SHOULDA, WOULDA, COULDA, IF

The plane glides over a darkened landscape scattered with electric puddles of light.  I hear the whir of wingflaps, feel the sudden change in air speed, and realize we will be landing soon.  As I look out the window I see the sky go from pitch to pink in a slow but constant display of morning.  The sunrise limns the mountainscape in silver as we dip closer to the ground.  Our wheels touch the tarmac seamlessly and I say my usual prayer of thanks to the Gods of Aviation for keeping me safe once more.

When I finally reach Baggage Claim, it is only a few more minutes before my luggage bumps out of the chute and onto the carousel. I haul it off the conveyor belt instead of asking for help, in spite of the warnings my doctors have given me about babying my right arm.  

I sit and wait for my cousin, who will be coming to pick me up any minute.  As I do, I try to log onto the free wifi of Madrid-Barajas Airport with no success.  When I lift my head I see the sweet face of my cousin smiling down at me.  Now I know I am here at last

We leave the airport and drive through a sepia landscape of palms, olive trees, and browning grasses. Mountains flow in the distance as we pass through towns on our way to my cousin's house.  She points to a church where several stork nests sit high atop its flat surfaces.  They are magnifient constructions and look to be five or more feet in circumference.  I see one of the great birds lift its head out of a nest and stretch its wings to the morning.  A few more storks perch themselves on utility poles as if they are sentries guarding their churchtop village. 

I remark to my cousin that the scenery here is strangely beautiful and she says under her breath, "This land, this land ..." Her voice trails off into an almost reverent whisper.

We are now traveling on local roads lined with dense clusters of rosy crepe myrtle and verdant vegetation.  This is a neighborhood of houses hidden behind stuccoed walls and neatly sculpted hedges.  We stop in front of one of them and pass through its iron gates.  Inside is a house made of stone and stucco with different levels of barrel tile roofing.  I exit the car and am, for the first time since arriving, immersed in the dry, but pleasant heat of this Madrid June day.  

Dropping my bags in the comfortable guest room, I'm drawn back outside to the pool, which is set in a backyard filled with fruiting trees of apricots, apples, and pears. I throw off my shoes and dangle my tired traveler's feet in the cool water.  For a moment, I close my eyes and take in this new place.  Dogs bark, doves coo, lizards skitter, and the air is scented with herbs and flowers.  

If I had opened my eyes onto this dreamy landscape a year ago, I would have thought I was hallucinating from the drugs I was being given for my cancer.  Yet today is real. I'm sitting in this homey paradise with my beloved cousin and her family on this gift of a morning.  A gift given to me by my ex-husband.  The man from whom I am divorced, but is still a dear friend, and who knows me perhaps better than anyone else.  

In truth, I didn't think I would actually make this trip.  I'd spent the last year in breast cancer treatment and wasn't sure I was up to  a major trip by myself, physically or emotionally, even though I'd been planning it for months.

"Why am I doing this again?" I would ask my ex over and over before leaving.  
"Because you need to reset," he would remind me.  "You need to stop thinking of yourself as a cancer patient and find yourself again."  

In the weeks preceeding my trip, every time I thought of traveling, fear would overtake me. I wanted to stay home where I felt safe and forgo the entire thing.  I searched for some spark of courage that would push me, when the time came, onto that plane and across the Atlantic. 

One day I was on the phone with a friend who was telling me she wanted to go back to school and finish her degree after a hiatus of almost thirty years. 
"I should have never allowed that much time to pass. I would have had my doctorate by now if I'd only been more focused."  
"Hey, there's no use in trying to change the past," I told her, "all you can do is take care of the present.  My father used to say 'Shoulda, coulda, woulda, if."

Later that night I started thinking about that shoulda, woulda, coulda, if.  Perhaps it applied to me as well.  Did I want to let my fears get in the way of my already planned adventure?  If I didn't take this trip, this amazing gift that had been given to me, would I regret it?  If cancer had taught me anything, it had taught me that there are absolutely no guarantees. Would I ever find the right amount of courage or time to go?

