Joy is a lake.
Grief is a river.
You can lose yourself in one; be lost in the other.
I wrote those words on the first day of this month. Then, I had no idea how soon I would have reason to understand, yet again, the essential truth of them.
Some people are like the water: Buoyant. They hold you up by the sheer force and fierceness of the their own spirits. They are forces of nature, a constant ebb and flow, eddy and tide, and they give life just be being present.
And it's not until you are cast fully into the drought that you realize how much life they give you.
My friend Lin is one of these people.
She is, in her way, a warrior too: one for Mother Earth, for the land and the air and, yes, the waters that she and I both hold sacred. She is sister and friend and force of nature. And like the earth she has fought so fiercely for decades to defend, she is in the fight of her life.
For her life.
Most know her by her username here: Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse, or PDNC. I "knew" her by that name a decade and a half ago, before I knew her personally: another dark time for our world, one in which the spectres of war and torture and suffering loomed large.
She fought against those, too.
It's been seven years, or just shy of it, since we met here and she became, instead of PDNC, Lin to me. In my culture, seven is the number of the spirits: of the virtues, of the gifts, of the sacred directions.
Of life itself.
I used to refer to Lin as The Blogathon Queen. She organized them for everything, depending on the need, from civil rights to food justice to the Kos Katalogue to eco-justice issues. She was perhaps best known for her own environmental diaries, participating in the DK Greenroots, E-Kos, EcoJustice, and other environmental groups here in a leading way. She was so well known and so highly respected for her work that none other than Bill McKibben gave her a very public shout-out and thank-you at an early NetrootsNation. It is, as others have noted repeatedly, to her credit that environmental series and blogathons here were such a success.
The one that sticks in my mind was the one that I screwed up: It was monsoon season, our connectivity here was its usual crap, and I was unable to post on the appointed (and originally final) day. Lin took it all in stride, posted in my stead, and opened up a slot for me the day after, so that my work would not have been in vain. But in the week leading up to that final day, she herded cats to protect (and become) hummingbirds, lining up well-known pols and policy folks to participate, juggling and covering when someone didn't post at the right time, and generally keeping egos both in tune and in check across the board, all while promoting environmental awareness and education and raising funds and awareness for significant efforts.
We worked together, and with several other Kossacks, on a food justice blogathon that she organized (and then moved me beyond description by dedicating it to the memory of my late sister); on groups like RaceGender DiscrimiNATION, bringing intersectionality and solidarity to what previously had too often been two-dimensional discussions; on the eventual founding of a group, SpiritSisters, dedicated specifically to intersectional solidarity among women (I had to withdraw form my role due to connectivity issues and other real-life constraints); and over the last seven years, too many justice and eco-themed projects to count. She was always the person to whom everyone went first when they needed a blogathon for their cause, and she worked tirelessly for the small vendors of the Kos Katalogue.
Despite our vastly different backgrounds, we had much in common, too. Over the years, we bonded over feminism and a gleeful reclaiming of the word "bitch," over a cathartic love of profanity and life experiences too often shared.
And the whole while that she was working full-time in her solo environmental practice, and working nearly full-time on community projects here at the Great Orange Satan, she was simultaneously working her way back from a bout with cancer.
Some of you may remember when, some five years ago, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. We "spoke," in virtual terms, almost daily; hers was a particularly aggressive form, requiring equally aggressive treatment, including a lumpectomy and radiation. It was an arduous and terrifying time for her. She continued to work even as she underwent painful procedures and suffered toxic treatment protocols, and I celebrated with her the day she got her NED ("no evidence of disease).
Nearly a year ago, she told me that she feared it was back.
The doctors were dismissive. "Nothing to worry about," they said. And the pain spread.
Several months ago, she told me she was having pain in her joints, particularly her legs. Her knees, her hips, then her back. I encouraged her to get tested.
"Nothing to worry about," they said. "Arthritis," they said.
Then, or so the doctors claimed, two ribs spontaneously fractured. In retrospect, it's not clear whether the pain was from broken ribs, or from the cancer growing and spreading rapidly throughout her lungs. But the pain was incredible. The fear was worse.
"Nothing to worry about," they said. They handed her more painkillers, and refused to run any sort of tests that would actually diagnose what was happening with her body.
