Keep it Simple Stupid. That's what Lee White would always say. And I miss him. I miss all our conversations and that he was probably the only one in history that I knew of that could out-talk me. He was wise, nosy and always keeping the peace. He was in love with his wife and so loyal to his children and did not dwell on the petty. Ever.
And he died of colon cancer six years ago.
I've decided that I hate cancer of any kind. I hate how insidious it is - how it can appear as something whole and healthy and eat people from the insides out whether it's dis-ease or negativity. But even Lee wouldn't see or say that. He'd say that God never failed him even though he had failed God many times. He would say that every day was a good day because the sun was shining. He would say that he loved his children and never felt that they were step-children; they were his, pure and simple.
We went to say goodbye to him at the Hospice in Maryland. They kept him on feeding tubes until we could make the twelve hour drive. I was in shock. He and I had talked and talked, days and days. And every time I sent him a package - I'd find out he'd taken a turn for the worse. But he never let on. Never broke. Never faltered and always seemed to come back. I would sing over the phone Five For Fighting's "If God Made You". I memorized his poem - one he'd written years ago and shared with me during many of our conversations. He wrote it in the middle of a melancholy night at a turning point for him in his youth. It was about procrastination, love and living...
We spoke soft words to each other in the quiet of that hospice room. He recited it and I whispered it back to him.
Here I stand naked and alone
Without hello or goodbye
I felt your pain I heard your cry
I must awaken to the realization
And bypass all procrastination
For in those times of those days
I did love in my way
Now all I have are memories of my
Thirty-second day - Lee White
I cried and squeezed his hands. We left heart-broken because we were losing a giant. Cancer killed him, but it didn't take him. It didn't take him the way cancer takes the hearts of so many people unwilling to see love, unwilling to step into joy. Joy is the only reason to Live. We waste this Life outside of Joy. Lee had every dignity taken from him and he doubted nothing. He found Joy if he could find the energy to walk from the condo office back to his home.
Lee's friend, Stanley, died this month. Stanley beat us to Lee's Hospice room with a fountain Coke. And Cancer has killed Stanley now, too. But I know that cancer did not take him either. If I know Stanley from the brief encounter, the laughter and jokes carried him all the way.
Do negative people around us even see Life this way? Have they become so accustomed to living in negative space that they have no idea that that's what they put out there? Do they not see that it is up to them to change? That Joy has nothing to do with circumstance and that complaining drains life and energy?
My Grandad died four years ago and he was like a father to me. He was a father to me. I talked to him often -sometimes multiple times a day - and had since I was 18. He was my rock. My lodestar. Everything. And I know that he lived long enough to be certain that I was ready to spread my own wings and fly. And I know that he walks inside of my Soul even now.
The lists of other losses are endless for so many people. But every loss is of someone who has made life pivotal and important in one way or another. And those who have left me behind have left me richness and perspective and they have left me Joy. Every loss has been of someone who has stamped their imprint and their legacy inside of my heart. And they Live on. I feel them surround me, waiting for me to remember to stop and to become aware.
I write a lot about being in a euphoric state. I Am. And yet it doesn't mean that my life became miraculously perfect. It doesn't mean that bills are easily paid, children don't go into the emergency room or that relationships aren't in transition. It means that I got "it" and I won't ever let it go. I understand that Happiness is a Choice. Happiness is all we have that's good and honest. Happiness transcends time and leaps into Eternity. Joy is all there is.
And I know...
That of the countless foster homes that Lee went through as a child, of the epilepsy he battled as an adult and of which reacted with his cancer treatments, he could have chosen misery instead of light. He remembers being dropped off by his father at five years old and left with the State. Abandoned. My Grandad experienced an absent father as well. We all have a story that early or late in life, could give us cause to drown in the dark and drag others with us.
Living Joy Is a Choice. Growth is a Choice. It cannot be handed to us and yet the sweetness of embracing it eclipses any other source there is. Take it. Grasp it. Make it yours. Blame is for the weak. Silence is for the fearful. Traction is for those who don't understand that they don't have to come undone but that forward mobility is always there.
Live this life. Every precious last drop. Build your own legacy. Be the catalyst that sets Love in motion and stands up for truth. Not truth in dogma, not truth in opinion. But truth in Love. I don't want to hate cancer, but if I should ever come eye to eye with it - Well, I have footsteps to follow and I'm on my way.
