My first memory of this scourge was when my grandmother became sick. I was seventeen the last time I saw her lying on a couch. She was a breathing shell of the beautiful, vibrant woman she had been just a few months earlier. It was so horrifying to me that I have tried to avoid seeing loved ones and friends off as they get near the end ever since. When my grandfather was a few months away from passing, I visited him for the last time. His horrible cough and seeing blood come out of his mouth was bad enough. He told me everything he could remember about our family history; the good, the bad , even the ugly. After that visit we talked on the phone, when he could, but I never saw him again. mercifully, he passed while I was on maneuvers out in Utah in June of 1988.
Sometimes you have to be there. It's so heartbreaking to be at a point where you wish they would give up, just to ease their suffering. There have been miracles. My own mother was diagnosed in 1999 and for the next 5 years it was touch and go. At one point she was given less than 3 months. Yet she beat it and has been in remission for 11 years. Why her? How? I don't know and neither does she. Her story is the exception it seems. They still call surviving ten years "beating" it. The fear of it returning is always there, and that alone is a form of torture.
Over the years, the list of friends and family lost to this nemesis has grown to be so long it's too heavy to read. Many of the firefighters and police officers I knew when I was in those professions have fallen victim. So too some of the veterans I served with. Children, friends, favorite Aunts and Uncles, cousins, coworkers, casual pals; the list goes on and on and it doesn't discriminate. As I am writing this, many of those names and faces are coming to the front part of my memory. All were brave. All were taken. For many, you could point to heavy smoking habits, being exposed to hazards unknown at the time, bad genes. All those reasons do not explain the huge number of victims today. I even had my own scare a couple times but was fortunate to not have had to do any real battle with it.
Tonight I am on the verge of having to say goodbye to another. A soldier, an airman, a combat veteran, a cop, a truck driver, a husband, father and grandfather. To so many of us, a friend. He has a beautiful family, and he is way too young to be saying goodbye. As recently as a couple weeks ago, the strength of his voice on the phone masked the agony his body was going through. It may have taken his physical being away, but not his spirit. He was given two weeks three months ago! He wasted none of the time given, but it was so short.
We all go through our lives, working, raising families and arguing about politics or a ton of other things. Yet this is always out there, randomly pouncing when we least expect it. Will there ever be a day when we have beaten this? There are over 7 billion people on the Earth right now. Shouldn't we be able to put the best minds together to put a stop to this? Shouldn't we want to? Awareness walks and fundraisers are fine, but shouldn't there be a political will to solve this? Wouldn't that be something to see if all the politicians who put so much energy into fighting each other actually put all their energy into solving this instead?
In the near future, my friend will be gone and his memory will join so many others. In a few weeks after that, I, like everyone else, will lose my focus on the enemy until it rears its ugly head again. It will reside in the sub conscience, once in awhile whispering a threat as you wonder, will it come to me?
Cancer Sucks!