There was only one answer.  Pack your bags and call a car service.     

So now it is the fourth morning of my stay in Madrid.  I'm sipping on a much welcomed cup of cafe con leche and watching a line of plump black worker ants start their day of hunting for food.  I look out across the valley to the line of mountains that I saw on my first morning here and marvel at their ever-changing form.  I've begun to know their stages.  At dawn they are a shadowy silhouette across the sky, mid-morning they bloom soft shades of violet, in the late afternoon hours they are rust and merge with the arid landscape, and in the evening they reflect the flame of sunset.  I will memorize them and carry their image with me when I leave this place to begin the next leg of my journey.  And for now, I'm happy to report that I feel less like a cancer patient and more like an explorer.  The "sweetness of being" has begun to return. 

A ROSE GROWS IN BROOKLYN

I was born in Brooklyn six short blocks from where I live now.  As I often tell my friends, "I didn't find my apartment, it found me."  Early in 2014, after I'd decided to move from my home in New Jersey, friends of mine who'd just bought a building in Bay Ridge offered me the place.  I said yes immediately and with that, became the fourth generation on both sides of my family to settle in Brooklyn.  My mother, my father, aunts and uncles, grandparents, and, yes, even great grandparents all chose Brooklyn.

I don't often say the word "blessing," it's a bit overused to me, and yet there seems to be no more appropriate term to describe the experience of landing here.  Because not too long after I got settled I was diagnosed with breast cancer which meant that I would have access to some of the best medical care in the country and be closer to my family.  I'd like to think that the spirits of my ancestors guided me back to Brooklyn so that I could be watched over during this most challenging time of my life.

My new apartment suits me perfectly.  It's a lovely space in a great homey neighborhood that still has mom-and-pop shops and great ethnic restaurants.  It's close to the subway, and best of all, it has a garden.  In fact, I don't think I would've been as quick to say yes to living here if I hadn't had access to some sort of garden space. 

I can't live without a garden.  I'm happiest when my hands are grimy and my face is smudged with dirt.  Gardens teach you patience.  Gardens give back beauty.  And sometimes, gardens even give you hope.

I brought a little of my Jersey garden with me when I moved to Brooklyn.  Two dwarf peach trees, a few day lilies, a handful of herbs, and one rose.  No ordinary rose, this wild beauty had never been planted.  It volunteered itself by starting as a single shoot growing up through a trellis in my front flowerbed.  I couldn't figure out how or why it came to be, but its origin didn't matter -- to me it was a special gift of nature that chose to visit my garden.  So I nurtured that single shoot as it grew bigger and stronger, and in June of that year it actually produced buds.  A few weeks later it joyfully erupted into an old-fashioned single-petaled rose with deep crimson blossoms.

Through the years, my volunteer rose sprawled over the flower bed growing bigger and taller and giving me more and more blossoms.  When I made the decision to move to Brooklyn I knew I had to bring it with me.  I couldn't leave it behind.  It was early winter and probably far too late to transplant anything, but I dug it out of the ground, trellis and all, and took it to Brooklyn. There I carved a hole in the almost frozen ground, said a private prayer of protection over it, and covered the bare root with dirt.

That winter was harsher than usual and I wasn't sure if any of the plants in the backyard would survive, but eventually it turned to spring and my Brooklyn garden began to wake up, sprouting shoots and popping out leaves and buds in a happy life ritual.  I watched and waited for the rose to grow too, but it didn't.  It sat caged in the trellis like a fossilized rib of some prehistoric dinosaur showing no signs of life.  I watered it, fertilized it, and said quiet blessings over it, but nothing happened.  Reluctantly, I finally had to accept that I'd killed it.  Oh, the guilt, I was Diane the Rose Murderer, the selfish girl who'd yanked her beautiful rose out of the ground when she knew better.  I felt so awful that I actually avoided going in that part of the garden.  I didn't want to be reminded of my dastardly deed. 

