Esperanza

That was my name in my senior AP Spanish class (pretty sure it was the only AP class I ever took). Esperanza. Pronounced with a 'th' sound for the Z because that's how they do it in the motherland. Esperanza means 'hope'.

Hope is a funny thing. Funny isn't the right word. Hope can be wonderful. And cruel. And unforgiving.

Hope gives us a moment to breathe. It lets us relax a little. It gives us the possibility of peace again.  Hope enables us to get some rest, to return to life a bit, to check back in with things that don't really matter. But then just as quickly as you've checked back in, hope can disappear. Like a rug pulled out from underneath you. Like that magic trick where the waiter pulls the table cloth out from underneath all of the dishes without breaking a single dish. Only this time all of the dishes are shattered and you've got red wine on your white dress.  Suddenly, you're back to panic and sleeplessness and doing only what matters, incapable of doing the rest.

We had hope in the form of numbers. Mom's assholebastardstupidfucking cancer was responding to the chemo, dying from the chemo. The numbers showed us hope. Hope for more time. Hope that we would get her back. Hope that we could share in her magic for longer than we anticipated. I mean, numbers don't lie, right? Apparently they can be misleading.

Exit hope, stage right.

Despite the numbers, the tumors have grown. It doesn't even make sense. Not for the doctors. Certainly not for us. Because cancer sucks. It doesn't care who you are, what you've done, how many people love you to the moon and back. It just doesn't care.

But we care. So we have to hope for something. Hope that the time she has left is long and includes laughter and sunsets and joy and that radiant smile that lights up a room. Hope that she feels well enough to eat Wright's chocolate cake and dance on her birthday. Hope that we all get the help we need to navigate uncertain, uncharted, extremely rough waters with as much grace and peace as we can muster. Hope.

I've been sitting on this post for a couple of days. Just haven't been sure how to wrap this one up. But maybe it doesn't need a bow. A bow would indicate that it's all neat and tidy. And it isn't. It's messy and there's mascara running down my cheeks and knots in all of our stomachs. The ribbon for the bow hasn't even been cut off of the spool. And it's tangled in knots.