A quiet moment....

I’m still here. But I’ve not much to say. The days are plodding by, entrapping us in the limbo that falls between normal and surreal.

Work, home, eat, sleep. The same as everyday. Normal.

But surreal and ever present in the house is Hodgkin’s cruel taunt that cancer does not take a vacation. Where summers should be for lounging and rejuvenation, good food and friends, and week long trips to cottage land, these days following chemo, DD1 is now reduced to many little episodes of sleep, sleep, and more sleep, punctuated by un-happy glances into the mirror at her Sigorney Weaver go-army shaved head. There is nothing for a mother to do. Neither hugs nor re-assurances are convincing enough that she is still an incredibly beautiful young woman. She is a study in contrasts, both vunerable and strong in the same moment. If I were a skilled photographer I would try to capture that contrast, but I know I am not and would miss the essence of her beauty.

She and I sat companionably last evening in the chairs on the front porch, talking of how hard this time is and the changes it is bringing about her, the house to ourselves for a change, but enjoying none the less the last of the fleeting sun, she knitting a new baby blanket in lovely ice creamy pastels, and I plugging away at the BSJ. It was that quiet time that I cherish and can never get enough of, where the noise of neighbourhood children begins to quiet, the birds start their evening songs, and I can breathe, somewhat safe with the assurance that we have made it through yet another day.

It already smells like fall in the early mornings, and we have not yet had a summer. Tomorrow we’ll do it all over again.

Knit on.