I write raw though I have been warned against it more than once. However, one who has been to hell twice has their memories. I am happy to say that I am still here and have grown from the garbage that arose in my psyche after hearing my little girl would die. Who wouldn’t call that a housecleaning of the gods? “Let’s throw all of her worst nightmares at her. See what she’s made of.” I can imagine them stoking the fires into which I would continually be thrown.
Not just death, you see. But bone marrow tests, bald children, dying children superimposed on the instructions given to me at St. Jude’s. “Go home and live a normal life.” More taunts from the gods.
There was a trip to Disney World, which was rather wonderful. And a last trip to Disneyland after we were told, “We can remove this second tumor but she can’t have any more chemo. We will give her six weeks of radiation and then the cancer will return in a few months to a year.”
We went. We saw St. Juan Capistrano, something I had always wanted to do. We went to a TV studio taping and Bob and I went to a taping of Hollywood Squares. I was writing for Joan Rivers at the time. Back home, Laurie woke us in the night screaming with pain. At the hospital they x-rayed her and sent us home. It was up to her oncologist to tell us the cancer had spread to her lungs. I died before she did. But I went on.
We buried her on July 15, 1978. I had been warned that losing a child was hard. No kidding. I didn’t know that I would become a symbol of loss for people and that all I had left was God. And He didn’t show up that often. Oh, well. He knew what I was made of. For Bob would get his own case of cancer in 2000.
Fast forward to 2017. I am sitting here on Easter weekend. I am in good health and the most creative I have ever been in my life. Is it any wonder that I know a lot about the curative power of silence? The gods didn’t know what a gift it would be to me. Now I share it with all of you. Totally. What else can I do?
Some words from the beginning of my ebook, “The Edge of Enlightenment.”
If you donate to my website, I will send you the ebook. This is the way I am “selling” it right now. This way I don’t have to market it.
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