Life Itself

            Two years ago tonight, I discovered a lump.  My life changed.

            Now a full year out from cancer treatment, my life continues.  I am the same but different.  It would be nice to claim some huge leap into life after cancer.  However, life still plods along in its ordinary way.  Simple joys, everyday problems, daily routines define my days.

            I had imagined some grand and glorious new beginning for my cancer survivor life.  Instead, ordinary is my life.  And there is something to be said about that. 

            In an odd way, the year of cancer treatment was both peak and valley.  The peak was in an inexplicable peace and joy—the presence of God—that sustained me through the valley of suffering.  (Whether that sentence is sentimental or splendid I do not know.)

            Everyone says that after cancer, you find a “new normal,” and I guess that is true.  Health-wise, this new normal is more confusing.  Are my various complaints—fatigue, skin rashes and sores, more memory glitches, aches and pains—from fibromyalgia or cancer treatments or a complicated combination?  (I don’t know.)  Am I emotionally and spiritually healthier?  (I hope so.) 

            So I am going to post this nighttime journaling because I want to mark today on my blog.  It’s 11 pm, just about the same time I discovered the lump two whole years ago.  The miracle to embrace every day, in the midst of the ordinary, is life itself.