![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Apr. 10th, 2009 12:53 amLast Friday, I received news that a very close friend of mine had a mass on his gallbladder. He called a group of us together to give us the news and to tell us that if the mass proved to be malignant, he would not be going through treatment. He wanted to live out the rest of his days in relative happiness. We talked of advanced directives, healthcare proxies, and what would happen with his cat. None of us mentioned the C-word and any time someone even breathed the word "malignant", I turned my head and did my own version of Lie back and think of England. I watched my mother slowly die, twisting in a sallow sickbed of pain, and the idea of watching another person I love dearly go through the same fills me with The Fear.
Like any conversation in this group, there was a lot of ball-breaking. It's what we do. You can't get us together without it happening in some form or another. Shit, it was even going on at my mother's funeral (and she wouldn't have had it any other way). But, regardless of the momentary laughter, it was a terribly somber rest-of-the-night after everyone had left.
Today, I received a text message from this friend. I'd been waiting on screws and nails all week for news as I knew he had a doctor's appointment. The text message, with multiple exclamation points, said that the mass had turned out to actually be just fat cells throwing shadows. Fucking fat cells.
I was so relieved, I cried. I stood in the breakroom at work, laughing and crying at the same time in front of the majority of my co-workers who all thought I'd finally lost all my marbles. Even now, many hours later, I can still feel the relief thrumming through my veins. I can only imagine his own relief as his terror abated. It makes me shake.
For every single person who chooses to call me "friend", I am heartbreakingly grateful. It is particularly poignant in that I do not have much of a blood family to call my own; it's just me, Middle Brother, and my father. My friends truly are my family as they've been there for me when my "real" family has steadfastly ignored my existence for many years.
I will light candles and give offerings of thanks to the Baron tonight, for bringing such wonderful people into my life and for choosing not to dig one of them an early grave. There have been far too many graves around me in the past handful of years. And while I more than recognize none of us are immortal, it always brings me joy when one I love is able to skip around the scythe a little bit longer.
Go tell someone you love them.
Like any conversation in this group, there was a lot of ball-breaking. It's what we do. You can't get us together without it happening in some form or another. Shit, it was even going on at my mother's funeral (and she wouldn't have had it any other way). But, regardless of the momentary laughter, it was a terribly somber rest-of-the-night after everyone had left.
Today, I received a text message from this friend. I'd been waiting on screws and nails all week for news as I knew he had a doctor's appointment. The text message, with multiple exclamation points, said that the mass had turned out to actually be just fat cells throwing shadows. Fucking fat cells.
I was so relieved, I cried. I stood in the breakroom at work, laughing and crying at the same time in front of the majority of my co-workers who all thought I'd finally lost all my marbles. Even now, many hours later, I can still feel the relief thrumming through my veins. I can only imagine his own relief as his terror abated. It makes me shake.
For every single person who chooses to call me "friend", I am heartbreakingly grateful. It is particularly poignant in that I do not have much of a blood family to call my own; it's just me, Middle Brother, and my father. My friends truly are my family as they've been there for me when my "real" family has steadfastly ignored my existence for many years.
I will light candles and give offerings of thanks to the Baron tonight, for bringing such wonderful people into my life and for choosing not to dig one of them an early grave. There have been far too many graves around me in the past handful of years. And while I more than recognize none of us are immortal, it always brings me joy when one I love is able to skip around the scythe a little bit longer.
Go tell someone you love them.