With all my love, with every breath I take - make every day a better day.
I've decided that I hate cancer of any kind. I hate how insidious it is - how it can appear as something whole and healthy and eat people from the insides out whether it's dis-ease or negativity. But even Lee wouldn't see or say that. He'd say that God never failed him even though he had failed God many times. He would say that every day was a good day because the sun was shining. He would say that he loved his children and never felt that they were step-children; they were his, pure and simple.
We went to say goodbye to him at the Hospice in Maryland. They kept him on feeding tubes until we could make the twelve hour drive. I was in shock. He and I had talked and talked, days and days. And every time I sent him a package - I'd find out he'd taken a turn for the worse. But he never let on. Never broke. Never faltered and always seemed to come back. I would sing over the phone Five For Fighting's "If God Made You". I memorized his poem - one he'd written years ago and shared with me during many of our conversations. He wrote it in the middle of a melancholy night at a turning point for him in his youth. It was about procrastination, love and living...
We spoke soft words to each other in the quiet of that hospice room. He recited it and I whispered it back to him.
Here I stand naked and alone
Without hello or goodbye
I felt your pain I heard your cry
I must awaken to the realization
And bypass all procrastination
For in those times of those days
I did love in my way
Now all I have are memories of my
Thirty-second day - Lee White
I cried and squeezed his hands. We left heart-broken because we were losing a giant. Cancer killed him, but it didn't take him. It didn't take him the way cancer takes the hearts of so many people unwilling to see love, unwilling to step into joy. Joy is the only reason to Live. We waste this Life outside of Joy. Lee had every dignity taken from him and he doubted nothing. He found Joy if he could find the energy to walk from the condo office back to his home.
Lee's friend, Stanley, died this month. Stanley beat us to Lee's Hospice room with a fountain Coke. And Cancer has killed Stanley now, too. But I know that cancer did not take him either. If I know Stanley from the brief encounter, the laughter and jokes carried him all the way.
Do negative people around us even see Life this way? Have they become so accustomed to living in negative space that they have no idea that that's what they put out there? Do they not see that it is up to them to change? That Joy has nothing to do with circumstance and that complaining drains life and energy?
My Grandad died four years ago and he was like a father to me. He was a father to me. I talked to him often -sometimes multiple times a day - and had since I was 18. He was my rock. My lodestar. Everything. And I know that he lived long enough to be certain that I was ready to spread my own wings and fly. And I know that he walks inside of my Soul even now.
The lists of other losses are endless for so many people. But every loss is of someone who has made life pivotal and important in one way or another. And those who have left me behind have left me richness and perspective and they have left me Joy. Every loss has been of someone who has stamped their imprint and their legacy inside of my heart. And they Live on. I feel them surround me, waiting for me to remember to stop and to become aware.
I write a lot about being in a euphoric state. I Am. And yet it doesn't mean that my life became miraculously perfect. It doesn't mean that bills are easily paid, children don't go into the emergency room or that relationships aren't in transition. It means that I got "it" and I won't ever let it go. I understand that Happiness is a Choice. Happiness is all we have that's good and honest. Happiness transcends time and leaps into Eternity. Joy is all there is.
And I know...
That of the countless foster homes that Lee went through as a child, of the epilepsy he battled as an adult and of which reacted with his cancer treatments, he could have chosen misery instead of light. He remembers being dropped off by his father at five years old and left with the State. Abandoned. My Grandad experienced an absent father as well. We all have a story that early or late in life, could give us cause to drown in the dark and drag others with us.
Living Joy Is a Choice. Growth is a Choice. It cannot be handed to us and yet the sweetness of embracing it eclipses any other source there is. Take it. Grasp it. Make it yours. Blame is for the weak. Silence is for the fearful. Traction is for those who don't understand that they don't have to come undone but that forward mobility is always there.
Live this life. Every precious last drop. Build your own legacy. Be the catalyst that sets Love in motion and stands up for truth. Not truth in dogma, not truth in opinion. But truth in Love. I don't want to hate cancer, but if I should ever come eye to eye with it - Well, I have footsteps to follow and I'm on my way.
With all my love, with every breath I take - make every day a better day.
- This Carman Girl
