A Sort of Christmas Story
Author: Bill Roberts
We were planning to head East, to
hometown D.C., to see friends, then
onward to Ocean City to stay with
Brother Jim and Laurie in their high-
rise, the fourteenth floor at the beach.
The latter sort of reminds me of all
those old folks forsaking their even
higher-rises in frigid New York City,
moving down to Miami Beach to
sequester themselves on the forty-ninth
floor, excellent view of sand and water.
But I got a call from kid sister in Mesa,
Arizona, saying she was ill – stage-four
ovarian cancer, she sounding like
maybe this was the closing act of her
slow-but-steady drama through life.
Once a kid sister, always the kid.
So, plans shifted and we were there
with her gigantic Mormon family night
before hysterectomy-plus, the plus
the great unknown, to be determined.
After a big Mexican take-out meal
hosted by eldest daughter, my sis just
observing, no intake of jalapeno flavors,
two sons, a son-in-law and husband
performed a “blessing,” perhaps a
secret Mormon ritual that wife and I
were allowed to witness, the four men
stationed north, east, south and west
of kid sis, all hands on her head as
they alternately prayed for deliverance.
Moving doesn’t do the blessing justice,
its simplicity and honesty so electric.
Next afternoon, the operation was
performed with a DaVinci robot,
through belly button and two sets of
holes either side, with a wash of belly
cavity to secure biopsy fluids and tissue.
Sis was home again within 24 hours,
feeling better than she did after any of
five rambunctious children – even hungry.
Her CA-125 blood indicator for cancer
started off the chart at 1,675, plummeted to
14 after the third chemotherapy, within
normal range and quite unprecedented.
Biopsy results a few days later showed no
further evidence of Big C or its spread.
A miracle in early December, just weeks
before Christmas, the news a blessing.
I don’t know if Mormons have special
powers, other than the magnificence of
family magnetism and beauty, but I,
semi-heathen that I am, have to admit
this Christmas is special, a gift, something
one might read in the Bible or whatever
it was you were made to study religiously
in your youth, probably foreseeing the day
you’d be free to follow your own path.
I will look for a star in the West – not East -
this Christmas, won’t be surprised when
I don’t find it because it showed up early.
Note: The poem says it all, can’t add very much. If miracles happen, sister Bee’s experience surely is one of them. With great joy, Irene and I wish all of our family and friends peace, joy and good health to close out the year and throughout the new year, 2010.
