Cancer.

Currently,
There are two people I know that are living with cancer.
1. A colleague, who is expected to recover, but is going through some heavy, heavy duty chemo.  Her reflections on being a cancer patient are thought provoking, raw, powerful.
Her blog is Holy Spirit Portality

2. A parishioner, who is not going to recover.   She has battled this monster since before I knew her--maybe four and half years?  She had a big bone in her leg removed, scads of chemo, had her leg amputated up to the pelvis, and was on chemo drug trials til this past June.  She and her husband built an accessible house near family, which they moved to a month ago.  She found out in June that the trials weren't working. basically, there is nothing they can do, and so she was referred to palliative care.  She isn't sick enough for hospice.  in fact, she is running the household now, caring for her children, unpacking boxes, walking the doggies. Her impending demise...and death is right in front of her all of the time. She doesn't blog, but her husband writes the most wrenchingly honest and soul baring posts on their CarePages website, which is an avenue for keeping up with friends and family.  It sucks. Of course it does. Does she blame anyone? No. Not even God. Don't get me wrong, she thinks the whole thing sucks, too...she is no pollyanna.  She is doing the best she can, in the way she knows how--which is pretty brilliantly, imho.

Both of these women are warriors. but in an amazonian goddess kind of way.  I am in awe, more than I can tell you.

If I were struggling with cancer (which, in actuality, according to family history and my present state of health, struggle with heart disease before cancer)  I could not be nearly as faithful, as thoughtful, as loving, as open, as real as these two women. They have allowed themselves to be peeled back, stripped of what is unnecessary to truly be...real, I guess that's the word I am looking for right now.

God. bless these woman-children of yours.
God. please. open me...to be real...to be stripped, to be honest, to know. You.