I’m working to define my cancer as a chronic illness: “A chronic disease is one lasting 3 months or more, by the definition of the U.S. National Center for Health Statistics. Chronic diseases generally cannot be prevented by vaccines or cured by medication, nor do they just disappear. …” Since I’m planning on a long duration, I’m reminding myself that this isn’t now an acute illness (that is it isn’t going to be of short duration). As a former health researcher these words matter to me and are words that I can get my head around. Sort of.
A friend told me this beautiful story. The Nitobi Memorial Garden in Vancouver is one of the most authentic Japanese Gardens in this hemesphere. There are the expected bridges and paths and way stations of vistas and water features. But my friend told me that there is a fairly smooth path that eventually forks into two. On one side the path stretches ahead smooth, not curving not hilly. The other fork takes you up a rugged path that is quite hard to traverse. The two meet again, up the way, however, and anyone who chose to take the rugged path, or whose life forced them to is again on the smooth path after some time.
Prayer: Please give Alexa a smooth path after some ruggedness. And for you my friends and community I pray for your smooth path again after some ruggedness. I may not know what you are going through but my prayer is for a smooth route at the joining of the two paths over that hill. Blessed be.