Thursday, February 5, 2015

Titled: Profound Messages From My Hair Guy

Recently, my husband has been quietly correcting me on "time" questions.

If someone were to ask me, "when did you start treatment?" I would answer "last year".  

He pulls me aside and says "it was January, 2012".  

If someone were to question when I last worked at my job, I'd answer "last year".  

He tells me sideways that I really haven't worked since the end of 2011.  (we don't count those couple of weeks when I tried to work after I was diagnosed and quickly slid into heavy multi-appointment weeks and chemo and study drug tests...)  

If someone said "remember when we went out to dinner at that fabulous winery?"  I would sadly say before thinking "that was just last year, right?"  

Sometimes, he just looks at the people talking to me and implores them to understand without saying anything at all. 

The truth is that in my brain anything 2011, 2012, 2013 is all "last year".  

My internal-brain-clock has stopped.  

Or at least, warped.  

I feel like I have lost huge chunks of time, and still, my internal ticking clock is not keeping time properly.  There is no longer an innate, steady, rhythmic tick-tock alerting me to the change in the seasons, the change in the months, the change in the days.  

I often ask Scott in the middle of doing something "what day is it again?"  I suddenly want to make sure we are getting groceries on the proper day, or abruptly make sure I don't miss an appointment that I had forgotten.   

There is no longer a rhythm to life - no rhythm to the age-old "five on, two off" of the work week; no rhythm of eating or sleeping or exercising or working.  

Most days I happily go about life and living, not aware of what it is that has stopped within me, or aware of what has warped inside of me.  

I keep a calendar on the table and write down things as I go.  

Or not.  

This month I completely lost the darned thing until Scott just found it for me a couple of days ago.  

It seems like much of the recent past is shrouded in a mist, locked in a time-mystery as to the "whens" and the "wheres" of events the last three years.  And even though the present is not as foggy, I am still struggling to get my brain into working order.  

At my last oncologist appointment, I again asked my dear doctor if she thought I could be starting early onset Alzheimer's.  She laughed, and said "no, dear Karen.  It will happen, it will happen."  

I smiled weakly back at her.  

I'm not so sure.  

***

As many of you know, I am a great fan of literature.  I like *good* books.  I don't care so much for current authors, but always loved the great writers of history.  

Ahem.  At least I would have told you that "last year".  I haven't read a complete book for over three years going now.  

Even so, I can remember much of my life by the genre of the books I was reading -- I can remember our simple life in the small town of Nankin and some parts of the childhoods of my children due to the summer I read "Uncle Tom's Cabin".  

It touched the deepest part of my soul, and changed something inside of me forever.  

It made me hold my children closer.  It made me realize on a deeper level the wrongs of slavery; the wrongs of human beings intent on building themselves on the backs of others no matter how much those backs bowed or broke; the wrongs of enslaving anyone at anytime - whether because you paid money for them or you took control of their life financially in other ways.  

Simply, it made me realize on a current level how blessed our simple home was, how blessed our meager finances were as a young family trying to hold on during the recession of the early 80's, how blessed it was that we were born free.  

I remember holding my children so close that summer and I remember the little walks to the bookmobile with them, hoping they would find books that could open their eyes deeply as well.

I remember my fascination with Jayne Austin, and reading 'Pride and Prejudice' while watching my daughters starting to date.  I remember how deeply the story-line of a gentrified family demoted to poverty tagged me as we had just lost everything in a house fire while my husband was a full time student having gone back to school after being injured in a car accident.  At the time, I was working full time making $14,000 a year - with three teenagers needing lots and lots and lots of things.  

We had swung from being the family of a decently paid welder with good medical benefits and a decent yearly Christmas bonus, enabling a stay-at-home-mum if we were all careful with the finances -- to a family suddenly swung under the poverty level and a mum no longer able to provide the daily stability under the stress of a perfectionistic-employer.  