In early summer I started my cancer treatments.  Dead rose or no, that garden proved to be my oasis. During that period it wasn't easy for me to get out of the house so I spent most of my outdoor time sitting under a big green umbrella breathing in the summer air and listening to the life of the city beyond the garden walls -- the laughter of children playing in a distant backyard, the Mr. Softee truck's incessant song, dogs barking, neighbors gossiping and talking.  All these things were a reassurance that life would still be waiting for me when I was done with treatment -- something I sorely needed.

One day in September, after my second to last chemo treatment, I gathered my courage and walked over to the rose skeleton for the first time in months.  There, pushing its way up out of the ground, was a small green shoot much like the one I first saw years ago.  My wild rose had come alive!  It was too late in the season for it to produce flowers, but it surely was growing.  When I realized this I cried.  My stoic little rose had made it through its difficult season after all ... and so, I hoped, would I.

In late winter of this year, when there was still a good deal of snow on the ground in the backyard, I made my way over to my rose and inspected it for signs of life.  There they were, small red nubs peeking out of the rose canes.  It had survived another winter and was going to be just fine.

And now it is spring again and my rose is covered with buds and about to have its first bloom, an event made even more special because today, May 14th, is the first anniversary of my breast cancer diagnosis.  Happily, I'm finished with all my treatments and doing well.  Blooming, in fact, quite like my wild rose.  I'm planning a nice long trip to Europe for the summer where I hope to have new experiences to write about.  I am excited at all the possibilities that lie ahead.  I guess there's lots of life left in both of us gals.  Yes, two roses grow in Brooklyn.

AN EMBARRASSMENT OF RICHES

When I was a child there was a store in my Manhattan neighborhood called Nancy's Fancy. Way before all the hip antiques and notions stores that now seem to be everywhere, it was the only one around.  It carried all sorts of fun things -- jars of aged buttons embossed with flowers, moons, and stars; tarnished gold and silver upholstery tassels; delicate vintage passementerie fashioned from shiny jet and cut silver beads.  Not only did it carry old notions, but also silly things like paper cigars that transformed into American Flags, wacky plastic whistles shaped like trains and cars, books of Mad Libs, bouncing balls that glowed in the dark, and my favorite, a menagerie of handblown glass animals.  Oh, how I loved that store.  I'd save my nickels, dimes, and quarters and rush off after school to pick up some special trinket then skip home, my pockets bulging with treasures wrapped in Nancy's Fancy tissue paper.  

Thing is, most of the time I didn't keep them, I gave them away -- to my family, school friends, teachers.  Obviously, I had a huge need to give.  Now ask a shrink and they'd probably tell you I was seeking love and approval, and I suspect I was, but it made me happy so who cares? Don't get me wrong, I did love presents.  What kid doesn't stay awake all night on Christmas Eve imagining the wonderful things that are going to be left under the tree for them the next morning?  Who doesn't like the idea of receiving a pirate's bounty on their birthday?  And even now, so many years since the closure of Nancy's Fancy, my enjoyment of gift giving hasn't diminished. 

But what does all this have to do with having breast cancer?  Well, something happens when you're diagnosed with a serious illness: it brings out extreme generosity in people.  When someone finds out you're not well, they more often than not feel compelled to give you something -- an offer of their time, financial help, or a special something to make you feel good when you're feeling rotten.  Big or small, all are outpourings of love.  

Truthfully, there have been times when I've really needed help, but struggled with my conscience to accept it.  I had to dig down deep and try to figure out why it was so hard for me, especially when I'm a serial gift giver myself.  The obvious answer would have been that I didn't want to seem "needy."  But it wasn't that simple.  Why did generosity cause such a panic inside of me? I followed the threads back to when this started and realized that my inability to accept people's help directly related to my disease.  Would this illness and the needs that it created take away from the well-being of the people whom I loved and cared for?  I couldn't and wouldn't allow that.  

