Every Cancer Patients Worst Nightmare

Erin and I were sitting in a little Italian restaurant in Bozeman having dinner.  While we were eating a family was seated and one of the women wore the battle scars of chemo.  No hair, no eyelashes, no eyebrows.  We were both so moved because we know what that is like.  I wanted to get up and tell her that we would be praying for her but I realized that few cancer patients would want to hear what Erin and I have to say.  We are their worst nightmare.  We are death personified.  We lost our battle.  Or did we?  There is so much cancer takes from you.  Your hair, your bone density, your health, your money, your future, your hope...  But, in many ways it gives you a new perspective on life.  It changes who you are and often that is for better.  If you ask any cancer survivor, and the people left behind are cancer survivors too,  they will tell you that the acute awareness of the fragility of life is almost worth the price you pay to get it.  Almost.  If I had to choose I would still choose Tom.  The reality is that we are all terminal.  God has every hair on our head numbered.  He knows every breath we will take so Tom's outcome did not come as a surprise to God.  I so desperately want to cling to MY dreams that I hold on with white knuckled determination, but God knew the day I married him that March 14th, 2011 would be Tom's day.  What happened in both of us through this journey was a freedom that we never imagined.  We were keenly aware of how precious and short life is.  We learned to not be such control freaks because control is really a misnomer to begin with.  We never had control, only the pretense of control.  We learned to be content in whatever circumstance because right now that is all you have.  You only get this specific moment right now, do you really want to waste it?   What if you knew the day or the hour?  Would you live differently?  That is the gift that cancer gives you.  Right now.  This moment to spend freely.  How will you spend it?