A Kick-Ass Fairy: A Memoir (27 page)

Chapter 25

August 2003–December 2004

A
t the end of the summer Kim moved to an apartment in San Francisco with a friend she had met while biking the coast of California in a cancer research fundraiser.

We rented a U-Haul and helped her move into a second-floor, two-bedroom walk-up over a donut shop in the outer Richmond district. We gave her much of our furniture (a mutual benefit) and filled a ten-by-twenty storage unit with as much of the rest of the contents of our house as we could before the remodel was to start.

The construction was scheduled to last from six to nine months and encompassed almost every room of our house—new energy-efficient casement windows replacing the old single panes, a new roof, a new kitchen, a remodeled master bath. Hardwood floors and new trim would be installed, walls moved, the ceilings raised. In other words, it would be a total mess.

Still recovering from the finding of yet more tumors, I was sent again to genetic counseling. There I was tested for more genetic syndromes, all of which were found to be negative. Since there were still no western medical answers about why this kept happening, I turned my focus back toward eastern and alternative medicine.

Through my acupuncturist I met Tricia, a marriage and family therapist. She also happened to be a certified hypnotherapist. She was very knowledgeable in indigenous and world spiritual practices. Her office was serene; in addition to earth tones décor she had feather decorations, rattles, and plenty of turquoise.

She asked me to make myself comfortable on the cushy velvet sofa and offered me a pillow, a chenille blanket, and an eye mask filled with lavender. After weeks of sessions where we got to know each other, she helped me through guided imagery to see the lake in my mind of calm and stillness, which I could access any time I wanted. She was always offering her gentle and mothering suggestions or giving little gifts of wisdom or homework for me to do.

For example, she would assign chants for balance, ahh–hee-oh-
hum-om.

“These,” she said, “are to balance all your elemental energies, to balance your male and female sides and connect you to the universe.”

It all sounded interesting, I thought. I had no idea what she was talking about, but I vocalized the sounds regularly while going through my routine at the bathroom sink. She was a former Catholic, she explained, but now she was “spiritual.” Her path in life exposed her to many different belief systems and truths.

She prepared a natal chart for me using the time and place of my birth. She did the same with a Mayan astrological tool. She discussed the Enneagram and personality types. Over and over she kept asking, “Can you imagine a life without cancer, without trauma?” I didn’t understand what she meant. I understood the words but not the idea. I did learn from our guided imagery sessions, however, that I had a rich visual and creative imaginary life. I could conjure up images that were so full of depth, color, and texture that it was hard to imagine that they weren’t real.

She said, “You are a manifestor.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

She explained that I was a creator and, as such, I was also able to create my reality. She told me it was important that I spend time setting my intentions and channeling my creations externally and in ways that I truly wanted. I believed I was already doing that. I had helped to create the plan for the remodel, worked with the architect, the kitchen and bath designer, was selecting materials, wood, tile, working with the cabinet makers, designing trim. I saw everything in my mind’s eye and then hunted and gathered until I found exactly what I was looking for. Slowly, very slowly, the plan was executed. Later, I realized that my view of being a creator was extremely narrow.

We were living in three rooms of the house—which three varied depending on where the contractors were working. Our cooking was limited to a microwave in the garage and an electric frying pan in the laundry room. We ate out most of the time. The roof over our kitchen was removed and new scissor trusses were added to raise the ceiling. Even though our plans had been approved by our homeowners association, the day that the roof shingles were to be delivered we received a written notice that the association had contested our roof material and sent us a letter to cease and desist. We lived with a blue tarp on our roof for the entire winter while working with a lawyer and eventually an arbitrator. The temperature inside the house averaged about 50 degrees, and the pitter patter of rain sounded like continuous rifle fire.

In February, I went to see my father in North Carolina. He’d just been diagnosed with bladder cancer.

