One night, last week, I was all set to go to bed at a decent hour. Then, I happened upon a movie in progress. The C-Word. It was based on the book by Lisa Lynch, which was based on her blog (alrighttit.blogspot.com/p/c-word.html) about her cancer experience. So, yeah, I had to watch. I started recording it, with every intention of going to bed, but I couldn’t stop watching. I couldn’t stop saying, “Yes! Exactly!” and “Aww, poor thing. I’m glad my sitch wasn’t that bad.” And, of course, there were tears. Mine and hers. I’d never heard of Lisa before, but I can’t stop thinking about her now. Unfortunately, after she published her book, she developed secondary cancers (her original diagnosis was breast cancer) in her bone marrow and her brain. Funnily enough, at a therapist session, just after learning she was terminal, the therapist gave her a book. HER book. Dingdong didn’t realize that Lisa was the author. But, she gave it to nearly all of her patients. Sadly, Lisa left this earth 2013 (I think it was). I keep meaning to message her brother, who seems to be maintaining her blog. I just haven’t been in the right headspace yet. And I don’t know what I’d say, but I feel like I want to reach out somehow. I need to. We are complete strangers, and yet we’re sisters, in a way.
And… I think I’ll hold off on trying to publish my story in book form. At least until I hit the 5-year-mark, still C-Free.
Meanwhile, I think my ‘do looks more intentional than a work in progress, and I’m kind of excited about it. My next goal? Have enough hair to use product! 🙂
*Oops – I’d copy/pasted my brother’s URL instead of Lisa’s. Fixed now. Ha ha.
—jo Wilken, October 27, 2015