Bridges
We all have bridges that get us over.
Some people have people bridges. Others have objects or memories. Ideals. Dreams. Lucky talismans.
I have so many. You never think too much about those bridges until you need them. Or, at least I never did. Maybe there are several enlightened souls out there who are wise enough to give thanks for them daily. I wasn't one of them.
When your life is basically going along well, chugging right along, you don't seek those bridges out. We usually have good instincts, though, about exactly where and who those bridges are.
For many, many years, I just got up every week day and went to work. I came home and wrote, watched television, went for walks, read books, ate dinner. Took showers. And then repeated it the next day.
Then, I became sick and everything changed. Going to work became, not a joy, but a hideous chore. Something that seemed nearly insurmountable. I had been the Jill-of-all-trades in my office. I could do it all. I did my work and a lot of other work, too. I was known to be an excellent juggler. I could speedily type out a report, look over an expense account and talk on the phone at the same time.
And then, seemingly overnight, I couldn't. I could do one task at a time. Slowly. And then I would check it for errors because I didn't trust my lightning fast mind anymore. Chemotherapy had this weird effect on me. I had read about "chemo brain" but had never really understood what that meant. During chemotherapy, I was almost useless at any sort of multitasking, something that used to be my specialty in the past. My concentration was not laser sharp anymore. My mind felt dull. I would often sit and just.....stare.
Pain became a regular bedfellow. Nausea as well. Food was no longer something to look forward to, it was something that I had to ingest to stay alive. Fuel. In fact, I could not even watch Burger King commercials on television without gagging. The simple smell of meat cooking could make me wretch for hours.
I could drive, but it was difficult. Especially after I found out that I had leukemia. My feet and hands swelled up like they belonged to Mickey Mouse. I could not feel the brake or acceleration pedals in the car properly.
I began to rely on my bridges. T, my sister, and a few friends became my rides nearly everywhere. T either ate outside or began to stop for dinner on the way home from her job and then brushed her teeth immediately so that the food smell would not linger on her breath. She also waited on me hand and foot and did it with almost unbelievable tenderness. Did I need a drink? Maybe I could just TRY to sip some juice? How about a piece of toast? Maybe with just a smidge of honey on it to help it go down?
T and I have had our ups and downs but our marriage has become granite in the last few years. We have grown closer than I ever thought was possible. She has been my bridge over so many times that I have lost count. On my worst days, if I had requested that she buy me a zebra, she would have done it. No questions asked. She often drove me around the city on nights when my bones ached with tiredness but my brain would not let me rest. She put in my Lee DeWyze cd and just drove down that highway until I could relax enough to sleep, until the pain became endurable.
She is not a Lee DeWyze fan and often had work of her own that she neglected to do this.
But we would hold hands and sing.
"The sun is barely coming up
And I haven't slept yet
You're barely waking up
And all out of cigarettes....."
She stretched out and became the best, most compliant bridge ever known.
My other bridges were books. I had difficulty with concentration and could not read very fast. Long gone was my habit of reading two books per week. Now, I read slowly and deliberately. I chose books that took me out of myself. I lost myself in characters, places, situations.
I fell asleep often, a book open on my chest. (If it was a Stephen King book, it would lie open next to me. Everyone knows that Stephen King books are too heavy for chest resting...the same is true for the Harry Potter series, which I read all over again with the sole intent of losing myself in Hogwarts.)
During long hours of chemo, T would text me every half hour on my phone from her workplace. Sometimes just an "I love you!" Other times, she would send me jokes or words to songs. She would sometimes write of our future. "I can't wait to take you to Ireland!" or "One day this will all be just a bad dream. Maybe we'll even laugh. Okay. We probably won't ever laugh. But, it will be over. I promise. One day this will be a memory."
The future is now the present. I no longer spend my days with arsenic and chemo dripping into my arm. I still have to take a lot of naps. I haven't been able to return to work. The fatigue has been too powerful. But, life is better. I am writing again. Back to reading. Not two books a week yet, but one book. And that is acceptable. There is improvement. I am healing.
And so, so grateful for my beautiful bridges that got me over: My next door neighbor, who insisted on bringing our mail to our door every day so that I wouldn't have to walk to the street to get it. My sister, who picked me up from chemo three days a week. Conrad, who not only picked me up from chemo frequently, but mowed our lawn and trimmed our hedges so that T could spend time with me. A few nurses who got me my chemo as soon as possible so I wouldn't have to be in that hated chemo room any longer than I absolutely had to be, Freya the dog at the park who wagged her tail madly at the mere sight of me to the astonishment of her owner. ("This is so weird! She is not easy to make friends but she just adores you!") My cousin, M, who sent me her magic crystals and rocks and so many cards that I tied a ribbon around them and saved them because of all the poetry in them. The lady at KFC who had our mashed potatoes and gravy ready as soon as she saw T come in the door because T had told her that it was one of the few things that I could keep down. Another lady at Panera who served my chicken noodle soup EXACTLY the way I asked for it: mostly broth.
To my precious books.
But, mostly to T for being that perfect bridge. That bridge that, from afar, looks like it might not be anything special, but when the hurricane hit, became the only one left standing. For refusing to fold or fall or be beaten.
