Beauty of grey skies

It was during my first chemotherapy session when it finally hit me that I could die.

I began to ponder the afterlife and what may happen. I thought whether I would go to heaven, hell, or maybe that nothing at all happens and I just cease to exist. What does nothing feel like?

I received treatment at Deaconess Cancer Center in a room filled with windows. Sitting back in my reclining chair I gazed outside at the grey winter scene. Only birds equipped for Pacific Northwest winters remained, their plumage matching the grey of the sky. From somewhere below the windows steam billowed up from the hospital ventilation stacks. Looking at the treetops against the adjacent brick buildings and treetops I wondered what death would bring me, what it would bring all of us, eventually. I teared up a bit, but I’m not much of a public crier, so I hid it. I promised myself and the conductor of life that I would never, even if we drift to nothingness, forget how beautiful this place was.

Before I was faced with the potential of a journey to an unknown place, I remember being irritable, tired, cynical and judgmental. I had been heartbroken so many times. Each time, my ability to forgive and forget wearing thin. The mundane parts of life, such as unloading the dishwasher (after asking my family three times already and writing a reminder note) made me feel like life was just a series of heartbreak and work. Maybe, just maybe, we get to experience joy in between.

It wasn’t until I sat in that chair, viewing that gray winter day, thinking about death by stage three triple-negative breast cancer, that I shed a tear for the beauty of this view. For the mundane tasks that await me each day when I arrive home to my family because they are done in proximity to my loved ones. Also, the heartbreaks that caused me so much pain because the sweetest thing in life is love. I savor that in each moment so that I can fulfill my promise to feel all of it wherever I end up. «

by Mercedes McLain