I've written quite a bit about my friend Kathleen, her departing for more peaceful realms beyond. That is, she's dying. She has cancer. Cholangiocarcinoma... an aggressive form of cancer in the liver and bile ducts. When she was first diagnosed in May 2008, I asked the doctor (or was it her mother?) to spell it, then went home and looked it up online. I knew before she did how bad the prognosis. In fact, it surprised me how little she wanted to know. (I revealed nothing, but she knew I knew.)
For several months after the initial surgery, it appeared all the cancer had been removed. But it came back and had metastasized to her lung. Cancer sucks. It really does. This morning my cousin Jackie rightly proclaimed that cancer is "of hell." Jackie lost her mother to it years ago. We all know it to be an ugly, cruel assailant, but sometimes it's ugly, cruel AND relentless. Such is the way of Cholangiocarcinoma. It's a fucker. (sorry)
I spent last Tuesday with her; our time together was meaningful, productive and loving. She talked of things she needed to let go or decide on; we remembered good times; we ate Grape Pie; she napped some (while I pretended to). It was so good to be there, and she seemed serene, if not a little confused at times. I left reluctantly in the evening, wishing I'd planned for an overnight. (I didn't know that was an option until I'd arrived.)
Even though I cried all the way home from Buffalo to Rochester, I left her hospice room feeling certain that my return this week would be more of the same Kathleen, that her condition would not have had time to deteriorate dramatically. I was encouraged when I spoke with her mother, Marilyn, about Thanksgiving plans at home for the family gathering.
When Kathleen didn't return my call over the weekend, though, I started to feel a sense of foreboding. Rightly so: She's still with us in body, but she's leaving very rapidly in spirit, in consciousness. My conversations with her Monday and today were heartbreaking and haunted me all day both days as I tried to focus on writing deadlines. The weak-but-upbeat Kathleen of last week has been replaced with an old, hopeless, pained and delirious Kathleen. It was still her voice, but there was virtually no life in it, and no comprehension except for the knowledge that she hurt and that the pain was not going to stop. It felt like a huge accomplishment to make her laugh and hear her call me a "goof." (Extremely rewarding, actually. I've never been so happy to be an acknowledged idiot!)
It seems unfair that such a kind and generous person, that our Kathleen should wane from life so grievously, so painfully.
Yesterday Marilyn and I discussed the devolving of her own optimism since last Christmas. She remembered taking down the Christmas tree in Kathleen's apartment, trying to hold on to some sense of hope because, after all, she was still going through chemo treatments, still battling with an off chance of recovery. But she said that even a year ago, even last Christmas, a part of her knew. She cried as she put away the ornaments back then, and yesterday when she said of Kathleen's current condition, "I don't want this for her."
Last Tuesday Kathleen had predicted that she wouldn't survive much beyond Christmas, which seemed unthinkable to me even as I watched her labored breathing while she slept. Now the consensus is that it would merciful for her to slip away as soon as possible, even before Christmas. As such, Marilyn told me today that she, as Kathleen's mother, is "hovering." We're all hovering.
I write about Kathleen as if we're the closest of close friends. I'm only one of many good friends of hers. We shared a house - she upstairs, me downstairs in an old Victorian-style home divided into apartments. And so we saw each other nearly every day for eight years.
After we became friends, we used to fantasize about one of us hitting the lottery, and vowed we'd split the pot and buy a parcel of land with two houses -- one for her, one for me. We actually discussed where we'd most like to settle, and it turned out that one of my favorite places in town happened to be a place she once lived! We considered each other perfect neighbors. I'm not sure which of us were more heartsick when I moved to Rochester two years ago. (Actually, I was. I persistently tried to talk her into moving somewhere nearby, but she was too rooted to the Victorian.)
It's not that we routinely had riotous good fun together (although we did occasionally), but we were at ease in each other's company, we looked out for and often played nursemaid to each other; we house- and pet-watched; escorted in almost every holiday together (to some degree); performed emergency child pick-ups and drop-offs... you name it. We're friends, but mostly we're like family...ignoring each other for extended periods, at times, but always there when it matters.
My next visit with Kathleen will be painfully different from my last. It's not that I feel cheated by her rapid decline (although I do...selfishly). It's just that I'm not quite prepared to let her go.
But go she does. Ready or not, it's nearly time. I don't envy the journey she's on, but I feel bewildered that she's going someplace far away without me.
"Kathleen," I whisper, "your footprints are fading in the distance, but that's good, eh? You always said 'ta ta for now' and I can hear you thinking it! Ta ta for now."
I imagine her walking toward some snowy horizon. I feel I'm in a small crowd of people when I smile and wave politely to the snowy footprints I imagine her leaving behind. Then I root around for the tissue in my coat pocket.
Incidentally, of my Kathleen writings and Patty's Kathleen tattoo, she says:
"Hello, World. It's good to know I'll be around after I'm gone."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thank you, Owen, for sharing this poem...
The End Of The World
We went today to clean out
Her mother’s apartment
The movers had already been
The place was nearly bare
And though it was not
The end of the world
I could see it from there
A place once full or warmth and life
Meals rolling out of the kitchen
Onto the long table
The family gathered around
Plants, and paintings on the walls
Armoires full of silverware and plates
Bottles of wine and dusty books
The tiny bedrooms harboring secrets
A crucifix on the wall
Proclaiming faith in something
Damp towels hanging by the shower
Combs and various brushes
All the odds and ends
Which fill our days
And hasten the passing hours
But now the place was bare
And yesterday’s rain
Still puddled on the empty balcony
The tiles in the kitchen
Which I’d never noticed before
Were looking weary and grey
Bearing the cadaverous complexion
Of the unwanted
The parquet strips
Were suddenly showing their age
In the most dismaying manner
Like a threadbare coat
On a public street
The walls which I’d never
Paid any attention to whatsoever
Were covered with sad reminders
Of every scratch and scrape
Over the years
Now naked they stood screaming
In the winter afternoon
How many coats of paint
Would it take
To hide
This sad history ?
Her parents’ rooms
Were at opposite
Ends of the hall
Perhaps toward the end
They called to one another
More likely the doors were shut
Now the rooms are empty
And the hollow echoes hang
In the cold winter air
And though it was not
The end of the world
I could see it from there
Sphere: Related Content
"Snow day tomorrow?" Cory wonders? I doubt it. 
