This morning, facing up to a three-month cancer check, found myself sitting at the keyboard at 4 a.m., trying to explain to my on-line diary why I was sitting at the keyboard at 4 a.m. Failed miserably. Failed inevitably. Waving my hands in the air as if I might conjure unknown words that everyone could grasp as describing the way it feels when you’re facing up to a three-month cancer check. They, the words, remained stubbornly invisible.
It set me thinking about a writer’s limitations. If, for example, I wanted you to imagine a street corner in a hot and humid Asian capital, you wouldn’t need to have been there. Hot, humid, loud and gagging – you’ve got it. I’ve put you somewhere you’ve never been.
I can’t do that with this. It’s not about pain or fear, though there’s been plenty of that. There’s a concept missing, a word that describes what comes after the moment when they tell you and you think, “OK, I’ll beat this,” and then later realise that it isn’t about beating it, because even after it’s beaten, you live with altered thinking. The shudder of uncertainty that goes through everything you thought was certain never dies away, never ever again, even after the last cancerous cell has been driven from your body. There should be a word for that.
The new you wants someone to tell you that everything is all right, just like it always was. But they can’t fool you; you’re wise to it now. They can only repeat that the ‘chances of a cancer are small’, and even though the chance is reduced back almost to the way it used to be, you’re now a person who knows just how big small can get on the wrong day. There should be a word for that kind of wisdom too.
It’s later in the day now and I’ve seen the consultant surgeon and he’s prodded me around and told me it’s all going well and that I should come back in another three months and I’ve said thank you as if he’s just saved my life again, and I’m sitting wondering if I should delete this or post it, because it seems to me wholly self-absorbed and irrelevant. I’m one of the lucky ones after all; today has confirmed it. For all the effort, I still haven’t captured the point that I started at 4 a.m. Five hundred words looking for one good one. To hell with it.
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So sorry to hear you were in that head space. Please don’t print this, I suspect it will be misunderstood: I think this may be the best writing you’ve shared here, and I’ve read your three short stories. What seems narcissism from inside is outrageous courage to onlookers. Thank you for sharing your thoughts – you can’t imagine how helpful they are.
I’m chatty today, so let me share this anecdote about how useful and helpful your writing that morning really is.
My best friend went through stage 3 and a double mastectomy last year (and is exactly as you explained, “fine” now). We’ve been inseparable since grade three although for many years we’ve lived an 8-hour flight apart (disregarding a few lost years following bridezilla incidents that hardly matter). She’s in the habit of telling me that I Don’t Understand in a very snotty and entitled way, starting with boyfriends and moving as we grew to encompass horses, cars, mortgage, marriage, and kids. Once, when I’d found a fantastic quote guaranteed to set her mind at rest about a deeply troubling topic, she refused to let it resonate until I ascertained the writer had children of his own, and was therefore qualified to make an insightful observation about them.
That specific irritant, her rejection of words without substance (as you say, a little dust, the high note of camel dung and the Far East drifts onto the page), had my eyes rolling until I read what you’ve written.
I’m a little ashamed, a little concerned. I hate to think I’m constrained to write only what I’ve personally experienced but hate more to consider “story” a synonym for “lie.”
Thanks for sharing. I’m deeply touched and find myself challenged.
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Hey Kim, thanks for your kind comments. Maybe I got closer to finding the word than I thought.
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