Can you tell I like musicals? (P.S. I only borrowed this, because it was cute!)
I had a lot of time to think about my cancer experience during my recovery from the excisional biopsy. I was angry that I had to play the waiting game again and spend my time waiting for the inevitable, again. I spent countless nights reading statistics and medical journals in a desperate attempt to understand what I was facing. While I learned a lot about my disease and the care I would need, it also had the unfortunate side effect of making me feel hopeless and fearful.
One morning I woke up, feeling energized for the first time in a long while. The sun was shining into the room through the blue paper shades, coloring the room in a pleasant hue. I stretched and looked to my right where David was passed out, asleep next to me. I looked at him and suddenly felt grateful for all of the support and love that has surrounded me during my time of need. I felt like doing something. I felt like getting up, showering, eating breakfast and going shopping like a normal human being.
I decided that it was time to put the angry, pissed off, stressed graduate student away for a while.
Later that day, I asked David to go with me to the craft store. I bought a bright green photo box, stickers and put all of the things I collected through my cancer adventures so far in the box; the blue hair cap from my surgery, the bright red "ALLERGY!" bracelet, the gray no-slip hospital socks, newspaper clippings and cartoons, and ticket stubs. (Of course, with more things to come.) I wasn't picky about the stickers I bought; I picked up whatever appealed to me and I covered that photo box with zillions of stickers, patterns and cut outs of things that made me feel good.
I also bought this mini photo album kit that inspired the name of this blog. It had all sorts of stickers with corny inspirational phrases and statements on them such as, "You are gorgeous!", "Always in style!", "Friends Forever!!!" "Such Good Memories", and of course, "Find Joy in the Journey". As corny as the little photo album kit was, I really liked the idea of finding joy. It was such a paradigm shift for me. The idea of happiness was always something that I believed, in a weird way, would find me with hard work, good schooling and a list of references. Not the other way around. As hard as this was going to be, I realized that I can't spend all of my time being angry, though it is important to acknowledge and honor angry feelings about cancer. I still say, "F-you cancer!" but I won't let it rain on my parade.
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