My small town heart

I probably only get home a handful of times most years. And this year, even less. Because cancer has put a damper on getting out of O town.

But my goal, before surgery, was to make it home for Easter, if possible. It would be four weeks out from surgery. I would be able to travel, fairly comfortably, in the car. And my sleeping pattern would be a little more human.

And it’s here. And we are there. Or here, as it were.

We are home.

And something happened. When we hit the city limit sign, I wanted to cry. It happens a lot right now. Where tears just fall. I wanted to let them wash my cheeks. I wanted to get out of the car and run through the streets and kiss the ground and lay on my old front lawn and look at the clouds change shape. I wanted, so badly, to go knock on my friend Rachel’s door, even though she doesn’t live there anymore and climb the stairs to her room and snuggle up on her bed and look out her window at all the trees lining the cracked sidewalks. I wanted to go down to the Legion park and let my feet pound the gravel and sprint around the circle. Around and around. And around. Run until I couldn’t breathe and my chest was pounding and I wanted to cry because I couldn’t run anymore. And in my mind, I never wanted to stop running because eventually, if I just kept at it, I could run away from it all. I wanted to walk into the school and see the secretaries that I loved smiling back at me and take my spot in my desk in German class and talk with my friends about how annoying the Principal’s newest idea was or what happened on Friday night.

I wanted to be taken back in time when my biggest concern was which pair of Doc Martens I should wear with my Silver jeans.

As we drove down the streets that, in my memory, are the safest place in my personal universe, though, I didn’t cry. I didn’t do anything except dance and tap my feet to the beats playing on the kids radio station. But I wanted, so badly, in coming back to go back.

Because I never had cancer here. The girl who grew up here never knew she’d have cancer. And some days I want for the days before that even became me. The days before I knew this would be a struggle that would be written here. On my blog. In my story.

But then I thought about it last night as I lay in the dark of the basement bedroom where I lived for the year before I got married. I couldn’t fall asleep. I just lay there, thinking about the safety of being a child. Of feeling like the world will never touch you. And I realized that my time, my growth into life in this town was preparing me for this time. It gave me the gift of knowing what it was to be supported. To be cheered on. To figure out how to be myself. It gave me the beginning of confidence to fight my battles. The ability to lean on my family. To trust in the goodness of people. And it started me on a faith journey. Being in this town formed me into this woman I am today.

This mother.

This wife.

This sister.

This friend.

This cancer fighter. And survivor.

It is the safest place I will ever know. It is my hindsight. It will always be 20/20.

And so I love to come back. And making it back this time was just what I needed.

But I know I can’t stay. I visit “home”. But I can’t stay in the past. Because now I’ve done the cancer thing. I know, instead, that we all grow up and life, well, it happens. It goes on. And if you’re lucky, you go with it.

…..

We went to the park today. The park with the horses. Clad in patriotic colors. The metal slide. The so-tall-metal-slide that surely wouldn’t be allowed on any state-of-the-art playground of the current day. Because it would burn your buns on a hot summer day.  And the merry-go-round {that my niece referred to as a round-about ala Peppa the Pig} that tilts a little to one side. The teeter totters that are wood. And a little weathered. But are the best see saws I’ve seen in years. And swings, of course.

As I watched the kids, laughing and giggling, and running from one thing to the next, the little world we were in revealed something I’ve forgotten lately. I’ve been calling this crazy ride I’m on a “Merry-go-round”. But really life, if you’re doing it right, is not a merry-go-round. It’s not the same thing over and over. Whirling about without being able to hold your gaze on any one spot.

It is a teeter totter… Ups and downs. Anticipation and and being let down. Seeing different points of view from different angles. And sometimes being unprepared for the big boom when someone unexpectedly changes their mind… Changes the plan. And you are left to deal with what that means.

This town. My safe place. I saw this morning. It’s not a haven from my cancer. It’s impossible to leave cancer behind, ever again. Even when I come back to the place where I never had it. And I believe cancer was written in my stars before I was a twinkle in my parents’ eye. All the life that came pre-diagnosis, including the foundation of growing up here, was meant to prepare me for what was to come. For what I would go through. And for who I would need to be. When cancer came along for the ride. Or rather for the ups and downs.