Dad had been dealing with kidney stones for years, so back pain and blood in his urine had not seemed unusual. The onset of heavier bleeding sent him back to the doctor, and he returned home with a diagnosis of cancer. He was scheduled to have surgery using cystoscopy and some scraping. This was similar to what my Aunt Marion had had done years before. I hated to do it, but I had to return home right before his surgery, since I had to be there for the final hearing that would deal once and for all with the issue of the roof.

I fell in love with Doug again as he presented our case before the homeowners board and the attorneys. He was eloquent and well prepared on every point. (It was interesting that while we were dealing with this issue and the never-ending skirmishes with the contractors during the past nine months we got along great—we were united.) We won the war with the board, with some arbitrated concessions. Our remodel proceeded.

My dad’s operation was a success, and the cancer seemed to go into remission. Brad was accepted into De La Salle, an all-boys Catholic high school, for the next fall. Success at last. The three of us went to Hawaii while our oak floors were being finished.

While we were there, Alane called to tell me that Dad’s cancer had returned. Even though we had been told they had gotten it all back in February, it appeared to be infiltrating the wall of the bladder and was now in his liver. She said my father was told he should consider getting chemotherapy but that he seemed reluctant. The chemotherapy wouldn’t cure the cancer but might slow down the progress. His oncologist said he should evaluate the quality of his remaining life with and without chemotherapy.

What was I to do? I was almost five thousand miles away.

I called my father as soon as I got home. “So, what are you going to do, Dad?”

“I guess I’m going to do it,” he said with resignation.

“It doesn’t sound like you believe it will help,” I said.

”I made the decision to have the chemotherapy for the family.”

He sounded defeated.

In the next few weeks he had two treatments. He had an allergic reaction to the chemotherapy and was having angina attacks. The oncologist said he would need to be admitted to the hospital for each of the remaining treatments to monitor his cardiac status. He was also scheduled for a scan of the bladder to see if there was any shrinkage in his tumors. I decided to go back to North Carolina in the next month.

When I saw Dad in July, he looked exhausted. He had suffered from the effects of scoliosis and kyphosis as long as I could remember. In fact, throughout my childhood I had spent hours kneading the knots in his twisted back with my hands, elbows, knees, and heels. He always sat in “his chair” with a ball pressed against some part of his back. In recent years many of his gifts from the family looked like implements of torture inspired by the Inquisition, all intended to relieve his back pain—balls with pointy acupressure knobs, some hook thing that looked like a shepherd’s crook, massage rollers, shiatsu appliances and whatnot.

When Mom finally stopped hovering and went outside for a cigarette, Dad smiled. He was happy to see me. He spoke with bewilderment about his diagnosis and prognosis while heavily leaning on the sharp corner of the wall in his kitchen, rolling his body from side to side.

“What are you going to do?” he said. “I blew it.”

It pained me to see him this way. For some reason he was blaming himself. I knew cancer was a tricky thing. How many times had I blamed myself?

“It’s not your fault, Dad,” I said.

I had never before seen him as someone so vulnerable, although I remembered he was somewhat passive when he’d had heart problems years before. I think what I realized at that moment was not so much that he was passive but that I wasn’t. I was strong. I was a fighter. I was relentless. When I was a little girl, Dad was my hero. But now, more than anyone else, even Scarlett O’Hara, the heroine of my young adult years, I was the hero of my life.

I went with him to the oncologist for a checkup before his next treatment and listened as he got a download on what to expect. He didn’t have any idea what questions to ask. This was something that was being done to him, and he was not going to be present. He treated the doctor not as an ally but as an omnipotent superior. Maybe this was a generational thing. I had never seen my father this submissive and powerless, but that night while lying in bed I realized this was exactly who he had always been.

In the eleven years of dealing with cancer, treatment, and surgeries, I had grown up. I no longer saw my dad through the eyes of a child. He was still an adult, but as powerless as a child. I worried that without his buying into the plan with his mind, body, and soul, it would be a miracle if he beat this. But even with his prognosis, I still had hope. I believed in the miracles.