Last week, with more broken ribs, two new doctors finally agreed to testing.
Her breast cancer is not merely back: It has metastasized, spread to both lungs and throughout her bones.
She knew already, deep down; she knows her body. But nothing prepares you for a diagnosis like that.
Nothing prepares you, especially when you are still young, for a prognosis like this.
A week ago, she told me that she has months, at most — perhaps only weeks. It's a case of the treatment being worse than the disease, in exchange only for buying a little more time, a few more weeks or months of misery. And my friend, my friend who is the water: She is being routed another way, far from where I can reach her.
There is one outside chance. She's going in today for a bone scan and into surgery tomorrow for another biopsy, one designed specifically to determine whether she is eligible for what could be both life-saving and life-extending treatment protocols — but it all hinges on whether the lung biopsy shows features that indicate that these clinical trials or experimental protocols might work for her. She was supposed to have the biopsy last Wednesday, but the medical staff gave her and her sister the wrong time, informed them it was their fault for being "late," told her it would have to be rescheduled, and then tried to extort her copay in full up front.
It's yet one more example of the savagery of our society, its refusal to take care of its own, and then to blame those in need for its own terrible behavior. It's also, in this case, an example of both the culture's and the medical profession's continual sexism, something she and both have cause to know all too well.
After her first bout with cancer, her male doctor put her on hormones (HRT), telling her that it was her only option. She hated them, and rightly so. There are all sorts of physical risks attached to HRT, but beyond that, Lin, like so many other women who have undergone this same protocol, suffered terribly with the cognitive side effects they inflict. Those readers who, like me, have autoimmune disease accompanied by brain fog will know what I mean: The HRT causes the same sorts of effects. And her brain has always been her livelihood; her profession requires that it function at peak levels.
The HRT torched all of that.
She's described trying to carry on an in-depth professional discussion while suffering the effects of the hormones as follows: Imagine that at the end of the conversation, both you and your conversational partner are given a puzzle that represents the end result of your discussion — the same puzzle. The other person's is complete. You think yours is complete — it looks complete at first glance — but when you go to work with the various pieces, you find that some are missing, others misshapen, still others not the right fit. But during the conversation, your brain did not see the warning signs that something was missing — indeed, did not even know to be on the lookout for it. It's an issue, in part, of how the HRT alters perception. But added to that is the Hobson's choice women, especially single women, are given in this culture: Keep working or die. To keep your job, get medical treatment. Oh, and the only medical treatment available to you is this hormone protocol, which women worldwide reject if they're able even as medical professionals continue to insist that it's all in their heads.
Of course, there are now studies showing definitively that it is not, that it's an all-too-real medical side effect. But as with Lin's more recent symptoms, it's all to readily dismissed as "overreacting," "all in her head," "not medically possible."
Lin, of course, has always known better. And she had someone in her corner to help her fight.
Some of you also know Lin's sister: Here, her name is gabriella. In the outside world, her name is Laura. She and Lin have been each other's essential and elemental support their whole adult lives; they've shared a home for just shy of thirty years. Laura calls Lin her North Star. And now she's faced with the possibility of losing her navigational guide.
In the process, she may lose her home, too. For that matter, it's possible that they both could lose their home even sooner, because while Lin has cut back her workload drastically since April, reducing their collective income substantially, now she can't work at all. Where they live? Cost of living alone is more than $4,000 a month. Her copay for the biopsy tomorrow will be more than $3,000. Then there are the costs of morphine, of the oxygen concentrator and nebulizer required to help her breathe, because the cancer that has invaded her lungs has drastically reduced their capacity to function. For now, Laura has paid for those out of her own pocket, but she can't sustain the pace of the expense.
A few of us here have begun working with Lin and Laura to try to take some of the burden off their shoulders right now. I'm not the organizer; I was just available to post today. Denise Oliver Velez, Onomastic, and rb137 will all be following suit. Together, we'll keep the light burning. We're trying to help them raise enough to give Lin some literal breathing room: to take care of the percentage of the cost of the concentrator and nebulizer and protocols and procedures and pain meds and whatever else of her medical expenses, including, if it comes to that, palliative care that gives her control, that her insurance won't cover. Laura has been lining up the equipment needed, including the oxygen concentrator and nebulizer. Lin needs a portable unit so that she can navigate outside (the stationary one is 62 pounds): She was supposed to go in for a bone scan this morning, but her breathing is so labored that she couldn't even make it to the car because she had no means to carry her oxygen with her. Now, the bone scan will have to be rescheduled, and time is a luxury she doesn't have. The out-of-pocket cost of the portable concentrator is more than $3,500, and we need to raise that as soon as possible. Her share of tomorrow's biopsy will also be another $3,000-plus.
