Good news, and bad news. Very bad news

The good news is, Blue Eyes is at a new daycare/preschool. She is very happy there and loves her teachers and the other kids. That is a brief ray of sunshine when I look at my last post.

I just recieved news that yet another friend has had a "something" removed from her breast. First it was a friend from college that I hadn't seen in 8 years. She's the one who helped me get where I am today, quite literally. Full double mastectomy, chemo, the whole bit. (This started in Feb.) Next, I find out a neighbor -- a woman who I come home and chat with two or three times a week -- a woman who has shown me what it's like to be a calm and patient grandmother, an excellent... okay, down right f'ing awesome housekeeper and matriarch -- found she had cancer. One breast gone, lymph nodes, gone. Chemo still to come.

And then I find yet another friend -- a "sister" who is younger than me -- she's f---ing younger than me just went in to have a lump removed. Didn't show up on a scan, couldn't biopsy it, so they removed a lump. And this is just what had happened to my neighbor 6 years ago.

And I know I shouldn't make this all about me. It's not all about me. But how did I go from being someone who had known NO ONE with this disease to knowing three friends, three incredible women having something like this just jump on them? I don't know what to do. I feel so incredibly helpless. And I can pray about it, because if anyone has any control over anything, it would be God. But sometimes I wish he had e-mail and would respond plainly, because sometimes I just want to ask him, WHAT THE FUCK?

Sending out a prayer and a laugh and some hope to all women dealing with fear out there.
'Cause after all of it, the fear is the worst. (At least, that's from my limited perspective.)
Hugs, ladies.

Mem'ries

This is to my daughter:
Okay, so there are all the things that pass us by, and some things I don't want to.

Like yesterday, after you colored on your chair with marker after I told you not to, after I chased you around the house, after you cried when Daddy left for the store and cried when I wouldn't give your markers back, finally, you sat in my lap and we watched Elmo as I rubbed lotion on your little legs and feet. And then you went to your room without complaint, your hand holding onto my finger. And you stubbornly would not let me read you the book, but you read it to me. "Elmo, tree!" -- skip 5 pages -- "Elmo dance!" -- skip 7 pages -- "all done!" Pretty smart for an almost 2 year old.

And I don't want to forget the strange things you do... like biting yourself on the thigh at naptime yesterday... in a way we can't figure out how you got your mouth to.

And I don't want to forget you singing every word you know to the ABC song, and how you love the line "Up above the world so high" in Twinkle, Twinkle.

And I don't want to forget the feeling of carrying your sleepy little body, curled up on my shoulder, after you have just fallen asleep in the car... to the songs "Jump Around" and "Low Rider."

You are strange. You are funny. You so belong in our family. I love you.