Cancer girls don’t get out much; something about energy levels, radiation side effects and Gus, the Asshole Feeding Tube. Yup, he’s still around. I think he likes my ability to eat bird size quantities of food so he can hang round and hear all the gossip.
Yesterday it’s pedicures for River Rafter Girl and myself. She’s been around forever and was one of the posse in Colorado when The Norwegian died. People who share a death experience are kind of attached. She stayed overnight after one of my surgeries. She keeps an eagle eye out for my chickens. A sweeter friend would be hard to find.
Every time we meet we go deep. Pedis gives us another opportunity. Something about foot and leg massage with hot stones opens the mind to all sorts of examination. Perhaps it’s the reflexology.
Or, perhaps, it was that both us so needed someone to rub our feet that our mouths ran away with us. My toes are half painted claws of a wild animal and River Rafter girl refers to hers as “fingoes.” Let’s just say both of us are guilty of foot maintenance lack.
River Rafter Girl is a student of the world; wise and deep. Today we examine change that comes through tragedy and difficulty. I tell her about wacky cancer dreams and messages and she shares with me her journey. Seems the girl I think is amongst the kindest in the world is beating herself up for being judgmental and not always kind. Whaaa?
I remind her that we are not generally responsible for what we think if it doesn’t come out our mouths to actually hurt someone. When we compare notes we find that we do, indeed, have some pretty nasty thoughts deep inside.
Like when someone hurts you and then you hear something great happened to them and their family. Instead of thinking, “Oh, good for them.” We think, “Oh, perhaps now they’ll stop being such an ass to me.” After all, it is all about us, we joke.
Which leads to others hurting our children. The mama bear claws are fierce. Seems we are not alone in wishing others less than stellar outcomes when their children have hurt ours. I rarely back down from this one. Hurt my chickens and I have nothing to say to you ever. I’m known to walk by you like we’ve never met. Always the mature road for this girl.
But since cancer has taken over and there’s more than a little time to think things through, I ponder, “Isn’t it better to just eliminate these people from our lives?” Life is so short—do we really need to mend fences of people who are ugly and wish us less than everything?
Instead, why not surround ourselves with people who reflect back the love we put forth, the kindness that friendship is based upon and who have the same foot care habits as ours? No judgment here.
The Duchess Diaries 