Obligatory New Year's Post

Happy not-quite-so New Year!

So let's talk. I'm not making any resolutions. For 2019, my only resolution was to read 4 books a month. I was doing really well and keeping on track for the first half of the year.

Then this happened. I hate to admit it, but recovering from brain surgery, a second brain surgery, chemo, and radiation, all things that were completely out of my control, completely derailed my progress last year, and. If you must know, I would much rather have spent 2019 reading books, teaching, writing, anything besides have cancer.

Because cancer sucks.

So, no resolutions. Instead, I am going to look to someone who really inspires me:

Be water, my friend." Bruce Lee

Before I talk about Bruce Lee, I want to talk about 2019. 2019 was objectively and undeniably the worst year of my life.

Of course, there were bright shining sparks through the year.

• My 10 year anniversary with The Husband. 
• Having a student contact me long after the semester was over to tell me he was inspired to teach because of my class. 
• Reconnecting with the instructor whom I consider as the source of my own inspiration to teach.
• Making real and deep connections with students, including the dual enrollment high school kids, the non-traditional students like the single mom with two jobs or the Navy veteran who was so excited to finally use his GI Bill, I got to connect with students who were poets, musicians, painters, theologians, and photographers. I also made connections with students who had the STEM-mind and could engineer marvelous (and mysterious to me) projects. 
• These two clumsy goofballs who have learned the fine art of snuggling when the baby sister weighs ten times more than the older of the two.

 

 

• This ornery old man who brightens my day (and some nights) by patting my nose and singing the songs of his people (usually not simultaneously).

Of course, I could keep going, listing all the ways that 2019 was actually not that bad, but then I remember this.

I can sit here and say that being diagnosed with a particularly frightening type of cancer was a blessing in disguise. I can sit here waxing poetic about the amazing life lessons I've learned, the peace I've found, the acceptance that washes over me.

I would be lying.

This is not a blessing. Cancer is an a-hole. Not only is cancer an a-hole, but it strikes without discrimination. Cancer does not care if you are a good or bad person (I'll let you decide which one). Cancer does not care if you haven't fulfilled your life goals yet. Cancer does not care whether you deserve it or not. Cancer does not care if you had other plans.

I am not making resolutions for 2020 because the most important thing I've learned is that even if I make a plan for the near or far future, there is simply no way to know if I will be feeling well enough to actually follow through on the plan. I've already had to last-minute cancel plans with friends on multiple occasions because of the fatigue, the nausea, or the bad mood.

So, instead of making plans, I will try to be water. Yes, that means that I will do what I can to go with the flow. However, I do not want to be misunderstood. I have had to remind some people of my boundaries. It should not be forgotten that it was water that carved that giant hole in the ground. The Husband was very brave to get so close to the edge and I was terrified that he would fall into the Grand Freakin' Canyon and no there was no possibility that I would be joining him that close to the edge are you crazy?*

Look at that sexy beast!

What was I saying?

Oh yeah! It was water that carved that giant beautiful hole in the ground with The (Not Yet) Husband in front of it, and I want to be clear in communicating my boundaries yet again. Water can flow or it can crash. Be water.

*I realize that was a run-on sentence, and that I should have better grammar as an English Instructor, but I argue sometimes it is more important to communicate your point efficiently, even if doing so is technically incorrect.**

**Also, don't get me started on the use of standard grammar vs. non-standard grammar, and how people are judged by how articulate or inarticulate they may be. The use of so-called proper grammar has a time and a place, and sometimes the point is more clearly articulated by slangin' it up.