Week #26 Roundup

The team is now over the $12 000 mark ($12 005.00, to be exact)! This does not yet include the concert money, so I suppose that technically, we have raised over thirteen thousand dollars!

Happy mother's day to all you moms out there. I remember every year, dad would rush to find a card and a gift of sorts (pajamas, usually). After he got sick, he couldn't drive, so it would be up to me and Stace to grab something for him. I never realized how frustrating that must have been, to depend on other people for such simple things like buying a present.

I keep hearing of sad cancer stories as of late. And it's funny, because I should know what to say or do, right? Yet, here I am, and I have no idea what's healthy and what's not, and what makes things better or worse. And I definitely can't tell people that it gets easier, because it doesn't. I almost think that is the hardest part. I think people expect those who experience loss to get back to normal after a while, to want to go out and have fun. And because I don't have the stress of school right now, shouldn't I want those things, too? Sadly, that's not really the case. I was talking to someone about it a while ago, and I don't think dealing with dad's passing gets easier - you just get used to living with that kind of sadness.

Right now, I've been enjoying spending time at home and giving Wallace some extra play and training. Without dad around, his whole routine has been flipped on its side. Now that dad's not around to hang out with him, he's lacking stimulation and enrichment. All he's been doing these past couple months is lie down by himself. But now that I think about it, isn't it the same for us? I know that I'm certainly missing out on having dad around, too. Does that mean I have to be retrained? Habituated? Desensitized? Psychology degree, you are useless in this situation.

I'll briefly turn to English.

My favourite university lecturer told me once that when writing a thesis, you should always ask yourself, "So what? Why is this important?" When I think about cancer, it's really easy for me to wonder why some people die and others live, why some people live much longer than others, and why a cure hasn't been discovered yet. And inevitably I wonder, "So what? What's the point of it all then?" Instead of being cynical, maybe I should be concentrating on that second part of the equation: why is this important? If I were a thesis, what would I have to offer in the grand scheme of things? What I have come up with is this: perhaps the point is to be as good as a person as dad: to be kind, smart, funny, generous, and a million other positive attributes, and hopefully inspire others to be the same.