gratitude

i am back to the office after 24 hrs of a sudden onset of food poisoning. (i think)

you know, it's being sick like that- the kind of sick where your skin hurts and you've purged everything in your system and you can do nothing but rock back and forth and hope that it will be over with soon-that reminds one to be grateful for their continued health.

many times yesterday, as i was writhing in pain and hunched over my toilet, my mind would turn to those poor souls undergoing chemotherapy and i would remind myself to stop complaining because this too shall pass.

but i also realized something else. those folks who fight with everything they've got for their lives are better people than i am. frankly, i don't know if i could survive cancer. i don't know if i could put up the fight necessary. it seems like it would a lot easier to just lay down and die.

i am in no way suggesting that my little 24hrs of food poisoning is anything like the suffering of those with cancer.

and that is precisely my point.

i knew my sickness was temporary. i knew that i was experiencing only a fraction of someone else's pain and i knew that tomorrow, i will be back to normal and it was still almost more than i could take. if i knew that i was going to undergo that for months at a time...i might have just quit. which doesn't seem fair to my family but damn...

how people survive it is a mystery to me and one that i shall not take for granted.

god be with my brothers and sisters who at this time are fighting for their lives in one of the most horrible ways possible.

it's you, dear friends, that remind me to be grateful for the day ahead of me.