A New Rhythm

It's horrible and gut wrenchingly terrible and wonderful at at once.

My brother is here. The original four were together last night. The OG, Original Gangsters. It was like we were whole again. We need to be whole so badly right now. 

There was some news from doctors yesterday. None of it good, none of it that we didn't already know, but every time you hear it it's like being mowed down by a boulder. The cancer is rare and aggressive and it could be coming from a few places. We knew all of that. And the surgery is rough and it comes with chemo. And if it's all successful, that gets her 5 years, maybe. 50% of people get 5 years after enduring the surgery and the poisoning. Then it comes back. And you die. The other 50% don't make it 5 years. So first you have a horribly invasive surgery where they basically scrub your organs, then they poison you. You lose your hair, throw up constantly, have mouth sores and steroids and all of these horrific side effects she's already endured one time. And then maybe you live. Maybe for a little while. Then it comes back. So the surgery and chemo are delaying the inevitable through torture basically. 

It's so hard not to be selfish. It's so hard to not say "Mom! You can be the 50%! You can be with us for 5 more years, or beat the odds! You've never backed down from a challenge, let's kick this cancer's ass! We want you here!"  But I might as well be saying "Mom, put yourself through hell, again, so that we can still have you here. Make the last years of your life horrible so that we can still see you and talk to you and be with you. It's OK that you won't have hair and will be in constant pain and won't be able to eat or bike ride or enjoy the ocean. Because we will still have you." And that's not how she wants to spend the rest of her life. Who would? 

We know she wants to be here. More than anything in the world that's what we all want. But those aren't the cards we've been dealt. And it sucks. More than anything has ever sucked before. 

So the OG went to dinner last night. Cried over sushi and decided it was better to cry at home. On the way home Ross plugged in Mom's iPod (yep, iPod) and we listened to Billy Joel and Carly Simon and Abba. Mom and I sat in the back seat and I sobbed. I sobbed uncontrollably with my head on her shoulder. If I didn't outweigh her by 30 pounds I would have crawled into her lap and sobbed. It was like I was 5 again. I just want my Mom to make it better. But she can't. She can only soften the blow for us by being Mom. 

My Mom has done everything with grace and dignity and has always done it HER way. And that's exactly how she is going to do this last journey. Her way. She's setting the most amazing path. It's so beautiful and so excruciatingly painful all at once. 

Last night we found a new rhythm. We cry and then we laugh and then we cry and then we laugh. We cry because we have a lot of 'lasts' coming up. Then we laugh about 80's shoulder pads in old pictures or Ross' tube socks. And that's how it's going to be. And we have to laugh. Laughter has gotten us through so much. That sigh you let out after a belly laugh, the ones where Mom can't talk because she's laughing so hard and everyone else starts laughing because she can't stop laughing. That calm you feel after a good laugh, that's what we need. And that's what we are going to do. Every uncontrollable crying session has to be followed up with laughter. 

Because... in the words of the great philosopher a Mr. James Buffett.. "If we couldn't laugh we would all go insane."