I realized recently that I graduated high school the same year a coworker was born.

Let's sit with that.

But then I reminded myself this brilliance was recorded when I was in first grade: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kqdJ6CsXt4Y

So it's okay, to be old. Because every generation contributes something awesome.

I had The Conversation with the little angel tonight. Why are we here?

I grew up steeped in Lutheranism, with a hint of high school existentialism.

I have raised my daughter differently than I was raised. I homeschooled religion.

Partly because of the crises of organized religion. Partly because of my own disillusionment with the laws of God versus the laws of Men.

Oh, parenting is hard.

I want to give her the tools to make sense of the world in a world that denies climate change and the effects of quarterly returns on our ability to be humane.

I want to give her something to cling to that represents what happens when our hearts cease to beat.

The reality is that we will all die, someday. We don't know when or how, only that we will. The young: They can't understand that. I didn't understand that.

I said to a co-worker this week that I'd borrowed a mission statement from someone whom I've forgotten: Live a life you don't need a vacation from.

I've tried to do that. We cut out eating out so we could ride horses. We shifted things around so we could have adventures. We drive shitty old-model cars and live in a bank foreclosure house so we can live a life we don't need a vacation from.

I believe that.

This year's cancer scare taught me that it can all be over tomorrow. You could have the rug pulled out from under you at any minute.

Are you ready?

Do you spend your time on what matters?

I don't, not entirely.

I need to make more time for my art, my writing.  I was good at it before I had a commute.  I need to get better at it now.

What do you need? Let's make time for it. Together. Because a) it won't mean a thing in an hundred years and b) it will mean everything to those we leave behind.

Both of those statements are true.

They say scent in the strongest tie to memory. What I will remember from this time is the scent of me.

I weathered radiation treatment during a hot Missouri summer. They told me I couldn't use normal deoderant because it contains aluminum, which is akin to putting aluminum foil in the microwave when undergoing radiation treatment.

This is what I smelled like:

• Burnt flesh

• Lavendar

• Linseed oil

• Aloe

• Musk

• Neosporin

• Aquaphor

• Eucerin

• Dead skin

• Sweaty polyester

• Wicking athletic bras

• Wet cotton

I finished my last radiation treatment last Friday. Since then, I've shed a layer of burnt skin, brown, almost black.

Underneath is the fuschia of regeneration.

Skin is pretty amazing stuff.

It itches. My God, it itches. I've tried not to scratch, but even the reapplication of Aquaphor after each shower has ruined at least ten tshirts and countless bras, and now with the skin so raw and new I'm not sure what I will wear to work tomorrow, when I'm sure they expect me to return anew and healed now that the treatment is over.

Except it's not really over yet. The radiation is still working inside me, and will continue to work for a few weeks, shining the flashlight over the dark room to make sure no cancer lurks in the corners before we shut the door for now. Until the next mammogram. And the next mammogram will reveal a completely new me, the me that is: after.

I will never smell aloe again and not think of this time.

But I am relieved. It is over. For the first time since April 2017, I can look at life through eyes unclouded by breast cancer. And that's a good thing.

ONWARD.