Back at home, as the contractors slowly moved through the house, I followed behind with my eight- and sixteen-foot ladders, tarps, rollers, brushes, and pans. For the rest of the summer, I painted every single wall of that house, though I left the windows, doors, and trim for the pros. I selected colors like Warm Apple Crisp, Acorn, Wilmington Tan, Sandy Beige, Basil, Lenape Trail, and Custard. While I rolled away, day after day, room by room, I listened to the entire Led Zeppelin anthology over and over again, committing every lyric and guitar lick to memory. I listened to the music loud enough through my earphones to drown out the sounds of nail guns, slamming, cussing, and barroom renditions of ZZ Top sung by the contractors.

I felt good in spite of what was going on with my father. I was up early in the morning every day and then went up and down the ladders until dusk. Some days I would go out in search of materials, knobs, hardware, paint, window treatments, and furniture. My goal was to create a home of peace and Zen, eliminate the clutter, clean up, and cover every corner with freshness and light. I was rebuilding—this time with brick.

I realized that when Dave died, I’d rebuilt my house with straw. The house blew down when I got cancer. Then I rebuilt my house with wood. It repeatedly burned to the ground when I got cancer again and again. Now I was using brick, creating a more stable and durable structure to live in.

I was taking guitar lessons and actually learning Led Zeppelin songs. Playing and practicing the guitar was a total immersion into the present moment. I was becoming a better player but knew I would never have the time, at least for the time being, to be great. I had to take a break from singing in the church choir during the remodel but kept going to Bible study throughout.

In July, I went back to see my father. He had lost weight but didn’t look any thinner. He had questions about reverse mortgages. I learned he didn’t have a will. He didn’t have an advanced medical directive. He had securities—paper certificates—in his name only. My mother didn’t have power of attorney; nobody did. He was preparing to die. He knew he had to think about what would happen then.

It was difficult to discuss these things with my mother around, though. He wanted to talk about it, but my mother kept saying, “This is none of your business” and “Why do we need to talk about any of this now?” He wanted each of his children to tell him what stuff of his we wanted. Mom blew a gasket.

I could tell from his face and his breathing that Dad was in a lot of pain, but he never complained. My mother was never much for ever allowing her children to have any alone time with Dad. So when she would start drinking early in the evening, and finally passed out in the family room, I would sneak into their bedroom and lay down next to my father. He told me things I never knew about him. I listened to stories about his childhood, his brother, his mother, and his father. I heard how my mother and her family made his life complete. I listened to his worry about leaving my mother with a financial mess. He told me how proud he was of me and all his children. I heard about his career. Night after night he would talk and I would listen until the wee hours of the morning, friend to friend, human to human, heart to heart, father to daughter.

By the time I left for home they had a banker, a broker, and a lawyer. My father met with the priest that I arranged to have come to the house. He made his confession and received the Sacrament of the Sick. We held a family prayer circle.

I left without knowing whether I’d ever see my father again, but you get to a point in life when you feel like that each time you separate. I felt during the trip that I had been a Martha, the type of woman who is always doing, doing, task-oriented, taking care of business. Years later I realized that I had many moments of being Mary too, just being present, listening and loving.

Brad started high school in the fall. The contractors were still in the house but their numbers were dwindling, and some days no one came at all. It had now been a year. The whole house had been virtually destroyed and was now almost back together.

The house was like my life. While I painted, I thought how many times I had almost died to live, been destroyed to be born again. Did I have to almost hate my husband to learn how to love him? Did I almost destroy myself, bringing my life to the brink to learn to love myself? Could I accept myself as I was, imperfect, unable to paint over the cracks in my foundation, the dark spots bleeding through the paint, the imperfect human part?

The third week of September, Alane called me, crying hysterically. My father had been admitted to the hospital. That morning they’d had to call my brother to help my father who was propped up against the wall of the shower, unable to move. He dressed him and somehow walked him to the car after gathering up all the essential belongings that my father had prepacked. Once he got in the car, Dad was immediately paralyzed from the waist down. Later that morning they learned that his cancer had not only metastasized and replaced his liver but was now wrapped around his spine in several places and had eaten away the vertebrae.