Wings and I made an unexpected sale last night. We’ve used it to donate $100 to Lin and Laura. Can you match it? If 35 people match it, we’ve raised enough for her portable oxygen concentrator, and she can be assured of getting to her medical appointments and procedures this week.
We're also trying to give them some metaphorical breathing room in the form of raising enough to cover some basic living expenses — perhaps a year on their house payments; food and electricity and heat and water and gas for the car and all the other thousand and one sundry expenses that are required, in 2016, to keep body and soul together. They living in a part of the country where cost of living is high, and just keeping a roof over their heads and the lights on and food on the table for the two of them runs more than $4,000 per month.
Laura has set up a YouCaring page for Lin here. If you click on the link just below the blue Facebook widget and just above the list labeled "Supporters," the link labeled "Other Ways to Help," it takes you to a pop-up window with 1) social media widgets, and 2) widget code that can be posted to create an image with a running tally [and I need to be able to embed the widget, so whomever can make that happen, please do it]. Those widgets are by far the most effective means of sharing, much more likely to generate donations. Laura has also set up a PayPal account for Lin using this e-mail address: lauramcclure01@gmail.com. [It is in fact PayPal that they're using as their YouCaring payment processor, too.] Laura's doing the legwork, but Lin will have complete control over both accounts and funds. And from someone who has helped innumerable people crowdfund emergent situations, let me ask you for two favors: If you absolutely must bypass the YouCaring page to use PayPal directly, choose "donate to friends or family" so that Lin is not charged a fee. But with crowdfunding efforts, there is a huge psychological advantage to using a site like YouCaring that is simply not available via PayPal, and that is, very simply, to permit other potential donors to see progress, and to feel confident in the authenticity of a given effort. If you're able to give via the YouCaring page and can do so, please include a few extra dollars to offset the processing fee so that Lin receives the full amount you intend.
Finally, we're trying to raise something more than money: We're trying to raise their spirits by raising a prayer to whatever forces and fates control this cosmos, one so loud and earnest and so infused with love that the universe has no choice but to answer it.
In light of recent events, "water is life" has become a catchphrase now. In reality, it's an essential truth, one that Wings's people and my own have known since the time before time. If Lin is the water, she is also life, and it is time to do all we can to keep hers flowing strong and in the proper direction. If there is to be a bend in the river, one that takes her beyond reach, it's our job to ensure that the journey is easy, one that allows her joy and peace even as she rounds that turn that takes her out of our physical sight.
Before I close, I want to contemplate, just for a moment, a different image, one that also reminds me of Lin:
This is my red-tailed hawk. She makes her home here now, and she knows us, our voices, the patterns of our lives. She appears when she's needed, even when a storm is in the offing.
As I wrote a few days ago, in part:
Purpose, reason, the whole point of everything — why?
Maybe it’s just enough to be.
The ancestors know. To them, we are the dream, the gift, the reason for existence. So, too, will our children be to us, even those of us with none of our own: The world’s children are ours.
The hawk knows, too. She lives each moment for itself, knowing that the light may hold nothing for her tomorrow, or even the next second. Even if it does not, it is enough, for now, to be.
To be. To have been.
A mark has been made. We may not see it, but somewhere, someday, someone who needs to see it will.
And it will be enough.
That is its own gift.
That is a miracle.
Lin has made a mark, in ways that will ripple outward for generations. People neither she nor I will ever know or see will nonetheless see the mark her life has made, and their own lives will be better for it.
That is more than enough for a legacy, more than enough for a gift, more than enough for a miracle.
Lin is a miracle. And it is time for us to lift her up in the light and give her a miracle of her own.
I want life and joy and the ability to lose herself in the best possible ways, for a very long time yet. I want a lake for Lin.
Except as otherwise indicated, all content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2016; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
