Hope

Can you see it?
The underlying current,
Sneaking its way around beneath our feet
Whether they are standing behind the glass or out on the treatment floor.
Do you feel it?
As you walk in the double glass entryway into a suddenly somber and
muted place waiting your turn.
Does it wind its way into your mind while in the small exam rooms as you listen to the latest news, get the latest numbers, focus on the odds.
Can you sense it?
Even when the toxic meds are being pumped through your body and you are drowsy from your Benedryl, trying to rest in a restless place of lights and alarms and bustling of feet.
It is there, I swear.
Following around every one you see.
All the doctors, nurses, assistants, volunteers have a trail of it like a vapor behind us as we move through the days of your medical nightmare.
The monster that is cancer that crawls through you and around your life cannot
defeat it.
It springs eternal from the hearts and souls of the people who surround you at the office on Asheville Avenue.
I, for one, promise that I will always be covered in it. Blanketed with it even when words are said to make it disappear. Even when it is gone. For I know where it lies.
I have learned, I have seen, heard, felt, and sensed it for seven years. Without it, nothing would matter and life would be meaningless.
I know of this thing, this integral part of what goes on at CCNC Cary, not only because of what I believe spiritually, but because I can recognize it glowing amid the darkness that is the disease we all loathe.
It shines like a beacon in the middle of a terrible storm.
My girls, in particular, practically reek of it at times. I know they could not do what they do without having a boatload of it.
The next time you are in those offices....look for it.
Look for it in a touch, a smile, a tender hand on a hurtful needle.
Look for it among the charts and graphs and percentages and data.
Look for it behind the serious dark eyes telling you a serious diagnosis.
Can you see it?
Please try to find it, because it is there and it will make your journey so much easier.
Reach out and grab it and never, ever, give it up.
I know I, for one, will never let go of hope.

"Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer." Romans 12:12