But as time went on I observed that the outpouring of love, time, and help, rather than harming those around me, seemed to have great significance to the people who offered it.  I was forced to shift my perspective on what effect my cancer had on my external world.  And believe me, it wasn't an easy shift, but it was necessary.  Because when people give they are also getting something in return.  I have finally allowed myself to relax and let the generosity of others be part of my path to wellness.  I've also learned to ask for help when I need it, one of the biggest lessons of my life. 

Today is Thanksgiving.  For most it is a time to reassess and be thankful for the blessings in one's life.  Now I know I am replete with them.  I am thankful for the generosity, love, and friendship that so many have shown me.  Family, friends, doctors, nurses, healthcare professionals and, yes, even strangers.  I am thankful that I was given a chance to see the meaning of my life in relationship to other's lives. 

Believe me, this is not an easy road, but who ever said the road is supposed to be easy?  It's just a road ... bumpy, scary, beautiful, challenging. This cancer, instead of being devastating, has become a rare gift in itself.  It has given me introspection and insight, and I'm sure will continue to yield many more lessons in the months and years to come.  Of course, no one wants to have cancer, but without it I don't think I would have understood how loved and cared for I am.  I truly have an embarrassment of riches.  Now, does anybody know where I can get those American Flag cigars so I can give some of this love back? 

THE SUPER MOON: SOMETIMES ALL YOU CAN DO IS CARE, NOT CARETAKE

 © 2014 Photo Courtesy of Tom Parr

When I was first diagnosed with cancer my family and close friends rallied around me.  They built a fortress of love that gave me confidence that I could get through the rough times to come.  I was touched beyond measure and it was absolutely what I needed.  But as time went on and all the necessary practices were put into place I heard from some people less and less and I started to feel as if I'd faded into the woodwork.  

You see, I prided myself on being strong so I often downplayed my needs.  I'm good at that.  What I'm not good at is asking for help.  It's one thing to have people volunteer it, it's another thing to put yourself out on a limb and say you need it.  So I didn't.  I put up a great front of strength and people followed right in step by thinking I was handling everything, but I wasn't.  

One morning I woke up and saw postings all over Facebook (yes, I am one of "those" people) about the super moon that had been out the night before.  Dramatic photographs of a swollen globe hovering above the Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building, and the entire cityscape. The super moon?  Why, I hadn't even known that there was such a thing.  I felt cheated. Why did I have to be sequestered in my basement apartment in Brooklyn where I wouldn't have known about it?  Why had no one called and told me to step outside?  Sadness washed over me and I had a good cry, but after some harsh self-examination I started to realize something -- that it was necessary for me to take more responsibility for letting people know what I needed.  And what I needed was a connection to the outside world.

Often people who are going through a major health issue feel as if they can't reach out because they might be pitied or they don't want to be categorized as "sick" or "ill" or "disabled."  They want to be seen as themselves and not a statistic.  Take me, for example.  From the get-go, there were things I "didn't want."  I didn't want to join a breast cancer support group or hear stories about a friend of a friend who'd survived.  I felt as though it would diminish my unique experience.  To this day it's still how I feel, but after several months I see that this kind of behavior can lead to a misunderstanding on the part of the people around me that being left alone is just fine.  It is not, not at all. 

Then there's the little matter of not knowing how to help.  I can't tell you how many people have told me that they didn't call or write because they "didn't know what to say."  In an effort to do the perfect thing, they let more and more time pass until they felt embarrassed to get in touch with me at all.  I think it's important to remember that there's no way that you can fix the big picture.  That's up to the doctors and nurses and health professionals.  So there's only one perfect thing to do and that's what you're capable of -- a call, a visit, an e-mail -- to let the person going through it know that you're there, that you're thinking of them.  It's worth more than you think.  

Every little text and phone call helps me get through the day.  Yes, I may have cancer, but I still love life, so when a girlfriend calls me and we can talk about the latest shoes in the Anthropologie catalog or laugh about some silly TV show that we both happened to be watching, it takes the heaviness away.

Just this morning I received a beautiful message from a woman with whom I've been friendly for a while.  She and I haven't had the opportunity to spend time together, but we've always known that there was something simpatico between us.  She wrote me that she'd included me in her meditations and that she wished me well.  It was the perfect tonic for a morning when I was needing to know that someone was thinking of me.

