This morning I met my ex, Kurt, to transfer the kids for the weekend. We've had a rocky year. Today we were trying to mend fences, get back on an even keel, when he mentioned that his sister just went through a masectomy - I had no idea she had been diagnosed or anything. It was a sad shock.
Turns out she's only been diagnosed for a month, but they had to remove a breast and 7 lymph nodes. It's stage 3 (out of 5). I finished the conversation after the usual expressions of sympathy and left.
Five minutes later I was driving to work in tears for a woman who has often hated me (and it was mutual). The years of resentment and mistrust and wounds were instantly burned away with the stark reality of her devastation.
Wow. That quick.
I cried some more, with the knowing that we are somehow connected, she and I, though the past was no less "real". It felt like an incineration of all the layers of ego and interactions and tangled humanity. She is a soul in deep distress and pain, struggling to make sense of her body and her life.
My sense of connection went beyond the Woman to Woman and more to something I read last weekend on a bumper sticker:
There is only us.
(There is no "them")
How come it takes such a horrific revelation to strip away the years and fears? Had she been in front of me in that moment I would have taken her in my arms and given her all the love I could for as long as I could. As much for me as for her.
Maybe it wouldn't have changed anything.
My sense of boundaries and of my self, along with its history and baggage, snapped back into place slowly over the next hour. I'll probably send her an email or a card.
Still I'm left with a deep appreciation for the tragedies in our lives - because nothing burns away the nonessential so well.
And maybe I did take her in my arms, just for a moment.
v
Posted by Vicki at October 24, 2003 01:02 PM