For being mine.
Some people have people bridges. Others have objects or memories. Ideals. Dreams. Lucky talismans.
I have so many. You never think too much about those bridges until you need them. Or, at least I never did. Maybe there are several enlightened souls out there who are wise enough to give thanks for them daily. I wasn't one of them.
When your life is basically going along well, chugging right along, you don't seek those bridges out. We usually have good instincts, though, about exactly where and who those bridges are.
For many, many years, I just got up every week day and went to work. I came home and wrote, watched television, went for walks, read books, ate dinner. Took showers. And then repeated it the next day.
Then, I became sick and everything changed. Going to work became, not a joy, but a hideous chore. Something that seemed nearly insurmountable. I had been the Jill-of-all-trades in my office. I could do it all. I did my work and a lot of other work, too. I was known to be an excellent juggler. I could speedily type out a report, look over an expense account and talk on the phone at the same time.
And then, seemingly overnight, I couldn't. I could do one task at a time. Slowly. And then I would check it for errors because I didn't trust my lightning fast mind anymore. Chemotherapy had this weird effect on me. I had read about "chemo brain" but had never really understood what that meant. During chemotherapy, I was almost useless at any sort of multitasking, something that used to be my specialty in the past. My concentration was not laser sharp anymore. My mind felt dull. I would often sit and just.....stare.
Pain became a regular bedfellow. Nausea as well. Food was no longer something to look forward to, it was something that I had to ingest to stay alive. Fuel. In fact, I could not even watch Burger King commercials on television without gagging. The simple smell of meat cooking could make me wretch for hours.
I could drive, but it was difficult. Especially after I found out that I had leukemia. My feet and hands swelled up like they belonged to Mickey Mouse. I could not feel the brake or acceleration pedals in the car properly.
I began to rely on my bridges. T, my sister, and a few friends became my rides nearly everywhere. T either ate outside or began to stop for dinner on the way home from her job and then brushed her teeth immediately so that the food smell would not linger on her breath. She also waited on me hand and foot and did it with almost unbelievable tenderness. Did I need a drink? Maybe I could just TRY to sip some juice? How about a piece of toast? Maybe with just a smidge of honey on it to help it go down?
T and I have had our ups and downs but our marriage has become granite in the last few years. We have grown closer than I ever thought was possible. She has been my bridge over so many times that I have lost count. On my worst days, if I had requested that she buy me a zebra, she would have done it. No questions asked. She often drove me around the city on nights when my bones ached with tiredness but my brain would not let me rest. She put in my Lee DeWyze cd and just drove down that highway until I could relax enough to sleep, until the pain became endurable.
She is not a Lee DeWyze fan and often had work of her own that she neglected to do this.
But we would hold hands and sing.
"The sun is barely coming up
And I haven't slept yet
You're barely waking up
And all out of cigarettes....."
She stretched out and became the best, most compliant bridge ever known.
My other bridges were books. I had difficulty with concentration and could not read very fast. Long gone was my habit of reading two books per week. Now, I read slowly and deliberately. I chose books that took me out of myself. I lost myself in characters, places, situations.
I fell asleep often, a book open on my chest. (If it was a Stephen King book, it would lie open next to me. Everyone knows that Stephen King books are too heavy for chest resting...the same is true for the Harry Potter series, which I read all over again with the sole intent of losing myself in Hogwarts.)
During long hours of chemo, T would text me every half hour on my phone from her workplace. Sometimes just an "I love you!" Other times, she would send me jokes or words to songs. She would sometimes write of our future. "I can't wait to take you to Ireland!" or "One day this will all be just a bad dream. Maybe we'll even laugh. Okay. We probably won't ever laugh. But, it will be over. I promise. One day this will be a memory."
The future is now the present. I no longer spend my days with arsenic and chemo dripping into my arm. I still have to take a lot of naps. I haven't been able to return to work. The fatigue has been too powerful. But, life is better. I am writing again. Back to reading. Not two books a week yet, but one book. And that is acceptable. There is improvement. I am healing.
And so, so grateful for my beautiful bridges that got me over: My next door neighbor, who insisted on bringing our mail to our door every day so that I wouldn't have to walk to the street to get it. My sister, who picked me up from chemo three days a week. Conrad, who not only picked me up from chemo frequently, but mowed our lawn and trimmed our hedges so that T could spend time with me. A few nurses who got me my chemo as soon as possible so I wouldn't have to be in that hated chemo room any longer than I absolutely had to be, Freya the dog at the park who wagged her tail madly at the mere sight of me to the astonishment of her owner. ("This is so weird! She is not easy to make friends but she just adores you!") My cousin, M, who sent me her magic crystals and rocks and so many cards that I tied a ribbon around them and saved them because of all the poetry in them. The lady at KFC who had our mashed potatoes and gravy ready as soon as she saw T come in the door because T had told her that it was one of the few things that I could keep down. Another lady at Panera who served my chicken noodle soup EXACTLY the way I asked for it: mostly broth.
To my precious books.
But, mostly to T for being that perfect bridge. That bridge that, from afar, looks like it might not be anything special, but when the hurricane hit, became the only one left standing. For refusing to fold or fall or be beaten.
For being mine.
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