For Better or Worse

This week, I have a new perspective on what people say when they make their marriage vows.

I am a runner. I am still a runner. When the going gets tough, I have to sneak away, hide and piece together the pieces, before I can come back and stand beside whoever it is who needs me before I can make good my part of any sort.

Since Dad's diagnosis, I have been itching to run for the hills. And finally, last week, I could in the guise of a work travel. 7 days and night on my own, in gloomy, wet cold England where I had wanted to let the autumn air and leave fall envelope me in its deep, dark embrace.

And so I did. Walking in the rain, staring into space on my endless train rides across the country. And I have returned - refreshed and recharge. Ready to take on come what may.

But as I look around me in my local environment, I cannot help but feel sad for my Mom. For while I can run when I need to and want to, take a hiatus from all this: Mom is stuck where she is. Because she is his wife. She is his partner.

And you know what? As tired as she is, her vows keeps her going and so, she sees no need to run.

And we wonder why I am still on my own - after all this time?

Fifty Shades

I am enraptured in Fifty shades - The Trilogy. And I just realized why... The similarities... The past.... Perhaps not the abuse... But DEFINITELY the hurt.

Oh me! Oh my!

From So Far

I turn 37 this year.

As I sit here and post my thoughts on the year past and the year ahead, I do not feel weighed down by the wonderment: If my parents are proud of me. I know they are.

I placed my last student for the new academic year this morning at 5.46 am - that's79 doctors to be and 10 dentist to come. At this poignant point of life, when grave illness has hit the family in a hard way: I am filled with hope as I recall each of these 79 faces.

A week ago, I sat in despair and cider, wondering where did I go wrong in Year 36 - it was suppose to be bigger and better, ending with a bang so loud, it'll make the New Year's Eve fireworks pale in comparison. And this morning I am exclaiming - Let the Fat Lady Sing!

It's all a question of perception. And not giving in to fear while giving out absolutely to hope!

Hope used to be my bogeyman, my monster in the closet, my bad 4-letter word. But I have come to see, that without it, life is not worth living, not worth my space in the world. Much like love - it'll take your breath away if you allow it too!

And so, as I step into another year of life, feeling extremely grateful for my health, my family, my friends, my work - My Life: I am hopeful.

And because I have that, and God - I know that come what this year brings: I will be fine!

Happy Birthday Me - you've come so far from licking the bottom of the Devil's cauldron!

The World Keeps on Turning

Traffic is moving as it always does on a Monday morning, along the highway, just by my apartment. The backfire of a truck, the sirens of an ambulance and the horn toots of inpatient drivers late for work.

The world keeps on turning....

I have bundles of bags standing by the door - my clothes for the next 3 days as I stay over at my folks, the puke-bucket, wet wipes, boxes of tissue, plastic bags, all in readiness in case Dad feels sick on the way back later today after his 1st chemo run.

The world keeps on turning....

As we prayed together as a family on Friday night, mum had a vision of me, sitting by the cliffs with a storm raging around me. I was apparently sitting still, knees clutched closed to the chest - looking lost, forlorn and alone.

The world keeps on turning....

A colleague from Ireland wrote last week, asking if I would be available to meet her in 2 week as she stops over in her first visit to KL. We have plans for breakfast since I did not think it was appropriate to tell her that I can no longer make plans longer than 5 days ahead.

The world keeps on turning....

I know deep down that while many thinks and believes that today is the start of the road to recovery, I know differently. Today is just the start of one long road. Whether it ends in recovery or it ends in us picking up a suit, shirt and tie for Dad - it remains to be known.

It is not that I do not have faith. It is not that I do not have believe. It is simply because  the world keeps on turning and to ensure that it turns as smoothly as it possibly can, I have to think 10-steps ahead and be on the ready for whatever the turn brings.

The world keeps on turning - Can you blame me then for feeling like I am all alone through it all?

In These Lil Hands

My world has gone upside down, inside out, left and right - all at one go.

Exhaustion. I thought I knew what that meant. But in truth, I did not - right up till now. And I suspect that as time goes by in the near future, I would begin to know that word with deeper insight.

Physically, the body and mind is tired. Tired of travelling close to 1000 km in under 8 days. Tired of researching, reading, digesting and summarising.

But the champion of exhaustion would have to be the emotional state of mind. Of having to be constantly up-beat, slightly non-nonchalant (but not too much now) and well, basically be the complete opposite of what it is really is. For when no one is around, I sit and stare off into space. If I thought I could afford it, it would be done with a bottle of wine in one hand and a carton of smokes in the other.

And apart from this lil box in space, I can only be all that I really truly am when I am with my persons. The one who saw me through all 7 levels of hell - hey, we didn't think there would be an 8th did we? And the one who still remains here, despite having me shatter into a million pieces.

If there is anyone that can save me from self-destructing, it would be them. So in these lil hands of mine, I'm collecting the pieces that have chipped and broken off in the space of the last 1 month. And I am asking you to keep them in a lil box somewhere. And when the time comes, to help me piece me back again.

Please always remind me that through all this, you've got my back.

Past, present & future

Today is the beginning of the future.

How the world changes, at a drop of the hat, a flip of the coin. Instead of waiting for Dad to come out of surgery today, we explored palliative therapies that the oncologist may prescribe come Monday. Instead of focussing on the curative, we are now looking for palliatives.

The whole of today as I drove from one errand to the next, I could not help but recall when I was Daddy's little girl - following him around JB town, getting lunch, picking up his cigarettes from the wholesalers, stopping by church...

What I would give to go back there again... When our world was safe, sound and made sense. When the present was forever and the future so distant it didn't even cross our minds.

I dread asking on Monday, how much time. And in many ways, I really do not want to know. For what is the point of knowing, if only to have dread set in.

If we are set and determined to make the best of life, then truly would knowing how long the future is going to last, going it make any difference?

All I have is the present and that is all that matters.

Winded

My dad was diagnosed with 1st stage renal cancer yesterday. In about 2 weeks' time, he would go from having a pair of kidneys to just having one.

"It suddenly dawned on me, that the time when there is no more fixing to be done, is drawing up really fast," I told Mandy. There is something to be said about saying something out loud - it brings it into shape, it brings it into the present. It makes it real.

At the countless funerals I have been to in the past 3 years, mortality has never struck me as an issue. I have my loose ends tied up and my 'i's dotted, 't's crossed. If my time comes prematurely, I know my children and family would be well taken care of. But I realise that I have been looking at it from a purely financial and material perspective. Sure - both kids would be millionaires then but they would be losing their one and only parent.

When Grandma passed on, my colleague told me that "losing a grandparent is unsettling." She neglected to say that losing a parent would be life-changing. Even the mere thought of it is already sending ripples and waves the size of tsunamis across this small ocean called my brain.

I have come to realise that no matter what age we are, we will never be ready to lose a parent.  It changes you in ways that you never thought possible. As it is now, having spoken to various persons most knowledgeable in this field, I am already filled with remorse. Yes, everyone tells me that I cannot put the blame of this illness at my own door.Yet, if you knew me as in really knew me - you would know that my own door is my first port of calling in the analysis of "How did this happen?!"

And so I will fight - with every ounce of my physical being, with every dime that I have tied to my name. Because I did not fight harder when I should have. As another colleague says: We're in curative stage - so no expenses will be spared, even if I have to up-root everyone to the one place where my faith in medicine and medical miracles is strongest.

My only hope is that, when the time comes - hopefully decades from now - I will not let it go with any regrets of not having done more.