Swimming in a pool of tears

Tonight, my cousin called me. He had taken my mother to the hospital. She had blacked out and hit her face. The hospital thinks it's a blood clot due to the spreading cancer and she's being given tests. She's been suffering from headaches for months now.

I am afraid to know what this may mean.

For two years now, since my mother's diagnosis of cancer, I have been putting aside having to deal with "losing her" ... "it's not going to happen 'til later" ... "it's not going to happen 'til later" ...

Tonight, I felt for the first time that "later" has caught up with me. And I am so filled with grief, I don't ever think the tears will stop.

No one is ever ready to lose someone they love. And especially not me now, what with Christmas and my birthday and New Year's just around the corner ... Me and the kids and the rest of the family still have some celebrating to do with my mom ...

I was supposed to swim tonight and wondered if the pool water would wash away my tears and distract me as I focused on technique. I nixed the idea and figured I didn't want to drown. Second choice was getting on my stationary bike, the infamous Mr. SB for those who have been reading my blog from the beginning ... but Mr. SB's dumb-founded look at my teary eyes told me instantly that he didn't know how to react to such great sadness.

I figured it best to turn to friends ... Thank you all for your hugs and support and love. Please say a prayer for my mother to help her get through this "hump". We've got a big New Year's party planned and we need her to be there ...

Warm healing vibes to Alston ...

Just found out that a friend of my friend MJ's that I met at her New Year's party is recovering right now in the hospital from having a cancerous tumour removed. He had only just finished an utterly gruelling chemo treatment.

Please take some time to look at Alston's blog and send him positive vibes, whether just in your thoughts or as a comment, even though you don't know him. There is a lot of truth in wishful thinking ...

Here he is at MJ's party, so incredibly full of laughter and warmth ... Alston, though I don't know you as more than an acquaintance, I remarked right away on your beautiful energy ... I'm sending you positive vibes. Hang in there, you will feel better soon ... All things in life are transitory.

When is a choice not really a choice?

What do you do if you are very sick and are given only two choices?

1) Take meds that will make you feel gravely ill knowing they may help a tiny bit or maybe not at all to extend your life and might even ironically shorten it ... then you die.

2) Take no meds, be "well" for X number of short days, or not as gravely ill .. then you die.

This is a very sad period in my life and I cannot even fathom what is going on in my mother's mind. I wish I could hold her in my arms and stroke her hair and make it all go away ... or even transfer it all to me.

When bad things happen to good people ... where is the sense in this world? My son, his eyes full of tears, asked me, "Why her?" There is no answer. Things just are.

All my childhood and adolescent memories are flooding back into my mind ... I'm not ready yet to let you go, mommy ... I am that lost little girl in the department store again frantically searching for you, afraid and crying, longing to feel safe and secure again ...

Me and my Coolrunning gang!

Met up with my running group at one of our favourite haunts, Hurley's!

I ate a wickedly good hamburger steak with fried onions in a peppery sauce, mashed potatoes and fresh vegetables. Absolutely scrumptious! Dragonrouges arrived after I did and ordered the same thing 'cause it was pretty evident how much I enjoyed it. Sorry folks, no pic of it as I was too busy wolfing it down to think about my camera.

Let me introduce everyone ...

Here's Turtleboy. Don't let the name fool you. He's anything but slow and is set on one thing and one thing only ... to get to the Boston Marathon.

Grommit. He's the craziest of us all ... Can be super fast on asphalt when he wants to be but he prefers using his unique "girly" duck-feet stride to romp around trails in the woods and forests, and on mountain slopes. He recently completed the newly sensational and incredibly difficult 54-mile "climb-six-mountains" challenge called Pittsfield Peaks.

Roly. He's Grommit's innocent running partner and together, they are lovingly referred to as "The Grolies". A brand spanking new ultrarunner, he competed as well in Pittsfield Peaks, his first ultra, and made it through a maddening distance of 42 miles. Wicked! Yes, Roly, I know you can now beat my marathon time ... but you just wait until I decide to pick up ultras!

Lifeany dreams of one day running a marathon. You go for it girl! She'd never thought she'd ever even run 5k and now she already has two races under her belt, and more to come! Don't listen to TB, go do that 10k this fall ... you'll be ready! Listen to your heart! You only live once, so never regret.

Here's the handsome Truxx with the beautiful Kneejerk. Truxx has the same training philosophy as I do "Why train, let's just race!" except he's got the speed. Kneejerk moved away from my neighbourhood and I "curse her" for living so far away now ... boo hoo ... I miss those 6:50 am wake-up calls to go run around the park.

Oh, and here I am ... Silly Sally! I showed Grommit my 5k *bling* and he laughed at me heartily as he pulled out his *tool*.

And here we are, the Montreal Coolrunners. I love you all! You're all so special (and so crazy!) Missing in action from the photo are the photo-shy Dragonsrouges and the already parted Mercury and friend.

Aren't we a happy bunch?

Going to Toronto tomorrow, folks, to take care of my mother - she will be starting chemo again. Please say a little prayer for her ...

Death is very finite

The man on the hill passed away Saturday.

My "lil' brother's" father passed away last Thursday.

At the visitation, I saw one of my runner friends, Mercury. His wife who was also mother to one of my best friends passed away last summer unexpectedly.

My swing dance friend CM passed away last summer from cancer. Very sad - she was only 35.

My mother's future is still in question because of her liver and cancer. Another friend, just a few year's older than I, has cancer and is dealing with it courageously, no complaints at all from him, just appreciation that he has one more day. Another friend's mother just got operated on for cancer ... I will cross my fingers for her. I share my friend's sadness because I was there in the same place a year ago, so sad and worried about my own mother.

And then of course, there is my near-death experience with my car crash.

DEATH. It's not quite the same when we hear about it. It's not the same either when we see it on television or in a film. Seeing the man on the hill die rocked me right to the core.

Made me do a lot of thinking. I don't want to have any regrets when I die, things I wanted to do and say ... I don't ever want to look back on my life and wonder what if? All we know for sure is that we have RIGHT NOW.

It was a morbid weekend and having not had the time to deal with it, Monday came and I was EXHAUSTED. On top of it all, my headache refused to leave.

A friend PB cheered me up Sunday night with a fantastic supper, osso bucco, aren't I the lucky one? We followed it up with some tango dancing ...

Today, I felt less affected by the morbidity of the weekend and met up with JC for a quick half hour swim. I guess the eleven hours of sleep I got did me some good. "What a hardcore weekend you had," JC said and gave me a hug in the pool.

I am so fortunate to be alive and to have good friends.