Books: The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly (The Gift of Ignorance)

While David is in this land that is not quite like our own, he is stalked by the villain of the story, the Crooked Man. At this point, he has discovered the Crooked Man's lair, with a thousand rooms and for each room, a story. Many of these rooms have stories that are almost, but not quite, familiar. A girl with a red hood. A gingerbread house. A witch.

In one of those rooms,

"a woman sat facing a blank wall, endlessly combing her long, silver hair. Sometimes, the Crooked Man would take those who had angered him to visit the woman, and when she turned to look at them, the would see themselves reflected in her eyes, for her eyes were made of mirrored glass. And in those eyes they would be allowed to witness the moment of their deaths, so that they would know exactly when and how they would die. You might think that such knowledge would not be so terrible, and you would be wrong.

We are not meant to know the time or the nature of our deaths (for all of us secretly hope that we may be immortal). Those who were given that knowledge found that they could not sleep or eat or enjoy any of the pleasures life had to offer them, so tormented were they by what they had seen. Their lives became a kind of living death, devoid of joy, and all that was left to them was fear and sadness, so that when at last the end came they were almost grateful for it" (Connolly 295).

I have mentioned many times before that I have my oncology team with all of their fancy degrees. These are very smart people. These are the only people allowed to provide me with medical advice. No Dr. Google, right? This passage also explains exactly why I choose (at least for now) intentional ignorance. For all I know, I have 10 days, 10 weeks, 10 years in front of me. As a direct result of my intentional ignorance, I have been able to not only enjoy beautiful things, but also forget, even for a few moments here and there, that I have cancer. There was Sunflower Day. The day that I didn't ring that bell. I got to Van Gogh to the Museum. I went to a hockey game.

The Husband has given me the gift of maintaining intentional ignorance, and it truly is a difficult gift to give. He carries the weight of knowledge on his shoulders and in his soul, and I know that weight is a difficult one to bear.

Because he has given me this incredible gift, I have had so many moments of pure joy. We have so many moments that I don't usually share, because to me, they are sacred.

I still don't have an official prognosis. Perhaps at the next scan there will be more news. But right now, because The Husband has given me the gift of intentional ignorance, I am able to experience true joy. The life I get to experience now is so fundamentally different from the Before. I try not to grieve too much for the Before life. Life now is different, but certain things have not changed. The Husband is still as big a dork as before (I can say that because I, in fact, am also a big dork). We still laugh together. I am grateful that I can still laugh, even in the face of all of this ugliness, but that is only possible because I have The Husband, the greatest gift of all.

Have I mentioned that I love this guy?