A lot of our friends were moving into the decade of their lives where they were building their dream homes, buying a nice second car, doing sweet vacations -- we were trying to figure out how we were going to pay for three pairs of sporting events shoes the following school year.    

Pride and Prejudice is a simple old style romance to many, but to me, it was a deeply moving lesson on keeping your chin up even when everyone says your life looks completely lacking in most things.  It made me pray fervently that my kids would not feel cheated in life by circumstances that none of us could control - but rather that they would grow up knowing that "things" are not what holds life together. 

My decade of the Russain Authors still shapes me, still hangs with me even if I cannot remember some (most) of the plot lines, most of the authors names, most of the characters.  

I loved them so much and related to them so.  

Having said all of this about my favorite literature, you have to know that I love bookstores, libraries, bookshelves.  

And I am always, always on a relentless search of good book-ends to contain the line of stories on any given shelf.

I feel that way with this blog. It's time to put some bookends on it. Although, the fallout and aftereffects of chemo and radiation leave a long shadow over me, I have finished active treatment.

I do a lot of appointments still, am seeing new doctors too often for new problems that pop up, but that is all part of the fallout, part of the long shadow of 'after-treatment'

To bookend all of these stories, all of these subjects and sections and parts of my walk and journey and travail through cancer land, makes me realize it's not done, it's not over, but it has moved to a different part of the library.

I'm in a different section now. I need some bookends to make some differentiation.

My life has dramatically changed. I've had story-lines added and edited that I never thought, never imagined would end up on my bookshelf of life.

I'm hanging out on a completely different bookshelf, completely different part of the library than I was a short three years ago.

***

I finally got my hair cut last week.  

It was the first time since 2011 that I've had it cut.  

You read that right - I haven't had a haircut in over three years.  

When it started growing back after I was done with my "year of chemo", I suspect because of the radiation treatments that followed, it was rather 'scant'.  I have always been *blessed* with extra thick, extra wavy/curly hair.  

Not now.  

Those that have had chemo, know that the last place to fully grow in completely is a rather large area above your forehead. It's kind of like male-pattern-baldness, only you're a woman, making it not so acceptable.  

I've worn hats constantly for two and a half years.  Just the past couple of months when my hair started to get thicker and much longer did I try to stop the habit of grabbing a hat every time I left the house.  

The male-pattern-baldness had finally gone from scant, to fine, to filled in.  

I wasn't so afraid of sunburning my scalp.  My eyes didn't seem to need the double protection of big sunglasses and a hat brim as much.  Maybe the body-poisoning, body-changing, chemo effects were finally, slowly leaving my skin, my eyes, my body, if not my brain yet.  

But to be honest, hat-grabbing was a difficult habit to let go.  

In fact, I felt quite naked without a hat. I was surprised at how accustomed I had come to wearing one all the time. All. the. time.

It had become my "new-normal".

I find myself living in a continual state of "new normal". 

***

I smiled really big when I saw my hair-guy Don. It had been a long, long time.

Truth be told, I have never been the kind of customer that any hair salon could build a good clientele base around. I would go faithfully every four months for a color and trim for stretches of time, then decide to grow it out for a while and not see Don for a good ten months maybe.

But whether I showed up monthly or a scant twice a year with horribly trimmed bangs done by my own shaky hands, he welcomed me like I was a Cadillac client.

I like to talk to him. We talk about business and how his business is going. We talk about philosophy and what needs to be fixed in the world. But mostly, we talk about God.

Don and I share a quirky, different viewpoint on God, the Bible, worship, prayer, and very few like to take off on tangents that are seldom talked about in the realms of Christianity, but so important, and Don is one of those people.

I love to talk with him.

While I was in treatment, he would pray with Scott every time Scott went in for his cuts. I mean like spontaneously, openly in the middle of the salon, grab hold of his hands and pray with him.

