joined Ash in carrying cups and plates and filling glasses and cleaning up when it was over. Ash climbed the swingset and watched the activities from his perch above. Bear hid in the house away from all the chaos, only coming up for air for food when we called. Bri filled our yard with joyous music.

And thirteen girls descended on our yard to create fairy gardens to take home, to run and play with Coop, to laugh around a beautiful table and fill their hearts and bellies. They piled around Bella as she opened gifts and oohed and ahhed. Our neighbors (Bella just adores Miss Emily) joined us for slices of cake. I loved watching it all, sharing stories of how the lemonade pitcher was Brian’s Grandma’s (purchased before World War II–such a lovely heirloom), laughing with Gen, and reveling in the delight of the girls as they tried to figure out whether they should raise their pinky or not when they drank. It really couldn’t have been more perfect.

I marveled afterward at all the hands involved. So many who stepped in where I could not to make Bella’s first party-planning event a success. Our hearts are so full.

And Bella? Oh, y’all… sweet Bella. After it was over, she leaned into me, overflowing with gratefulness. “Mom?” she whispered, “It was everything I hoped for…

And more.”

Then she looked up, eyes sparkling. “I’m already planning next year!”

The rain is pounding on our tin roof; the wind is buffeting and howling under the eaves. I want to hunker down, to hide, to let the tears flow today, to pour down like teardrops from dark clouds. I’ve shared heart and life over coffee with a friend this morning. And I have heard sad news today about another friend. That aching, heaving, cancer is horrible kind of news. I wrote her from my car while I waited for the rain to let up:

I’m just crying along with those raindrops for you… I want to cuss (and I’m not a cussing girl) and scream and stomp my feet and just beg God to stop it! Please, dear God, stop it!!

My Bear needed me yesterday… a lot. He shared stories of a handbell piece they performed. “Mom,” he told me, “It was a moving piece.” He told me of the story behind what they played, of the joyful start and fresh music of a girl living life, then finding out she had cancer, then thinking it was cured, then the sadness of the music as it returned and she passed; how the mallets hit the bells slower and slower until there was one final ring. He described the new tinkling of high notes, a brightness as angels came to carry her to heaven and home. His voice was husky as he shared. My voice could utter no words. We sat quietly in the car holding hands as music from my phone played around us.

I’ve described it to friends. We are okay. We are just living life with an overarching sadness, but not an overwhelming sadness.

Yesterday I saw my oncologist who went over the PET scan, and we discussed future treatment. Brian was with me asking questions that wouldn’t have even come to my mind.

The PET scan, as we expected, showed no new growths. Except there is an area around my vocal cord that was “hot.” This means they see something, but they’re not sure what it is. My vocal cord is where this metastatic breast cancer all began… she is sending me to my ENT to get it looked at more closely, to see if it’s inflammation or tumor.

No new growths is encouraging news. We are thankful.

However, my tumor markers are still rising. What this means is that because she’s been so vigilant with me, they’ve caught growth early. My cancer is growing, it just hasn’t grown enough yet to show up on scans. This means we don’t know where it is, how extensive it is, we just know it’s there.

But it’s small. Which is good.

But it’s insidious, which is scary.

After spring break next week, I will see her again and begin a new chemo. It’s one I’ve been on in the past and has been effective. It helps to know what we are facing. I’m just so weary. I’m tired of “doing.” I’m tired of suffering… of pain… of fighting literal death in my body.

I hate it that cancer is so relentless, that I can’t sing anymore, that my bones are brittle, that my days are consumed with making the right foods and homemade soaps and oils, that my eyes water and ache constantly, and that joy is so. hard. to. fight. for.

Yes, the rain pours down here. In literal and figurative ways.

But God…

I see blue skies rolling in from the west. And perhaps even a rainbow will appear.

God’s faithfulness.

God continues to give us yeses and nos.

And both those answers are good. And grace.

Because healing from cancer isn’t the answer. He is.

Because healing from cancer isn’t enough. He is.

So we thank Him for mercy in the fight.

We have strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow, even on rainy days.

On Brian’s 40th birthday (am I allowed to say how old he is?!), I threw him a birthday party with friends from college and early marriage days. Twenty or more years of friendship. Six couples around a table celebrating and laughing and enjoying life together. Each year since, I’ve thrown the second or third annual “Brian’s 40th Birthday Party.” For his party this year, we surprised him by all (except one couple who couldn’t make it, *sniff, sniff*) going to a Drew Holcomb & the Neighbors concert with dinner beforehand.

Y’all, these people.

I can still remember the guys as freshman who slept on couches in the house Bri lived in his senior year. Two of the girls were instrumental in me actually meeting Brian (I wonder if they even remember that.) Groomsmen and bridesmaids and attending each others’ weddings. College band gigs and camping trips that fell apart and soccer games that ended in too many injuries. The monthly theme dinners and long jeep drives, off-roading in the mountains. Then children… between the six couples we have 23 children…bleary-eyed days of figuring this parenting thing out and having gatherings that ended much earlier because we had to get home to bed.

We have, as Drew Holcomb sings, “walked miles in another man’s shoes.”

Yes, they have walked miles with us, grieving with us, rejoicing with us, and carrying burdens with and for us for longer than we could have imagined it would be. And we gathered last Wednesday night. We traveled over the mountains to dinner, talking of work and life, still figuring out this parenting thing, only this time instead we were talking of soccer games for our children, track meets, school trips. Instead of toddler foibles, it was relationships and colleges and how. the. heck. do we do this?

Some of us grabbed dinner together before the show, sitting outside on a cool spring evening to once again celebrate, toasting Brian and life and friendship. We ate long and leisurely, steaks and venison and crab cakes. We joked with our waiter and one another and we forgot, perhaps for just a moment, that a PET scan was awaiting me the next morning. We just breathed in life.

And the show. Oh, y’all, Drew Holcomb is a mix of Americana, folk, and roots with all kinds of relationship built in. At one point we were all on the balcony together, and I watched my friends in front of me, her head on his shoulder, whispers in each others’ ears… from behind, Jas, would lean forward the say to Brian, “Aww, yeah…” as a new song started. He’d talk about what chords the band was playing and he’d laugh in sheer joy. Brian belted out songs along with the band, and held me tight, as they sang of love and loss and hard roads. And I cried (of course) tears of gratefulness and sadness and joy.

When it was over and we parted ways, there were long hugs, whispered, “I’m praying…” in my ears. Less than twelve hours later I’d be in a machine again, seeing where, what, if there was any spread to this monster that has attacked our life. Yet another mile for them to walk in my shoes.

They’ve walked well with us. So few people I know have so many college and post-college/early marriage friends that remained in the same town together.

We are so very, very blessed.

Here’s to Brian’s next annual fortieth party.

Thank you, my old friends, there truly are no words.

There’s a “good light shining in you.”

(And thank you, Drew Holcomb & the Neighbors, for another amazing show.)