31 Days

I didn’t cry

The first time I saw the epic 2018 version of A Star is Born

I didn’t cry.

I teared up a little, who wouldn’t

Instead, I saw the movie as one of hope

Risks taken and rewarded

I was the girl who wanted more from this modern world

I had found what I was searching for

I had found my change

We were in the deep end and being far from the shallow was exciting

The adventure was working:  weekends together, work weeks focused on jobs

New people, new climates

The story was one of unbound hope and inevitable loss.  

I was buoyed.  I came home wired, dancing the joy of the life I had seized for myself.

 

But I was thirsty.  It was so strange. I had been in warm climates before, but dehydration was a constant factor.  So I drank everything I could get my hands on. I worried I was diabetic, but recent tests showed I wasn’t.  I didn’t know that for at least six months, probably longer, my bones were slowly being eaten away by cancer releasing calcium into my system causing the symptoms of severe dehydration.  Sure, I hurt everywhere but doesn’t every 51-year-old woman? Then the rib pain… like no pain I had ever experienced. Must be a kidney stone. CT Scan. Liver Cancer. PET scan. Bone Cancer.  Biopsies. Declining Prognosis. So emerged the optimistic pragmatist.

 

31 days later, in the company of a timeless friend, a true soul sister who has had life throw her more shit than one person should ever experience

 

I cried so hard

The second time I saw the epic 2018 version of A Star is Born

I cried with my hands over my eyes, shoulders heaving, through most of the movie.

I was no longer Ally, I was Jackson:  A ticking time bomb. Tired of acting so hardcore.

The deep end no longer held endless possibilities.  

Instead, it felt like the Columbia River I drive by each morning the blue and silver glittering surface hiding the freezing green depths that can drown you.

I wanted back to the shallow end and safe from everything that was tearing my life apart

My husband now the recipient of the ending song:  I’ll Never Love Again

At least we get to say goodbye.

But again, I left inspired.  The message of love so deep between brothers rang hard in my ears.  The legacy that can be left so that the person never really dies was like a banner through my brain.  

 

Two days later I get a card with a Meg Wolitzer quote.  I will confess it created the heaving crying again because, just maybe, I will have left the world with a legacy. It doesn’t need to be millions of people singing my lyrics, but maybe it will be a voice of hope in someone’s brain.  That’s enough.

 

“She took me in and she taught me things, and more than that she gave me permission. I think that’s what the people who change our lives always do.  They give us permission to be the person we secretly really long to be but maybe don’t feel that we’re allowed to be.”  

 

― Meg Wolitzer, The Female Persuasion

 

Thank you, Lara L. for the cards

Thank you Jodi S. for taking the risk on such an emotional movie and being that one of my soul sisters.  Who knew?