I finally caught up with my old time friend who has been battling cancer. We have texted back and forth but have never managed to find a time that both of us were free when we could talk on the phone and catch up. It's been 17 years since we have spoken. Man, it was so good to hear his voice. He sounds the same....just like I remember his voice...and his attitude. He has always been so laid back about everything. One of the first words he said to me when we first got back in touch was PEACE. I smile now just thinkin about it cuz that's just him. Peace. He has it. Even though he has had MS and now has cancer. He explained to me that he has gotten one full round of chemotherapy. Then radiation to his shoulder. It's in his bones. The chemo didn't work as well as they had hoped, so I think it was yesterday that he was to start another round with new chemicals. More potent ones. He said he would be okay for days and feel pretty good and then all of a sudden it would just hit him. Some days the symptoms were different than others. I can't even imagine. Then he said....."You know this is incurable, right sweetheart?"
It felt like my heart just broke inside my chest. I knew that was a possibility but to hear it. And to hear that he had resigned himself to dying. It was just too much. I sat there trying my best with the words I had to give him to let him know that God has the final say. And he said yes, there are miracles. But that he is okay with this. He said his friend asked him to go kayaking a couple days ago. He had the most energy he's had in a long time. He went kayaking with his friend and took his little chihuahua with him :) He had the best time. And he said it was great to be able to do that one last time before he dies. Again....I had no idea what to say, assuming I could have spoken through the lump in my throat. Geez. I was speechless. I think he sensed that I didn't quite know what to say....and he told me it was really nice talking to me, and to keep in touch, and that he had to go. His 17 year old daughter was downstairs waiting for him. She was going to college and he had to have a talk with her before she left. I couldn't help but think it was a goodbye talk. I thanked him for taking the time to talk to me, hung up the phone, and just let loose the tears I had been holding back. You never know. You just never know. Life is so fragile and fleeting and so uncertain. No one knows when their time will be up. But we live like we know it's not today....or tomorrow...or next week...or even next year. What do we know?!?!? We don't.
A surprise-me-God morning....as I sat at my kitchen table this morning re-reading a book my brother gave me called Crazy Love by Francis Chan. Absolutely amazing book by a revolutionary thinker. I guess that's why I'm reading it again a year later. Anyway....he was talking about death and how we have to realize that we could die at any minute for it to change how we live. He goes on to speak about a friend of his whose friend asked him if he thought maybe he spent too much time serving others and giving too much away. His friend said very gently, "I wonder if you'll say that after we're dead." Wow.
Sometimes I need reminded of that. Our lives are so short. Some are shorter than others. We never know when our last day on Earth will be....or when we hug someone goodbye that it's the last time we will ever do so. Nothing we achieve will ever be remembered for eons. Nothing we own will be ours for eternity. The only thing in this life that has any eternal value is how we love others. Because it spreads. And because it changes lives.
Pick someone out in your mind....doesn't even have to be someone you know very well. Now think about how you can, within the next 48 hours, show them love in some way....show them they are valuable....that you are thinking of them...SPREAD THE LOVE! :)
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