last week, i had to tell my friends, families and colleagues that i had had a recurrence of melanoma in my lymph nodes. this is considered stage 3 melanoma, and has obviously been devastating news for me. i’m 35 years old. i feel like i’ve only lived a third of a life.
after i got home from the hospital last friday, with the news of my diagnosis weighing me down, i sat down at the kitchen table and started writing emails. (i also made fresh guacamole, which i find simultaneously hilarious and depressing… how i mustered the energy, i have no idea) immediately, as the news started rolling in, my friends started reaching out.
“i’m getting on a plane right now,” said ashley, into the phone, as she ran breathlessly along the hiking trail in hong kong.
“we love the mess, and we love you,” texted mary, after i had told them not to come.
for the first time in our friendship, they didn’t listen. they all descended on my doorstep 24 hours later.
they were wearing matching TEAM FLEMO t-shirts, and they had one for me. i was still high on the sedation they had given me for the MRI i had had earlier that day. they brought games, ordered indian food from my favorite TWO indian restaurants (including tandoori broccoli, which in my drugged state i called a ‘god damn miracle from god’), and helped me change my surgery dressing. somehow they knew that all i needed was hugs, company, and not to have to make any decisions on my own. i didn’t even know what i needed, but they did.
thanks to the sedation, i was in the best mood i had been in all week. i felt light, happy, calm. i knew that i had cancer, but i didn’t feel scared or sad. i now understand how people get addicted to drugs.
we have always joked that i would write a memoir. we’ve been writing chapters of the “flemo’s guide to world domination” for years. every time i did something embarrassing, or ridiculous, it was a chapter in the book. we have chapter 42, entitled ohhhhbviously; from when i embarrassed myself at a faculty meeting. we have chapter 27, entitled i like the idea of TV; when i admitted that i rarely watched any and that in my quest for productivity couldn’t fit it in. we have chapter 92, entitled living at 1.25 speed; from when i admitted that i listen to podcasts and audiobooks faster than average… who needs all that wait time?!
over the life changing broccoli, i told them i was finally going to write my memoir… but that it was going to be different than i had previously planned. since it was now a memoir about cancer, i told them with a laugh, that it would be called “half a life”. (i was not feeling optimistic about my prognosis at this point; and since i was still high from the sedation i wasn’t aware that others did not find this dark humor funny) a quick google, and i realized “half a life” had already been taken. thwarted. i threw out other potential titles: “a third of a life” or even “two sevenths of a life”, neither of which had quite the same ring. i wish i could say i was joking, but i wasn’t. this was also the deep depths of the first few days of diagnosis.
the table got quiet. my friends stopped eating. ashley looked me square in the eyes and said, “no fractions”.
and so whole life musings was born.
no fractions. i’ve got too much left to do.
*photo taken in sydney, australia in october 2017.
