Last Cancer Treatment

Tomorrow is Patty's last scheduled treatment for the breast cancer diagnosis she received on August 9, 2006. 1 Year, 4 months, and 18 days ago. To steal a phrase from a not so favorite president of mine, FDR, "...a day that will live in infamy." She will still continue receiving treatments for her arm but these are not technically treatments for cancer rather treatments for the side effects of the surgery.

Patty is in remission or as we say in the medical field NED (No Evidence of Disease). No one is officially cured of cancer, you either have it or are NED. We continue to pray that she will remain NED until she dies of something else at least at the age of her grandmother Bessie who turned 90 on Dec. 7. This has been a long road to travel and Patty and I are both praying for some green pasture. We need it.

Christmas has been a blur. The first few hours of Christmas morning were great spending time with the kids. It went downhill after that as I begin to drown in the excess of it as it all added up. It was a conflicting day for me. I thought of my friends in Haiti who it was most likely just another day trying to survive. I thought back to simpler times in America as I heard Patty's grandmother describe her Christmas's to me as a little girl in the 1920's where they got only a few pieces of fruit in their stocking. The only time they got fruit. And lastly, I longed for a more fulfilling Christmas like the one in an 1850 Christmas short story by Harriet Beecher Stowe I read before my grieving soul rested for the night.

A young lady complained about how she gave Christmas gifts to her friends and family that weren't really needed and was done more out of tradition then need and how she longed to give gifts that were truly embraced and needed. Her aunt told her of many people, mostly poor, who had needs and that gifts for those needs would be truly embraced. The young lady took this advice and begin to act upon it. This desire to fill real needs is my prayer for myself and for each of you for next Christmas. As Jesus said 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.' May we all follow his wise advice.

God Bless.