So it's as easy as that.  Nothing big.  Nothing profound.  Don't think you have to solve the problems of the world.  Just be there for the person you care about and do what you can.  St. Francis of Assisi is quoted as saying, "Be great in little things."  Little acts of kindness go a long way. A caring heart is like the super moon.  You may not always see it, but when it's out there, it's huge.  

THE BIRD AND THE SCENT OF SUMMER RAIN

"Like a bird on the wire, like a drunk in a midnight choir, I have tried in my way to be free." Leonard Cohen

First let me say this: I love summer.  I love everything about summer. Roses in June, heirloom tomatoes and sweet corn, crisp white wine and tart Cosmos at sunset.  I love sitting on a porch and talking late into the night as candles flicker and burn low, concerts under the stars, flea markets and farmer's markets, fresh figs, watching the NY Yankees play a home game, and open-toed sandals. I think there's nothing better than peach juice dripping down my chin after a first bite, the smell of newly mown grass, and bike rides along the ocean.  But summer storms are the best. I get a thrill when I see clouds start to gather in a stark blue sky and hear the rumble of thunder. Most of all, it's the scent of the warm earth after the first few drops of rain that makes my heart thrum.  But I was dealt a detour this summer and had to spend a good deal of time away from what I love.  No matter: I understand that this was my season of getting well and it's a full time job.  So instead of splashing in the surf or having cocktails at a tiki bar I filled my time writing.  It was my way of tuning my senses to a higher note, to something sweeter and more positive.  

Before this experience of cancer I didn't really know how much I loved all the things of summer.  Yes, I felt them, yes, I experienced them, but I didn't understand that my soul craved them.  It wasn't until I had a conversation with a nurse who worked with patients who'd overcome life threatening illnesses that I started to understand more about what I was feeling.  She told me that it was as if these people had become more attuned to the life experience.  It makes sense, right?  Who wouldn't?  But here's the thing, it's an almost inexplicable difference. You don't just wake up one morning and become Julie Andrews singing on an Alpine mountaintop.  It's much more subtle. From the first moment you're dealt "the news" to when you're finished, it slowly becomes part of you.  I'm not quite sure what that "it" is, but I know it has something to do with gratitude.  Gratitude for getting the opportunity to see what life looks like on the other side.

As for me, I may actually be grateful to my cancer for allowing me to see that I was too wrapped up in the wants of life.  I wanted to own a house, but that house didn't make me happy because I worried too much about how to pay for it.  I wanted to live in a city again, but when I did the city seemed more foreign than I'd remembered.  I wanted to travel the world, but when I was away I often felt homesick.  These wants went and on and on.  I guess I was suffering from The Grass Is Always Greener Syndrome.  What a waste of time.  Now I've learned that time is not a currency you spend without consequences.  If my illness hadn't been caught, I would have run out of time way too soon. So for me time is now as precious as the rarest element, but life seems so much simpler.  My daily life has been whittled down to the little things.  The get-up-and-do-the-day-right things.  These things may not be sexy, but they're satisfying.  I revel in a good cup of Stumptown Coffee, I photograph a rich blue morning glory in my garden, I celebrate sunrises at the ocean.  There are so many small things in the day that make me grateful, and each every one of them is brilliant and beautiful.

When I was younger I was on a search for a connection to the universe.  I found myself at an ashram in Upstate New York getting up at four in the morning so that I could chant for hours while sitting on a cold marble floor with five or six hundred other seekers. I would look around and see people with their hands to the heavens as they experienced the ecstasy of chanting and wonder why I wasn't having the same feelings. I was numb. Why were they able to connect to the great universal "I am" when I couldn't?  I felt like such a failure.

