‘I just got the word today’

I ran  into a friend at the bakery today. “I haven’t seen you for awhile,” I said. “How are you?”

“I haven’t been well,” she said. “I just got the word today.”

I was afraid to ask, “what word?” but I did. “What is it?” I asked.

“Two months,” she said. “It’s the Patrick Swaze thing.”

Pancreatic  cancer. She told me how it had hit her a few weeks ago when she was in Vancouver. She felt ill, collapsed, and the next thing she knew a bunch of emergency guys were surrounding her. Then, it was raining. That’s what she felt next as they loaded her into the ambulance to take her to hospital.

What was out of place in this story is that she laughed as she was telling it, emphasizing not the tragedy but what she saw as the amusing little pieces of it, the bizarre nature of the whole thing.

She’s been writing a book about her fascinating life and she’s been having trouble getting it finished, even though she’s had offers from three publishers. She has to write faster now, she said. I offered to do anything I can to help her with it, and when I told her how devastated I was at the news, she laughed again and said, “Shit happens.”

That’s typical of this amazing woman, to be thankful for what she’s been able to do in her lifetime, and to accept what she can’t change. I doubt I could be that strong.