Hope

Now that I work at the hospital, I see life on a daily basis. I don't get to witness birth anymore, per se, but I am a part of the melding of individuals into a family. I feel really thankful to have a job I love, one that fills my cup and reminds me that there is good to be done and sometimes I get to be a part of doing it.

These last two weeks I have been even happier to come here, and it's not just because of the air conditioning, though that doesn't hurt. In January I blogged about a friend getting cancer. Now it's August, and we are waiting for her to die.

It's kind of like being in purgatory. We can't really live joyously, freely, because we know her moment is moments away. And yet you never wish someone to die, but I think sometimes I feel like I am so ready to rid myself of the knot in my stomach and start mourning. I want to cry, sob, heave for myself and my loss of a friend, for her beautiful husband and child, for her mother and father and sister and brothers and for all the people she has touched with her grace in her life who will now have to know a world without her.

When I last saw her I very much had the sense that she had one foot in this world and one foot in the next, whatever that looks like. She said she was not scared, that she was ready to leave the pain behind and see what the next life has to offer. I wouldn't feel ready if she didn't.

Back in April my friend blogged about Hawaii, I think, and she made mention of palliative care. A mutual friend of ours who is a med student was so distraut because she new palliative care was the beginning of the end. After I talked to her I spent days in a depression about the idea of losing my friend.

I went to the beach for the weekend and I came back decided that if Julie had hope, who was I to say she was wrong? And I held out hope until the end, really I did. And now I have a new hope, a hope for an easy transition, a hope for peace, and hope that I can keep doing what I do so I can get life along with death.