REFLECTIONS

Yesterday I received something very special in the mail.

My mom who is quietly battling lung and bone cancer, has a best friend namede Barbara who has always seemed like a second mom to me. She's a nurse, and has worked in many exciting locations and has always kept in touch with our family. I call her Bobbie....and she has been a very dear presence in my life.....especially now with mother's illness.

She now lives in El Paso, TX and calls mom every day and in her words, is like "Chatty Cathy". She has also made several visits and spent significant quality time with my parents as they shuttle back and forth to a variety of chemo and radiation treatments.

So far in the past 3 months, Bobbie has given two treasures that I will cherish until I croak.

One was left at my mother's house for me to pick up this past fall. It was a framed 5X7 b/w picture of me with my mother that was taken during the summer of 1959. (Yes, I had a belly back then too!) I had never seen it before, but it was something! I see my resemblance to my daughters at that age. When one considers resemblances, it can get kind of creepy!

The second treasure arrived yesterday. It was a photograph of both my parents that was taken back in October -- just after one of mother's earliest chemo treatments.... She had just announced that if her hair was gonna fall out as a result of the treatment, it was gonna fall out in style! So she had just returned from the beauty parlor.

It's an awesome picture that will hold a special place in my heart along with the picture from August 1959.

Life is about change. Nothing ever remains the same.

Sometimes it's all so scary.