One day I took a walk with a friend through a beautiful wooded section of the ashram.  It was the peak of fall and the trees were awash with color.  We got into a deep, or so we thought, existential discussion.  It all felt very important.  Hadn't we come to the ashram to discover the answer to this complicated question?  As we talked we wandered into a clearing.  There, standing tall and majestic in flowing robes of orange, was one of the guru's monks.  My friend and I were quite literally stopped in our tracks.  The monk greeted us and asked what we were talking about.  "Oh, nothing important, " I responded.  "Ah," he said with a smile that curled at each corner of his mouth, "you must be talking about life.  And have you come to any conclusions?"  Well, I don't remember who, but one of us launched into an extremely serious regurgitation of what we'd been speaking about.  "It is good that you delve into these questions," he told us. "But see that bird in the tree?" Both of us looked up to where the monk was pointing and saw a small brown bird perched on a branch.  "That bird wakes, finds food, builds its nest, flies, and sings.  It does not question why it does these things. There is no ego there.  No need to know why.  It just is.  Enjoy your day."  The monk then turned and walked up the path leaving my friend and I dumbstruck.  Was it that simple?

I can tell you now that that explanation has stayed with me for all the years since, but never have I comprehended it more than at this moment of my life.  I'm not trying to preach; everyone comes to their own understanding in their own way.  But for me, it has been my cancer that has given me some of the clarity that I was seeking. Sure, I'm prepared for more questions to come flooding in when I'm done with my treatment, but I no longer ask why this happened to me.  And for right now, I am that bird.  I get up in the morning, I tend to my nest, and I sing.

Photo/Text Copyright 2014 Diane Garisto

MY RED SNEAKERS

This has been the summer of my red sneakers.

I got my first pair when I was a kid. They were fire-engine-red Keds with white laces.  From the moment I put them on I absolutely adored them.  I wore them every day until they were dirty and stinky and full of holes.  When I could no longer wear them they lived at the bottom of my closet.  I couldn't bear to part with them.

One morning early this spring, a good forty years later, I woke up and thought, "I want a new pair of red Keds."  I'd just started my treatments for breast cancer and needed a little pick-me-up after a difficult week.  Red Keds seemed like the perfect thing to make me happy.

I went to every shoe shop in my Brooklyn neighborhood looking for them. There were aisles of Nikes, Vans, Sketchers, Adidas, Converse, and even some Keds, but not red ones. I started to think that, like the mythical unicorn, the Keds of my youth would never be found. Yes, yes, I know I could have done the on-line thing, but I wanted to feel those sneakers on my feet and see if they gave me the same kind of rush I'd had as a kid.

After two days of searching I struck gold at a discount store.  There, sitting on a shelf amidst the flip-flops and cork-wedged sandals, were a knock-off pair of red sneakers.  They might have not been the Keds of my dreams, but when I slipped them on they fit me as perfectly as Cinderella's lost shoe.

From then on I wore them every chance I got.  My chemotherapy kept me housebound a lot of the time, but on my good days those flashy red kicks went with me everywhere -- to the park, to the beach, even on bike rides.  As I pedaled on the boardwalk I'd look down and admire them on my feet, and I was sure everyone else was admiring them too.  Was it wrong to love a pair of shoes that much?

Only a couple of months later my red sneaks started to wear out.  What was I gonna do without them?  I needed to find a new pair and I needed them quick.  So I headed back to the mother ship.  On the shelves were lace up shoes, knock-off Uggs, all-weather boots, closed-toe high heels, slip-on flats ... but no sneakers.  Not one itty-bitty pair.  What'd happened?  Had summer passed by that fast?  It was only the middle of August and already fall and winter merchandise was on the shelves. 

I was bereft, not only of my beloved red sneakers, but also of the summer that had slipped by because of my cancer treatments.  In truth, it was a summer I'd kind of wished away.  Believe me, I didn't want to. Time is so precious, especially when you're faced with an illness that puts you smack dab in front of your own mortality, but if I could've clicked the heels of my ruby slippers and been anywhere else at any other time I'd have done it.  All I wanted was for the cancer and everything that went with it to be a distant memory.