When I finally showed up again after a long, long hair hiatus, Don gave me a big hug. He talked to me about chemo curls. He talked to me about the new texture of my hair, and how it didn't seem to have enough *integrity* to do a color job on it.

He gave me an honest assessment. I told him about the growing out process and how my son in law had given me some hair wax and shown me how to use it on short hair, and how I had marveled at how easy it was for men to get ready in the morning with a much easier hair routine.

I told him how just that past week I had started to use a curling wand again, and started using hair spray again.

He laughed and said he had kind of noticed that when washing my hair.

I tend to overuse that spray a bit maybe.

He took a good long time running his fingers through my hair, determining what it had lost, what could be done with it, and then he finally asked me "can I have free reign and give you the cut I think you need?"

Three years ago, I would have broken out in a cold sweat, laughed nervously and told him a polite yet strong "no!" I want my hair this way, I've had this hair for years and years and struggled with it for years and years and the thought that someone would once again give me a bad cut that makes me scream in front of a mirror for an extra 15 minutes every morning made my blood pressure shoot up quickly.

Three years ago anyways I needed total and complete control over my haircut no matter what anyone else said. I have survived a lot of bad cuts. A lot. It's difficult to find someone that understands curly, wavy, frizzy, unruly, three crowns hair.

I froze for just a moment. Maybe if I had just not brought out the hair spray last week, reminding my brain of what had been.

Then I quickly unfroze.

This time, I looked at him, smiled, and said "cut away oh great holder of the hair snipping shears!"

And he did.

While he was cutting, we of course got into our long theological discourses, and I told him how frustrated and angry I was some days because my brain wasn't working correctly. I told him how some days even though I am so thankful for being alive, I grieve when I realize how much I have lost. I told him, that I just don't seem to "fit" anywhere, anymore.

He cut. We talked. He told me some deeply personal things that made him tear up, and I told him some deeply personal things that made me tear up.

And then he put on some gel, used the hair dryer and handed me a mirror.

I turned around and looked at a short, curly hair cut. Completely different than what I had ever worn in my previous life. Completely different from anything I had done with my hair pre-cancer.

This was not a BC (before cancer) haircut.

But as my hair had taken it's good old time growing back out, I had done lots of different things with it, waxed it, gelled it, just plain old letting it do it's thing.

Then just that previous week, it had been long enough, unruly enough to make me step back into the old ways of styling again. Only it wasn't the same type of hair. It had really changed.

He watched me as I measured up the new cut, and said something very profound to me -- he said, "you know Karen, not every hair has to be in place".

Which is what I have done for years and years - every hair in place, sprayed, gelled, curled, steamed into submission.

Every. hair. in. place.

Always.

His words hit me like a ton of bricks. I eyed him and wondered if he realized what door he had just opened for me. I wondered if he knew that God himself had used his mouth to relay a very important message to me - a message that had been nagging at the edges of my mind, a message needing to break through, needing to be delivered to my now rather shallow, sluggish brain.

The ever so profound, so needed message delivered to me that bright sunny spring day: "every hair does not have to be in place." 

***

My brain may never work the same again. My fatigue may never go away. My body may never wake up without pain again.

But that's ok maybe.

It's going to be different. It's going to be way out of my comfort zone. It's going to be a different way of thinking, a different way of doing things.

My life is going to look really different.

But that's ok maybe.

Can I be a David promised to be king and then forced to hide out in caves for over a decade of time? Can I be a Sarah tied to an Abraham and move far from my previous life? Can I be a Joseph, touched by God, then thrown into a pit by those that should love me, and jailed by those that despised me, only to be rescued by a God that heard my cry?

Can I live on a different shelf? Can I be a different person than I thought I was? Can I be less smart and function and have worth and value?

Can I look in a mirror and realized I have aged twenty years in appearance, and forty years in my brain and still have a life?

Maybe I can.

Just maybe I can.

Because, you know Karen, every hair does not have to be in place. 

























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