Strange Days Indeed

More of my videos here.

I'm getting back in the saddle, making videos again, writing on the blog. I just uploaded another belated video from this summer, but I never shared its predecessor here, so I'm posting that one first.

My office this afternoon is a hospital waiting room. I'm passing the time while my husband undergoes minor surgery. His surgeon, who comes highly recommended, was the doctor who diagnosed me with breast cancer three years ago. It wasn't until after after the biopsy, after his diagnosis—which was delivered over the phone at my request—, at my second office visit, when I requested that he show me where my lymph nodes were because I kept worrying something was wrong there even though he'd said otherwise, that he found the lump there too.

I will never forget the look on his face in that moment.

I haven't spoken to him since I left his office that day.

Both Jim and I felt a little tension about how he might react when he saw me today, sitting at Jim's side pre-op. Jim actually considered asking me to stay away, so as not to add stress to his surgical experience, but I reassured him that I would follow the doctor's lead, that I would be pleasant, and he decided it would be okay.

"Nice to meet you," the doctor said, shaking my hand with a perfunctory smile, turning his attention to the man of the hour.

Apparently he didn't recognize me at all. Or else he was being discreet.

Just now he called my cell to tell me the surgery is done and that it went very well.

What a strange thing, hearing this man's voice in my ear as I'd heard it once before, delivering good news instead of bad.

As I said before, life goes on.