So there I was, sitting on a vinyl-covered stool in the middle of Payless, and I started to weep. A salesgirl came by and asked me if I was okay. I choked back a tear and told her I'd just gotten a little bad news, but that I was fine. How could I confess that I'd been crying over a worn-out pair of red sneakers? "Buck up, girlie," I told myself, "you can't fall apart in the middle of a discount store." I reached into my handbag and pulled out a Kleenex. As I wiped my eyes, I spied a lovely pair of burnished silver loafers across the aisle. They winked in my direction as if to say, "Hey, don't be sad, you could wear me with straight-leg jeans when the cool weather comes around and be seriously styling."

With a bit of guilt, I unlaced my beloved sneakers and reassured them that I'd get back to them just as soon as I'd tried this one little pair of loafers, but the minute I slipped them on I knew they were mine.  They were comfortable and chic, a winning combination.  The red sneakers sneered up at me as I put them back on.  "Oh, don't be that way," I told them, "you're still my favorites."  Then I carried the new shoes to the register and handed the salesgirl my credit card.

Now it seems odd to say it, but those silver loafers turned out to be my silver lining.  As I strolled home I started to think about all the swell outfits I could wear with them once the weather got cooler.  That's when I realized I was looking toward the future and that it was okay that the summer was about to end.  Yes, sometimes it takes something ridiculously small to aid in understanding what's going on inside of you.  Those new shoes helped me see that there are so many good things to look forward to, like walking through Central Park when it's ablaze with the colors of autumn or making footprints in the first snowfall of the season.  There are holidays to celebrate, like Thanksgiving, when my sister will lovingly cook her special feast for the family, or Christmas, when I will gather with friends in Washington Square Park and sing the "Hallelujah Chorus."  I've never been a big one for New Year's Eve, but this year I'll be the first to pop the cork on the best bottle of Champagne I can find.  All these things will mark the end of my treatment.  I realize I haven't wished away my summer as much as I've wished ahead to the beginning of my healing period. 

And what of my red sneakers? Well, they'll stay with me until they're unfit for wearing.  Sure, I'll mourn their demise, but I'll go in search of a new pair next spring and maybe this time I'll even find some honest-to-goodness fire-engine-red Keds.  I certainly am hopeful.

FROM HAIR TO THERE: A Lesson in Acceptance

"Give me a head of hair, long beautiful hair, shining, streaming, gleaming, flaxen, waxen ..."  From Hair, the Musical

When I graduated from middle school, my yearbook had captions under the names of each of the students.  Descriptions like "Most Likely to Become President," "Most likely to Marry a Millionaire," "Most Likely to Win the Nobel Prize."  These were given to each of the graduates by their fellow classmates.  Under my photo was a curious caption, "Girl Most Likely to Become Lady Godiva."  Yes, I know, odd.  I've often wondered how the teachers let that one go through, but in a way it was completely appropriate.  You see, I've always had long hair.  Sometimes below my waist, but most always flowing down my back.  I suppose it's my Italian heritage that enables me to grow it as long as I want and I'm grateful, because as a child I felt terribly ordinary and my hair was the one thing that made me feel special, dare I say, beautiful.  

With few exceptions, throughout my life I kept my hair long.  Oh, there was that time in the Eighties when I chopped it all off, dyed it bright orange, and spiked it out.  What was I thinking?  Not sure.  It certainly wasn't my intention to look like a member of A Flock of Seagulls, but I assure you I did.  Happily, once I came to my senses, it didn't take long for me to grow it all back because, like I said, I'm blessed with the good hair gene.

So what happens when you feel attached to your hair and wake up two weeks after having your first round of chemotherapy and see piles of it on the pillow?  The answer is you panic.  And I did.  No amount of warning prepared me.  One day it was fine and the next day it was falling out in handfuls.  It was the oddest thing and it was mortifying.  Of course, I knew it would happen at some point, although it did come sooner than my doctor had advised, and I knew that it would only be temporary, but the idea that I would have to face even six months without hair depressed me. 

After about an hour of private hysteria I called my pal Jennie, one of my style gurus.  "I'm going to be so ugly (sob sob) ... who will find me attractive (sob sob) ... how will I get through this (sniffle sniffle sniffle)?"  Well, Jennie, a take-no-prisoners kind of a gal, wheeled over in her Jeep and whisked me off to several very nice stores where she bought me hip colorful scarves and showed me how to tie them fashionably around my head.  I was grateful for the help, but inside I was madder at my cancer than a hornet that's been sat on by a bull!  I didn't wanna know how to tie scarves, I didn't wanna look like a socialite sunning herself on the Isle of Capri.  No!  I just wanted to have my hair back!  But that wasn't to be and I knew it.  So, once again, I did my very best impression of a brave girl and went and got my head buzzed a la GI Jane.  What a surprise to see myself, really see myself, for the first time.  No hair, just eyes and lips and cheekbones.  Nothing to frame my face except my big ears.  It was fascinating, but it made me cry all the more.  I ... wanted ... my ... hair!  I would wake in the middle of the night, go into the bathroom, and stare in the mirror trying to fill in the hair like one of those childhood Hair Do Harriet games where you move around fuzzy metal shards with a magic magnetic wand.  Where was that magic wand now?

I suffered through the trauma of hair loss until the Monday after my buzz cut when my wonderful sister once again came to my rescue.  Leslie took me to a wig shop in Manhattan and we had a great time as I tried on all sorts of lengths, colors, and styles.  What I learned that day was that hair really does change your look.  You can be Marilyn Monroe, Diana Ross, Marianne Faithful, even Tina Turner.  We had lots of laughs as we picked out two completely different personalities.  One was a short, sassy, honey-colored cut and the other was a sophisticated platinum bob.  Now I could be Sassy Diane or Sophisticated Diane according to my mood.  And in the tradition of "it takes a village," so many of my good girlfriends pitched in to help with designer scarves, summer hats, and the crowning glory to my collection, a long blonde wig gifted to me by my darling friend Nikki.  When I put it on in the wig shop and looked into the mirror I finally felt like me again. 

Now let's talk about the men in my life.  They were wonderful too.  I have lots of great guy friends and they all, without exception, confessed that they found bald women sexy (due, in no small part I'm assuming, to the pioneering efforts of Sinead O'Connor, Demi Moore, and Veeger, the robot cum space probe in the first Star Trek movie).  A couple of guys even told me they'd shave their heads in solidarity.  I was told that I was sexy and beautiful no matter whether I had hair or not.  What an outpouring of support.  

My new hair consciousness got me to thinking about how strongly hair is tied in with our standards of beauty and how I wasn't the only one who was preoccupied with it.  People who have curly hair want straight.  People who have straight want curly.  There's the myth of blondes having more fun, redheads being fast, brunettes being sultry.  We cut our hair, perm our hair, color our hair, weave our hair.  Our fairy tales show beautiful heroines with long, lush locks -- Cinderella, Pocahontas, and let's not forget Rapunzel.

So I defy anyone to tell me that it doesn't matter when you go bald in a culture that is obsessed with hair ... especially when you're a woman.  But as with any other major change in life, it's an opportunity for self-discovery, albeit one that's forced upon you.  Every woman who I've talked to who has lost her hair to cancer has had to come to terms with it.  Personally, I've railed at the gods, cried, and complained, but I am finally making peace with it.  It's not because I'm so evolved that I can handle this hair crisis on my own.  Oh, no, no, no.  It's because over and over again the people around me who I trust and love have reinforced the belief that my beauty does not depend on my hair.  I'm a strong woman with an inner and outer beauty that they value and appreciate.  And you know what?  I now look at my bald self in the mirror and think that I am beautiful, not in spite of my baldness, but because of it.  It has been a stunning realization.  In fact, just this afternoon something happened that showed me that I've come to terms with this no-hair phase of my life.  I actually walked out of the house bald.  I'd completely forgotten that I hadn't covered my head with a wig, a hat, or even a scarf, and I didn't mind at all.  Guess I've finally gotten from hair ... to there.